Talk:Appeal to flattery

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Latest comment: 14 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion

"Surely a man as smart as you can see this is a brilliant proposal." (so, if you don't, it means you are stupid)

"I needed a beautiful woman to endorse my product, so naturally I thought of you." (so, if you don't accept, it means you're ugly)

Perhaps this isn't worded correctly, or maybe I'm not reading it right, but I don't see how the conclusions in brackets can be deduced from what is said prior to them? Their conclusions are verly loosely implied, maybe, but that's not what the lines in parenthesis are saying.

--Terpoma 13:49, 7 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

I would definitely question the conclusion from the second example. All I see it implying is that the subject is considered beautiful. I believe the writer of these particular comments is confusing this with the Ad_hominem fallacies. Both fallacies could still be present in one statement, but this should instead reference the possible combination.

-- Sasuke Sarutobi 20:43, 12 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

I agree with you, the conclusion is flawed, rejecting the offer doesn't imply rejection of being beautiful. It is an appeal to flattery, of course. It resembles the first example, but is quite different. "Surely a man as smart as you can see this is a brilliant proposal." is another way of saying "smart people think this is brilliant", which does imply that people who don't think it is brilliant aren't smart. The difference is that people might well be mistaken in their assessment of someone's intelligence, and might reassess that person's intelligence, but they aren't likely to misjudge how attractive someone is. People won't judge someone's appearance by what they endorse, they will judge their appearance by what they see. There are many implications that endorsing a product makes, appearance isn't one of them.--RLent (talk) 16:39, 4 June 2010 (UTC)Reply

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