牛津逻辑推理入门 - 6.论证评估.二.

视频全文转录（中英双语）

以下为完整中英双语转录，已加标点。英文在前，中文在后，逐段对照。

由 Groq Whisper 转录 → M3 B 方案整文标点 + 分段 → M3 段号保留翻译 → 逐段对照。

[段 1]

Okay, here we are at week six, the very last week of our course, and this week we’re going to have a bit of a romp. We’re going to start looking at fallacies. Fallacies are bad arguments that look like good arguments and can easily be confused for them. Okay, let’s get started. Just a recap on last week as always. If you remember, we looked at what makes a deductive argument sound, and we looked at what makes such an argument valid. So just a quick reminder for you. Would the argument be sound in this situation, where it’s valid but it has false premises? Put your hand up if you think that’s sound. So it’s a valid argument but false premises. What about if it’s an invalid argument with false premises? No. What if it’s an invalid argument with true premises? And a valid argument with true premises. Okay, good. Well done. Yep, it’s only sound if it’s a valid argument and it has true premises. All its premises must be true and it’s valid. Well done. Okay, now here’s the tricky one. Okay, the question is, could the argument be valid when it’s got false premises and a false conclusion? It could be valid. Well done. Could it be invalid? Well done. Good. Okay, what if it has false positives?Well done. Good. Okay, what if it has false premises and a true conclusion?

[译文 1]

好的,我们来到了第六周,也是本课程的最后一个星期,这一周我们要轻松一下。我们将开始学习谬误。谬误是看起来像好论证的坏论证,而且很容易被混淆。好,我们开始吧。像往常一样,先回顾一下上周的内容。如果你还记得的话,我们研究了什么使一个演绎论证可靠(sound),以及什么使一个演绎论证有效(valid)。所以给你一个快速提醒。在这种情况下,这个论证有效但前提为假,它可靠吗?认为可靠的同学请举手。它是一个有效的论证,但前提是假的。如果是一个无效的论证且前提为假呢?不是。如果是一个无效的论证但前提为真呢?以及一个有效的论证且前提为真呢?好的,很好。做得好。是的,只有当一个论证既是有效的且所有前提都为真时,它才是可靠的。所有的前提必须为真,而且它是有效的。做得好。好的,现在是一个棘手的问题。问题是,当一个论证前提为假且结论为假时,它可能是有效的吗?它可能是有效的。做得好。它可能是无效的吗?做得好。好的。如果它有假阳性呢?做得好。好的。如果它前提为假且结论为真呢?

[段 2]

Could it be valid? Put your hand up this time. Could it be valid if it has false premises and a true conclusion? Could it be valid? okay those of you without your hands up is that because you don’t know right okay um what about if it’s got true premises and a true conclusion could it be valid then okay could it be invalid then oh yes it could okay there’s only one situation in which it couldn’t be valid only one situation which it couldn’t be valid, and that’s this one. If it’s got true premises and a false conclusion, it couldn’t be valid. Otherwise, it could be. It could be either valid or invalid. And the reason for that is because an argument is valid if and only if there’s no possible situation in which all the premises are true and its conclusion false. so it’s a sufficient condition for an argument being valid that there’s no possible situation in which its premises are true and conclusion false and that’s a necessary condition too and if you remember I said to you last week there are two things you’ve got to remember one is that it’s the possibility not the actuality of the combination of true premises and false conclusion that’s important and the other is it’s the combination of true premises and false conclusion that’s important.

[译文 2]

它可能是有效的吗?这次请举手。如果一个论证前提为假且结论为真,它可能是有效的吗?它可能是有效的吗?好的,那些没举手的人,是因为不知道,对吗?好的,如果前提为真且结论为真,它可能有效吗?好的,它可能无效吗?哦,是的,它可能无效。好的,只有一种情况下它不可能有效——只有一种情况下它不可能有效,就是这种情况。如果前提为真而结论为假,它就不可能有效。除此之外,它都是可能的。它可能有效,也可能无效。原因是:一个论证是有效的,当且仅当不存在所有前提为真而结论为假的情况。所以,一个论证是有效的充分条件是:不存在前提为真而结论为假的情况,这也是一个必要条件。如果你记得的话,我上周对你们说过有两点必须记住,一点是重要的是前提为真且结论为假的组合的可能性而非现实性,另一点是重要的是前提为真且结论为假这一组合本身。

[段 3]

