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Comment by greyish_water | Hacker News Reader

Repeaters of that quote invariably neglect to mention that those are the words of a fictional character that lived to be at least two thousand years old.

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There are plenty of fictional characters whose remarks are both widely quoted and found to be enlightening and/or inspirational to many.

Several are currently running for President.

It's an interesting and eloquent statement, and worth thinking about. There's no need to resort to ad-hominem attacks against whoever said it, no matter how fictional they might be.

I don't think you can call that an ad hominem attack. For one, he's not talking about the actual author of the quote (the writer), and for two... well, it's just not an attack at all.

I find it very relevant that a person who does all these things is a (fictional) character that lives for thousands of years; that means he has plenty of time to learn a lot about many different fields and trades. Normal humans don't have this luxury.

I've lived roughly half a normal lifespan and have accomplished most of that list myself. No need to live for thousands of years.

Methinks you've missed the point.

Sure I can. The argument was challenging the merits of the statement based on some quality of the entity that made the statement, not based on the statement itself. It's the very definition of "ad hominem".

You can argue that the sentiment expressed by the fictional character is impractical, as you do in the last part of your comment. I disagree with you, but that's neither here nor there.

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