Talk:argumentum ad hominem

RFV discussion: April–November 2016

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argumentum ad hominem

Previously rfc not rfv with the same summary. I've looked through the first 50 Google Book hits. This does not seem to be Latin. By which I mean not used in Latin with this meaning (or indeed any meaning). It seems to be used in English and French with this meaning. Obviously it is coined based on Latin, a bit like biology coined based on Ancient Greek, but not Ancient Greek (no Ancient Greek entry at biology). Renard Migrant (talk) 20:59, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Looking at books published before 1771 found quite a few in Latin using the exact phrase. I therefore didn't look as those involving other forms of argumentum. I don't know in what vintage of Latin earlier than New Latin this might have occurred. DCDuring TALK 22:09, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Even if it was used in Latin, wouldn't it be a sum of parts of argumentum, ad and homo, roughly "argument at or to human"? -Ikiaika (talk) 20:50, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

As a Latin entry it could still be SOP. But maybe the first editor incorrectly added an English phrase or noun derived from Latin as a Latin noun anyway (August 2008‎) -- to which then another editor added an English example (February 2013‎), but to which a bot added the Latin pronunciation (Kennybot, 17 April 2014‎).
As an English noun it is attestable and one can find the English plurals argumenta ad hominem and sometimes argumentums ad hominem.
As it originally was an RFC request and as it has an English example, I changed the entry from a Latin one into an English entry, that is I cleaned it up.
A Latin section whith Latin examples, labels (New Latin?) etc. could still be added -- and then one could have a RFV process or a RFD dicussion (SOP?) for the Latin term if there are doubts. -Ikiaika (talk) 05:43, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

• This has been changed from a Latin entry to an English entry, so it seems to be resolved. —Granger (talk · contribs) 21:45, 17 November 2016 (UTC)

RFC discussion: April 2016–June 2018

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup (permalink).

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argumentum ad hominem

Tagged by an IP, not listed. Equinox ◑ 23:51, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

It could be RFV as the user is claiming it's not used in Latin (not as an idiom, anyway) but rather it's used in English, obviously a coinage based on Latin if that is indeed the case. Renard Migrant (talk) 18:45, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

That doesn't make it English though. I've seen the same term used in Portuguese, German, French and Dutch texts, and I think readers are aware of the fact that this is a Latin coinage. So labelling it as English seems a bit silly and it would also require the lemma to be duplicated for pretty much every European language and even some non-European ones. And it also assumes there is no such thing as modern Latin. For what it's worth, the Latin wiki article on the topic uses this same phrase.

(And I may have found a New Latin (1708) attestation: https://books.google.nl/books?id=He9eAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA42#v=onepage&q=%22argumentum%20ad%20hominem%22 But be careful: the context may influence the meaning and I haven't read the surrounding text.) — This unsigned comment was added by 80.114.147.138 (talk) at 13:54, April 8, 2016.

I've found a text (https://books.google.nl/books?id=ZdaP5IehqFsC&pg=PA398#v=onepage&q="argumentum ad hominem") saying that around 500 AD the term was used in a different sense, namely an argument that tries to convince someone by reasoning from his own (possibly mistaken) assumptions. The example quoted is that if the other person beliefs all useful things to be good, you can convince him that something is good if you can prove its utility. (In that sense the modern use could be considered a narrower sense, since it follows the same general form: if your audience beliefs that cat people make for unreliable witnesses, you can convince your audience that someone is an unreliable witness by showing him to be a cat person. Note however that originally ‘homo’ referred to the person to be convinced or the audience and not necessarily to the person to be attacked.) — This unsigned comment was added by 80.114.147.138 (talk) at 08:55, April 10, 2016.

Thanks. I'd noticed that the older usage was as you say. Century 1911 had that older concept at the core of their definition, but referred to medieval logicians who, extending a point of Aristotle's, said ad hominem arguments were of two kinds: one against a person's positions, the other against his person as "by taunting, rayling, rendring checke for checke, or by scorning." (Thomas Blundeville c. 1575). This isn't quite the modern meaning which includes smear campaigns, IMO. DCDuring TALK 15:06, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Blundeville said: ‘Confutation of person is done either by taunting, rayling, rendring checke for checke, or by scorning.’ So according to him, refutation of person means to either ridicule someone or show contempt for him. Both those meanings fall squarely into the modern category of ad hominem. (As such I'm a bit puzzled by the use of ‘thus’ in the C1911, but maybe the editor meant what I meant by ‘narrower sense’ above.)

The quotation of Wilson immediately afterwards though seems to draw the distinction between the Aristotelian straight solution and the solution tailored to the man, which is the old sense again. Or so at least it seems to me. And I think the same applies to the quote of More.

I think I may have found some more quotes from Latin texts around 1700 (give or take a century) but vetting them would take a lot of time. So I don't know if these texts use the old or new definition. Still, by now I think it somewhat probable that this phrase was indeed somewhat commonly used in Latin texts, at least newer ones.

An other interesting thing is that the old-style ad hominem can also be used to argue not from someone's actual assumptions, but from things he must assert for some other reason. — This comment was unsigned.

The modern definitions, from A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms 2nd ed, (1991):

"#Abuse of your opponent's character.

"#Basing your argument on what you know of your opponent's character."

But, perhaps more significantly for this page, per COCA, ad hominem is currently used with attack much more than with argument or argumentum. Even when used with argument or argumentum it retains the same sense of attacking the source of an argument rather than its substance (ad rem). I can find no trace in current use of the historical sense, which seemed to be standard even in the 19th century. There was, however, in the 19th century much use of the term in reference to what we now call flip-flopping, which seems to have become an attack on the sincerity of the flip-flopper, not just an observation of logical inconsistency. DCDuring TALK 17:05, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

The only general dictionary that includes it is Collins, as follows:

1. fallacious argument that attacks not an opponent's beliefs but his motives or character
2. argument that shows an opponent's statement to be inconsistent with his other beliefs
3. an instance of either

The general classical sense is not mentioned, nor does it appear in ad hominem on Wikipedia.Wikipedia . DCDuring TALK 21:21, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

• Struck out. Has been through RFV and survived, with cleaning performed in the process. Well done, everyone. --Harmonicaplayer (talk) 11:49, 13 June 2018 (UTC)