Okay I gave you another test so if that was one test of validity and the other test I gave you is that an argument is valid if and only if it’s counter example set is consistent and the counter example set is the set consisting of the premises plus the negation of the conclusion so if you have if it’s Friday Marianne’s wearing jeans it is Friday therefore Marianne’s wearing jeans that’s an argument an argument if you take the conclusion Marianne’s wearing jeans and negate it so you’ve got it’s not the case that Marianne’s wearing jeans the counter example set then becomes if it’s Friday Marianne’s wearing jeans Marianne is wearing jeans, it’s not the case, it’s, I’ve forgotten what the premise and conclusion was. If it’s Friday, Marianne is wearing jeans, it is Friday, it’s not the case that Marianne’s wearing jeans, that’s the counter example set. Now, listen again, is that consistent? Could all these sentences be true together? If it’s Friday, Marianne’s wearing jeans, it is Friday, it’s not the case that Marianne’s wearing jeans. Could those be true together? They couldn’t, could they? And that shows that the original argument is valid. It shows there is no possible situation where the premises are true and the conclusion is false because the set consisting of the premises and the negation of the conclusion is inconsistent.

[译文 3]

好的,我给了你另一个测试,所以如果那是一个有效性的测试,另一个我给你的测试是:一个论证是有效的,当且仅当它的反例集是一致的;反例集是由前提加上结论的否定构成的集合。所以如果你有——如果是星期五,Marianne 就穿牛仔裤,今天是星期五,所以 Marianne 穿牛仔裤,那是一个论证,一个论证。如果你把结论"Marianne 穿牛仔裤"取否定,就得到"Marianne 没有穿牛仔裤”,那么反例集就变成了:如果是星期五,Marianne 就穿牛仔裤;今天(译注:原文此处口误,应为 it is Friday,即"今天是星期五");Marianne 没有穿牛仔裤。我已经忘了前提和结论是什么了。如果是星期五,Marianne 穿牛仔裤,今天是星期五,Marianne 没有穿牛仔裤,这就是反例集。现在再听一遍,这是一致的吗?这些句子能同时为真吗?如果是星期五,Marianne 就穿牛仔裤;今天是星期五;Marianne 没有穿牛仔裤。这些能同时为真吗?它们不能,对吧?这说明原来的论证是有效的。这说明不存在前提为真而结论为假的情况,因为由前提和结论的否定构成的集合是不一致的。

[段 4]

In other words, there’s no possible situation where they’re all true together. That’s why that test works. So, okay, and I said to you there are two tests. You will have understood the concept of validity once you’ve understood, firstly, the paradoxes of entailment, and secondly, why this works. If you understand why this works, you’re getting there. If you understand why the paradoxes of entailment are valid arguments, you will see why you’ll have understood the concept of validity. Okay, I can see there are still people worrying about the concept of validity. And if there’s time for questions, we’ll have a look at the questions that you might have then. But we must go on today, I’m afraid, so we’ll move straight on. This week we’re going to be looking at common fallacies. And a fallacy is an argument that looks like a good argument, that can easily be mistaken for a good argument, but that isn’t a good argument. and you won’t believe how many fallacies there are fallacies that you can just identify and explain why they’re fallaciesidentify and explain why they’re fallacies, why they look as if they’re good arguments and they’re not. But I’ve listed a whole load of fallacies. Actually, I’ve taken them from a website that I’ve mentioned on the top. And I think there are four pages or something of fallacies, all in, I apologise for the smallness of the print, but they wouldn’t have let me photocopy it if I’d put it any larger.

[译文 4]

换句话说,不存在它们同时为真的可能情况。这就是为什么那个测试有效。所以,好的,我对你们说过有两个测试。一旦你理解了,你就会理解有效性的概念:第一,蕴涵悖论(paradoxes of entailment);第二,为什么这个测试有效。如果你理解了为什么这个测试有效,你就有眉目了。如果你理解了为什么蕴涵悖论是有效论证,你就会看到为什么你将理解有效性的概念。好的,我看还有人在担心有效性的概念。如果有时间提问,我们会看看你们可能有的问题。但今天我们必须继续,我恐怕得直入正题了。这一周我们要看常见的谬误。谬误是看起来像好论证的论证,容易被误认为是好论证,但它不是好论证。你不会相信有多少谬误——你可以识别谬误并解释为什么它们是谬误,识别并解释为什么它们是谬误,为什么它们看起来像是好论证但其实不是。但我列出了一大堆谬误。实际上,我是从一个网站上摘录的,我在顶部提到了这个网站。我想那里有四页左右的谬误,总共……我为字号太小致歉,但如果我印得再大一些,他们不会让我复印的。

