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Philosophy: Logic Start‑class Mid‑importance

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Prevalence in WP:RS sources that Arguments from silence involve risk and hazard

I think in view of the discussions, I should just go ahead and cite policies and guidelines. In Misplaced Pages articles, weight is assigned to a specific scholarly view as the "majority view" and "minority view" by using the WP:Due policy. This was summarized by Jimmy Wales as follows:

• If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;
• If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;

The WP:Due policy thus states:

"in determining proper weight, we consider a viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Misplaced Pages editors or the general public."

So to determine the "majority view", we "consider prevalence in reliable sources" and not "prevalence among Misplaced Pages editors". So it does not matter if HumanPublic, Minorview or 12 other people Wiki-editors assume that scholarly opinion is divided 50/50 on this issue and they need equal weight. That matters not. The determination is made via "prevalence in reliable sources". Is there such a prevalence - I hold that there is not, and I have provided sources in the article to that effect. Am I right? Try to prove I am not by showing prevalence in reliable sources for a 50/50 split, or a source that says "most scholars hold that arguments from silence include no hazards". Just show me source, not source free statements on talk pages. Have I "cherry picked" sources? If so, show it not just hypothesize it, imagine it and then state it; do not just state it without a basis in WP:RS prevalence sourcing.

Now, do we need a source that says "most scholars hold that arguments from silence involve hazards"? Only if we are going to say "most scholars hold that arguments from silence involve hazards". That is where the WP:RS/AC guideline comes in. That is not part of the WP:Due policy, but part of the "Identifying reliable sources" guideline. It states: "The statement that all or most scientists or scholars hold a certain view requires reliable sourcing that directly says that all or most scientists or scholars hold that view."

So here is how it works:

• To assign "weight within the article" and a corresponding amount of real estate, per WP:Due the majority and minority views are determined via the consideration of "prevalence in reliable sources" - here the number of Wiki-editors supporting a view means zero. What matters is prevalence in reliable sources.

• To be able to say "most scholars believe X" WP:RS/AC is used and a source that directly states "most scholars believe X" is needed.

Now, is there a 50/50 prevalence in reliable sources regarding the hazards of arguments from silence? I am categorically stating that not to be the case, and that the prevalence in reliable sources is that they involve hazards, risks and dangers. And I can even provide further references that indicate the prevalence towards the existence of hazards. Note that per WP:Due I do not need a statement that states the prevalence; but we need to make an assessment of the prevalence by providing reliable sources on either side of the issue. Are there many more sources on the other side of the issue? I hold that there are not. Let me say that again: I hold that there are not. If there are, let us see them. Let us see the sources. In Misplaced Pages, sources rule. This is a straightforward application of policy to determine weight via the determination of the majority and minority views. Policy is clear on this. History2007 (talk) 10:29, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

I don't follow your logic, and don't know what you mean by 50/50 split. To my knowledge, nobody has ever claimed that any type of historical argument is without hazard, certainly not this one. You're proceeeding as if the question is whether AFS proves anything, and then you point out that most sources say it doesn't prove anything. That's a strawman. Given your dishonesty about the Duncan source (above), and the dictionary of foreign terms, I see no reason to swallow whole your statements about a prevalence of sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Humanpublic (talk • contribs) 23:14, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

By 50/50 split I meant an equal prevalence of sources that consider arguments from silence as involving hazards, and those which do not. Also you must, must, must stop these baseless statements about honesty/dishonesty of other editors. You must stop this. As usual you are long on accusations, short on sources. There has been no misrepresentation by me, and I have read all sources I have used. None. Now stop it. History2007 (talk) 23:39, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes, and that is a strawman, because all historical arguments involve hazards. Nobody has ever said that the AFS proves anything. Of courzse there are hazards. The quotes you are adding are heavily slanted toward saying it is "invalid" and a fallacy. That is quite different from surveying its strengths and weaknesses. You are misrepresenting sources and misrepresenting the discourse. Now you stop it. Humanpublic (talk) 23:49, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Just a note here that user:Humanpublic was topic banned and then indefinitely blocked from Misplaced Pages. History2007 (talk) 21:14, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

No, that is not the case. And you are arguing from first principles here again. You are again short on sources, long on opinion. History2007 (talk) 23:52, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Anyway, I do not want it to go without a response that no one says "any type of historical argument is without hazard". That is a meaningless argument here given that one could say "all air travel has risk". Of course there are risks in air travel, but the risks associated with hang-gliding are different from those of traveling in a jumbo jet. There are also risks for car travel, and I think traveling by a commercial flight is even safer than driving on freeways, etc. So there are different levels of risk and the whole point about the scholarly statements here is that arguments from silence are in the more hazardous category. So a statement that the hazards of hang-gliding are just part of the hazards of air travel is just meaningless. And the scholarly allergy towards arguments from silence is well reflected in the ongoing warnings about them by multiple scholars, as reflected in the article, and others, e.g. that more recent documents can invalidate them, e.g. the shipping documents from the time of Xerxes which changed the previous picture derived from road documents, Sidon, etc.. I will add that anyway, because it is an issue not even mentioned yet. History2007 (talk) 13:37, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

I also added a section on author's interest now, and included Barnes' analysis. With all these other examples, I can not see why a single reference to Christianity can not appear in the article. There are plenty of other examples anyway. And I do not see any reason for the POV tag, now that there are diverse examples. History2007 (talk) 04:19, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree. An example or two from Christian exegesis or Biblical scholarship would be highly useful, and would not violate either WP:NPOV or WP:UNDUE. Bearian (talk) 20:24, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, that is what I think too. And Jeppiz, removed the tag already. There are, however, other interesting issues as well:

• Sometimes the work of one author may be used in an arg from silence convincingly, e.g. Cicero on Cato; and sometimes not, e.g. Cicero on Caelius. That is not in the article yet, but I will add it now.

• Sometimes the information may be scarce because it was deliberately not revealed, e.g. Christians deliberately keeping to themselves in Rome in the many cases.

There are a couple of other examples that can be added (say Henry XVIII theater programs, etc.), and I have added those now - and there may even be more... History2007 (talk) 21:14, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Cicero?

"An example of a convincing application is the silence of Cicero on works of oratory by Cato". No argument is given here. The silence of Cicero is suggested to imply some argument, but what argument is implied is never stated. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 21:34, 26 May 2022 (UTC)

That's due to this edit by VanishedUserABC. Page 153 of the cited work, Bloomer's The School of Rome, is happily available via Google books -- "Astin further noted that Cicero never refers to a work on oratory by Cato. This argument from silence is especially convincing because Cato was such an authority, a figure to be cited if one could." Peter Gulutzan (talk) 14:34, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

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