Hacker News Reader

Comment by respondo2134 | Hacker News Reader

Reductio ad Absurdum may be what you're thinking of, but Straw Man might also apply. Funny enough the responder didn't actually do what you said. They stated of the 600+ dependencies they counted there was only one they felt comfortable implementing themselves. Your accusation of them taking your statement to the extreme is reverse straw man rhetoric; you're misrepresenting their argument as extreme or absurd when it’s actually not.

View on HN

Reductio ad Absurdum is not a fallacy but a legitimate rhetorical technique where you can point out obvious flaws in logic by taking that logic and applying it to something that people would find ridiculous. Note that this is not the most 'extreme' version, it is the same version, using the same logic.

Example:

Argument: People should be able to build whatever they want on their own property.

Reductio ad Absurdum position: I propose to build the world's largest Jenga tower next to your house.

Note that this does not take into account any counter arguments such as 'if it falls on me you will still be liable for negligence', but it makes a point without violating the logic of the original argument. To violate that logic would indeed be a straw man.

Just wanted to comment that chatgpt also wrongly categorizes this as reductio ad absurdum and strawman.

This is very dead internet theory, but not automated, someone copied my comment, gave it to chatgpt, and returned the chatgpt answer, presumably passing it off as their own, but in effect we are talking with chatgpt lol.

It wouldn't be that annoying if it weren't wrong, I guess.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com