[段 5]

And I’d just like to point out at the top, the one fallacy is, now I haven’t got my glasses on. It says something like, please note that the argument from fast talking on page eight, that tells you that if somebody talks fast, you haven’t got a chance to work out for yourself whether the premises are true and the conclusion is valid. And I’d just like to point out that I’ve gone through these ideas in these lectures so quickly in some cases that there’s no way you’ll have had time to stop and think about them as I’ve been talking. And so you could say that a whole of these series of lectures has been a giant fallacy of fast talking. I promise you it’s not. And that if you go back and consider what I’ve said, and of course, they’ll all be on the podcast. So you’ll be able to actually go back and listen to what I’ve said again. You’ll be able to listen to all my mistakes as well as the things I’ve said correctly. I hope we’ve identified all my mistakes as we’ve gone through but that’ll give you time to actually think about what I’ve saidBut that’ll give you time to actually think about what I’ve said and work it out for yourself. Because actually, nobody can teach anybody else anything. You can learn from what I say.

[译文 5]

我想在顶部指出的一个谬误是——我还没戴眼镜。它大概是说,请注意第八页上的"快人快语"谬误,它告诉你,如果一个人说话很快,你就没有机会自己去判断前提是否为真、结论是否有效。我想指出的是,在这些讲座中,我有些内容讲得很快,你根本不可能有时间停下来思考。所以你可以说,这一系列讲座就是一个巨大的"快人快语"谬误。我向你保证它不是。如果你回过头去思考我说的话,当然,它们都会放在播客里。这样你就可以回去再听一遍我说的话。你既能听到我所有的口误,也能听到我说对的地方。我希望我们在过程中已经识别出了我所有的错误,但那会给你时间真正去思考我说的话。但那会给你时间真正去思考我说的话,自己去把它想清楚。因为实际上,没有人能教别人任何东西。你可以从我说的话中学习。

[段 6]

There’s nothing I can do to make you understand the concept of validity. You’ve got to put that effort in for yourself. One thing I will promise you, though, if you do put that effort in, you will understand. And if you still don’t, after putting in a lot of effort, email me and I’ll give you a tutorial all on your own. because it really is easy to understand once you’ve seen it. And it really is just a question of looking at it in a slightly different way and you’ll see it. It’s one of those rather irritating things you’ll probably remember from maths from school. OK, so fallacy of fast talking. But the list of fallacies is down there just for your amusement. OK, here’s a fallacy or rather here’s a deductively valid argument. and here’s a fallacy that looks like it. Okay, here’s an example of modus ponens you’ve come across before. I think you’ll agree. Could these be true and this one false? If these two are true, could this be false? No, absolutely not. So if you negated that conclusion and took away the therefore, if you negated that conclusion, the set would be inconsistent, wouldn’t it? And that shows you it’s a valid argument.and that shows you it’s a valid argument. Would you like us to do that there? We can look at the counter-example set.

[译文 6]

我无法让你理解有效性的概念。你必须自己下功夫。不过,我可以向你保证一件事,如果你真的下了功夫,你会理解的。如果你在下了很大功夫之后仍然不理解,给我发邮件,我会单独给你做一个辅导。因为一旦你看到了,它真的很容易理解。它真的只是需要你用略微不同的方式去看它,然后你就会明白。这是那种你在学校数学课上可能记得的、相当令人恼火的东西之一。好的,所以"快人快语"谬误。但谬误列表就在那里,只是为了逗你开心。好的,这里是一个谬误,或者更准确地说,这里是一个演绎有效论证。这里是一个看起来像它的谬误。好的,这里是你之前见过的 modus ponens 的一个例子。我认为你会同意。如果这些为真,这个能为假吗?如果这两个前提为真,这个结论能为假吗?不,绝对不能。所以如果你否定那个结论,去掉"所以",如果你否定那个结论,这个集合会是不一致的,对吧?这向你表明它是一个有效的论证。这向你表明它是一个有效的论证。你希望我们就在这里做这个吗?我们可以看看反例集。

[段 7]

