RE: [compost_tea] BEHAVIOR

From: Tom Jaszewski <tom_at_livesoil.com>
Date: Fri, 31 Dec 2004 07:04:56 -0800

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Tim Kiphart [mailto:kiphart_at_ev1.net]
Sent: Thursday, December 30, 2004 5:00 PM
To: compost_tea_at_yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [compost_tea] BEHAVIOR

 

...it worked for the Nazis.

 

Tim

 

[Tom Jaszewski] Godwin's law (also Godwin's rule of Nazi analogies) is an
adage <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adage> in Internet
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_culture> culture that was originate=
d
by Mike Godwin <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Godwin> in 1990
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1990> . The law states that:

As an online discussion grows longer, the probability
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probability> of a comparison involving Nazis
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Socialist_German_Workers_Party> or
Hitler <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler> approaches one.

There is a tradition in many Usenet <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet>
newsgroups <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newsgroup> that once such a
comparison is made, the thread <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thread> is
over, and whoever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever
argument was in progress. In addition, whoever points out that Godwin's law
applies to the thread is also considered to have "lost" the battle, as it i=
s
considered poor form to invoke the law explicitly. Godwin's law thus
practically guarantees the existence of an upper bound on thread length in
those groups. Many people understand Godwin's law to mean this, although (a=
s
is clear from the statement of the law above) this is not the original
formulation.

Nevertheless, there is also a widely-recognized codicil
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codicil> that any intentional invocation of
Godwin's law for its thread-ending effects will be unsuccessful. See
"Quirk's exception" below.


Origin


Godwin's law is named after Mike Godwin
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Godwin> , who was legal counsel for the
Electronic Frontier Foundation
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Frontier_Foundation> in the early
1990s <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1990s> , when the law was first
popularized. Richard Sexton maintains that the law is a formalization of hi=
s
October 16 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_16> , 1989
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989> post [1]
<http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=21000%40gryphon.COM&output=gplain=
>
(http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=21000%40gryphon.COM&amp;output=gp=
lain)

You can tell when a USENET discussion is getting old when one of the
participents (sic <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases#S> )
drags out Hitler and the Nazis.

Strictly speaking, however, this is not so, since the actual text of
Godwin's law does not state that such a reference or comparison makes a
discussion "old," or, for that matter, that such a reference or comparison
means that a discussion is over.

Finding the meme <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme> of Nazi comparisons o=
n
Usenet illogical and offensive, Godwin established the law as a
counter-meme. The law's memetic function is not to end discussions (or even
to classify them as "old"), but to make participants in a discussion more
aware of whether a comparison to Nazis or Hitler is appropriate, or is
simply a rhetorical overreach.

Many people have extended Godwin's law to imply that the invoking of the
Nazis as a debating tactic (in any argument not directly related to World
War II <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II> or the Holocaust
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust> ) automatically loses the argument=
,
simply because the nature of these events is such that any comparison to an=
y
event less serious than genocide <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide> o=
r
extinction <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction> is invalid and in poo=
r
taste.

[edit
<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Godwin%27s_law&action=edit&s=
ectio
n=2> ]


Objections and counter-arguments


One common objection to Godwin's law is that sometimes using Hitler or the
Nazis is a perfectly apt way of making a point. For instance, if one is
debating the relative merits of a particular leader, and someone says
something like, "He's a good leader, look at the way he's improved the
economy", one could reply, "Just because he improved the economy doesn't
make him a good leader. Even Hitler improved the economy." Some would view
this as a perfectly acceptable comparison. One uses Hitler because he is a
universally known leader and the example requires no explanation. Pretty
much everyone would know exactly what you were talking about in the above
example.

Some would argue, however, that Godwin's law applies even to the situation
mentioned above, as it portrays an inevitable appeal to emotions as well as
holding an implied ad hominem <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem>
attack on the subject being compared to, which are classic logical
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_fallacies> fallacies. Hitler, on a
semiotic <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semiotics> level, has far too many
negative connotations associated with him to be used as a good comparison t=
o
anything except for other despotic dictators. Thus, Godwin's law holds even
in making comparisons to normal leaders that, on the surface, would seem to
be a reasonable comparison.

Godwin's standard answer to this objection is to note that Godwin's law doe=
s
not dispute whether, in a particular instance, a reference or comparison to
Hitler or the Nazis might be apt. It is precisely because such a reference
or comparison may sometimes be appropriate, Godwin has argued, that
hyperbolic overuse of the Hitler/Nazi comparison should be avoided. Avoidin=
g
such hyperbole, he argues, is a way of ensuring that when valid comparisons
to Hitler or Nazis are made, such comparisons have the appropriate semantic
impact.

 








Received on Fri Dec 31 2004 - 11:03:26 EST

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