5 Special Pleading Fallacy

#atheism #atheist #skepticism #skeptic

In this video I discuss the Special Pleading Fallacy, and what it is. I also take a look at a couple of examples. One example showing where atheists and sceptics often misapply it during debates and discussions on-line. As well as an example of where many atheists and sceptics commit the special pleading fallacy.

Refs

[swiftkillt]

In my experience the special pleading for the Kalam comes from the discussions of it's premises, namely the second one.

When confronted on this point with a fairly simple "The universe could just be eternal" the person in favor of the Kalam has to come up with a reason that's not possible. However by doing so they shoot themselves in the foot, because they want their god to be eternal, so when the logic they use to show that the universe can't be eternal is turned back on them in the form of "But doesn't that apply to your god" they cry out in pain and plead that their god is special.

Basically, replace "universe" with "god" in the argument. It works just as well, so trying to use it to argue for one and not the other is special pleading. It's just wrapped up in pseudo intellectual jargon. Not as bad as the Ontological argument at least.

[eklektikTubb]

The way i see it, Special Pleading comes when theists reject both alternative possibilities and defend it by lack of knowledge, saying something like: "Universe MUST have been created because why not (?!) and God COULD NOT be created because how could he?!"
As you see, that argument is a typical double standard. Besides, saying "Because why not?!" is also Argument From Ignorance fallacy (lack of knowledge is not the knowledge/evidence of the contrary).

[macmac]

Its specials pleading because the general principal you are using is everything that exists has a cause, then you throw that out the window with 0 justification and say god does not have a cause even though you just said everything does. Adding in the begins to exist is pointless as the original argument is everything that exists. Putting begins there is only so you have a backdoor for god who you claim to be eternal but it really does nothing other then that. And now I am going to ask some simple moral questions.

People of all kinds please state if your christian or muslim, atheists, agnostics or any combination of those and then if willing participate in the test. As well, looking for 5 good moral theist questions for atheists/agnostics.

#1 You see a child drowning in a shallow pool and notice a person just watching that is able to save the child with no risk to themselves but is not, is that persons non action moral?
#2 If you go to save the child, the man tells you to stop as he was told it was for the greater good, but he does not know what that is, do you continue to save the child?
#3 Is it an act of justice to punish innocent people for the crimes of others?
#4 If you were able to stop it and knew a person was about to grape a child would you stop it?
#5 Would you consider a parent who put their kids in a room with a poison fruit and told the kids not to eat it but then also put the best con artist in the room with the children knowing the con artist will get the kids to eat the fruit and the parent does nothing to stop it a good parent?

[petercollins]

This version of the Kalam contains no special pleading; that is patently true. But this is not the version that theists - all that I know if - use. They repeat this argument and then say "So god must have created the universe." Without that, this argument is, even if true (and likely it is not) trivial to the point of banality. Most atheists are responding to the 'god dun it, and god wasn't created because reasons' that theists call the Kalam. And that is, of course, a patent and loud example of special pleading, as well as several other failures.

[ilonachan]

The way you present it, the Kalam indeed does not have any special pleading in it. It is however still not valid, because premise 1 is not demonstrated. "Whatever begins to exist has a cause"? No, actually. Quantum particle pairs appear out of nowhere all the time, without any reason! So there's no reason to assume that this rule holds even WITHIN our universe, let alone outside.

That said, the way the argument is usually applied, and in context, it ABSOLUTELY is special pleading. Because you're not just saying "the universe was caused", but "the universe had a causER", namely your particular god. Then, what caused that god? If it began it must have had a cause, right? Oh wait, God could just have not had a beginning. the universe still had to have one, because reasons. Your God just happens to be the particular special thing that terminates this infinite regress, because he's just such a special boy.

Your example for "atheist" special pleading is interesting, because it has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with anything related to religion. if anyone goes to the dictionary to read you a definition smugly and confidently as if that's a defeater, that person is an idiot, but none of this relates to religion in any way. I don't believe that the dictionary DEFINES what words mean, it DESCRIBES the way words are used. And definitions aren't perfect, nor are they ground truths that one must adhere to: in the end it's usually better to not just pick a label, because they mean different things to different people: expand on your specific views instead, so you're on the same page, then argue the substance. That's ALWAYS a more fruitful conversation.

I'd quickly like to note why this "definition pedantry" thing is certainly not an "atheist" thing: do you think trans women are women? because a lot of people don't (many of them on the religious Right), and a lot of people like to quote the dictionary definition of "adult human female" as counter-evidence. Which is nonsense by itself, but alright. But what now if I open up a contemporary dictionary, and one of the definitions of "woman" is "a trans woman"? do those people accept then that trans women are women by definition? A lot of them wouldn't, because they'll claim that dictionary has been "corrupted by the liberal woke agenda". So.... one definition is correct, because they say so, but the other definition is incorrect because cultural marxism or sth? sounds like special pleading to me. (By the way, the argument that trans women are women is NOT from the dictionary definition, it's more fundamental; The world just agrees with us now, which is cool)