If it is snowing, the mail will be late. It is snowing, the mail will be late, and we’re going to tack on it’s not the case that, which is just that symbol there. Okay, that’s what that means. It is not the case that. So we’ve got the set consisting of if it’s snowing, the mail will be late. It is snowing. It’s not the case the mail will be late. Do you agree that’s inconsistent? That there’s no possible situation in which all those three sentences can be true together? Okay. Well, if there’s no possible situation in which those three sentences can be true together, then the set consisting of the premises plus the, sorry, there’s no possible situation where the premises are true and the conclusion is false, is there? Because that’s what the counterexample set is. The true, the premises just as they are and the negation of the conclusion. Okay, that’s why that test works. But look at this one. if it’s knowing the male will be late the male will be late thereforethe mail will be late, the mail will be late, therefore it’s snowing. Let’s create the counter example set of that. So tell me what to write, somebody. If it’s snowing, the mail will be late. What do I write next? The male will be late. No, we don’t put the therefore in because we’re creating the counter example set now.

[译文 7]

如果正在下雪，邮件就会晚到。现在正在下雪，邮件就会晚到，然后我们要加上"并非……"，也就是那个符号。好的，那就是它的意思：并非……如此。所以我们得到了由这些句子组成的集合：如果是下雪天，邮件就会晚到。现在正在下雪。并非邮件会晚到。你同意这是不一致的吗？也就是说，没有任何可能的情况能让这三个句子同时为真，对吧？好。那么，如果没有任何可能的情况让这三个句子同时为真，那么由前提加上……抱歉，没有任何可能的情况让前提为真而结论为假，对吧？因为反例集合就是这样的。前提照原样，再加上结论的否定。好的，这就是为什么那个检验有效。但看看这个：如果正在下雪，邮件就会晚到；邮件晚到了；因此正在下雪。我们来构造它的反例集合。所以告诉我写什么，有人说一下吗？如果正在下雪，邮件就会晚到。接下来我该写什么？邮件晚到了。不，我们不写"因此"，因为我们现在正在构造反例集合。

[段 8]

We’re just making a set of sentences. So I’m putting it is snowing. And then what do I do? I put the negation sign in front of that and say it’s not the case it’s snowing. So we’ve now got the set consisting of the premises, just as they are, plus we’re pretending the conclusion is false. Okay, we’re putting a not the case in front of the conclusion, pretending it’s false. Now, could these sentences be true together? Is there a possible situation in which all these sentences are true, where if it’s snowing, the mail will be late, the mail is late, but it’s not snowing? Yes, okay, give me a couple. There’s a postal strike, yes, exactly so. Okay, give me another one if you can think of one. The mail van’s broken down, exactly. So there are all sorts of situations in which theExactly. So there are all sorts of situations in which these two premises are true and so is the negation of the conclusion. Therefore, it’s obvious there’s more than one possible situation in which the premises are true and the conclusion is false. So making a counterexample set enables you to think about situations where the premises are true and the conclusion is false. And that’s why it tells you whether the argument’s valid or not. So this is a deductively valid argument and this is a fallacy.

[译文 8]

我们只是在构造一个句子集合。所以我写下"正在下雪"。然后我做什么？我在它前面加上否定符号，写成"并非正在下雪"。所以现在我们有了一个由前提组成的集合，前提照原样，另外我们假设结论为假。好的，我们在结论前面加上"并非"，假装它是假的。现在，这些句子能同时为真吗？是否存在一种可能的情况让所有这些句子都为真，也就是说，正在下雪则邮件会晚到，邮件晚到了，但并没有在下雪？是的，好的，给我举几个例子。邮政罢工，对，完全正确。再给我一个，如果你想得到的话。邮车抛锚了，完全正确。所以有各种各样的情况让这两个前提为真，结论的否定也为真。因此，很明显有不止一种可能的情况让前提为真而结论为假。所以构造反例集合让你能够思考那些前提为真而结论为假的情况。这就是为什么它能告诉你一个论证是否有效。所以这是一个演绎上有效的论证，而这个是谬误。

[段 9]

This is the fallacy of affirming the consequence. So if you like, you take the consequent of the conditional instead of the antecedent and you put that as the second premise and then derive the antecedent instead of the consequent. And it doesn’t work, as you can see. OK, so that’s a formal fallacy. we’re going to look at fallacies informally. Some of the fallacies that we’ll look at are actually formal fallacies but I’ll talk about them informally because it’s just as easy for you to understand. Okay we’re going to have a look at three types of fallacy. We’re going to look at fallacies of relevance, fallacies of vacuity and fallacies of clarity and even then we’re just skimming the surface. Okay, so let’s look at fallacies of relevance. The first one is a non sequitur. And you commit a fallacy of…you commit a fallacy of non-secretaire when you cite in support of a conclusion something that’s true but irrelevant. Okay, so you cite in support of a conclusion. So one of your premises is true, so that’s fine, but it’s irrelevant to the conclusion. Now, you might be a bit worried about this, but let me just give you an example of non-secretaires that will be obviously the non-secretaries. Bill lives in a large building, therefore his apartment is large. Okay, is there any situation in which this premise is true and this conclusion false?

