Hacker News Reader

Comment by fdschoeneman | Hacker News Reader

"You can't speculate that a specific tree was felled with an axe rather than a chainsaw when you weren't in the woods to see it happen."

-- on the contrary, I'm pretty sure a rational person could speculate that a specific tree was felled by an axe vs a chainsaw depending on what she knows about loggers in a given area from a given culture and during a given time period. It's a question of probability. It's normal and rational and fair to discuss probabilities when speculating. It's unclear that you understand the terms you are using though so I'm gonna peace out and wish you luck.

View on HN

> I'm pretty sure a rational person could speculate that a specific tree was felled by an axe vs a chainsaw depending on what she knows about loggers in a given area from a given culture and during a given time period. It's a question of probability. It's normal and rational and fair to discuss probabilities when speculating.

Given that you know nothing about the hiring practices of the OP's company, it's safe to say that you know nothing about the woods in this analogy either ha.

> It's unclear that you understand the terms you are using though so I'm gonna peace out and wish you luck.

I understand very well. You made an analogy, and I made a more apt one. But when in doubt, resort to ad hominem.

Ad hominem? I don't know if you know this, though you probably don't, but 'ad hominem' is a category of logical fallacy, committed when one argues that one's opponent's argument is wrong because he is, por ejemplo, an asshole or a pedophile or a loser or a dildo. At no point have I argued that your position is logically incorrect because you are an asshole. I've only ever argued that you are incorrect because your logic is dumb.

Move along.

Implying that I’m disqualified from the conversation because I “don’t understand the terms” that I’m using is ad-hominem. It’s being dismissive of the argument because of something you believe to be inherent in me, rather than the subject of the argument.

I think you should learn the usage of terms rather run than me, lol.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com