[译文 9]

这就是肯定后件的谬误。所以如果你愿意，你可以把条件句的后件而不是前件拿出来作为第二个前提，然后推导出前件而不是后件。这就行不通了，你可以看出来。好的，这就是一个形式谬误。我们将非形式地来看谬误。我们要看的有些谬误实际上是形式谬误，但我会用非形式的方式来谈它们，因为这对你来说同样容易理解。好的，我们来看三种类型的谬误。我们要来看相关性谬误、空洞性谬误和清晰性谬误，即便如此我们也还只是在表面掠过。好的，让我们来看相关性谬误。第一种是不相关推理。当你引用一个虽然为真但与结论无关的东西来支持一个结论时，你就犯了……你就犯了不相关推理的谬误。好的，你是引用来支持一个结论。所以你的某个前提为真，那没问题，但它与结论无关。现在，你可能对此有点担心，但让我给你举一个明显是不相关推理的例子。比尔住在一栋大楼里，所以他的公寓很大。好的，有没有这种情况让这个前提为真而这个结论为假？

[段 10]

Hundreds of them. Yeah, I mean, he may live in a large apartment, large building, but his apartment may be no bigger than a broom cupboard, right? So you can see that that isn’t a valid argument, and the reason it isn’t is because the premise, it doesn’t matter how true the premise is, It’s completely irrelevant to the conclusion, isn’t it? You cannot derive the truth of the conclusion from the truth of that premise. Now, I can imagine that you’re thinking, well, what about those paradoxes of entailment then? Surely that was a paradigmatic case of irrelevance. If you remember, I had grass is green. therefore 2 plus 2 equals 4. Okay? Now surely that premise is irrelevant to the conclusion. But let me ask again. Is there any possible situation in which that premise is true and that conclusion is false? Is there any possible situation, let me ask again, in which that premise is true and that conclusion false? Why not? You’re right, there isn’t. But why isn’t there? We saw here that this premise can be true and that conclusion false, can’t we? That’s not a problem. That is a non-sequitur commits the fallacy of irrelevance. But why doesn’t this one do that? That’s all right, go on. First, the conclusion isn’t dependent on the premise. Well, neither is that one. I mean, that’s what’s wrong with this one, is that the premise and the conclusion are completely irrelevant to each other, aren’t they?

[译文 10]

情况太多了。是的，我是说，他可能住在一栋大楼里，但他的公寓可能还没有一个扫帚柜大，对吧？所以你可以看出这不是一个有效论证，原因在于，前提无论多么为真，它与结论完全无关，对吧？你不能从那个前提的真推出结论的真。现在，我能想象你在想，那么那些衍推悖论呢？那肯定是无关性的典型例子。如果你记得，我说过"草是绿的，因此 2 加 2 等于 4"。好的？现在这个前提肯定与结论无关。但让我再问一下。是否存在任何可能的情况让那个前提为真而那个结论为假？是否存在任何可能的情况，我再问一下，让那个前提为真而那个结论为假？为什么没有？你说得对，没有。但为什么没有？我们看到这里的这个前提可以为真而那个结论为假，对吧？这没问题。那是一个不相关推理，犯了无关性的谬误。但为什么这个不会那样？好的，继续说。首先，结论并不依赖于前提。那一个也不是。我的意思是，这就是这个的问题所在，前提和结论彼此完全无关，对吧？

[段 11]

So why isn’t that a problem with this one? The conclusion is necessarily true, that’s right. So the reason this is a paradox is that the premise is completely irrelevant to the conclusion, but it satisfies the definition of validity, because there can’t be any possible situation in which the premise is true and the conclusion false if there isn’t any possible situation in which the conclusionif there isn’t any possible situation in which the conclusion’s false? How can P and Q be true if Q isn’t true? If Q is necessarily false, then how can P and Q be true? The truth of P just becomes irrelevant, doesn’t it? The truth of P is just unnecessary to the whole claim. Are you with me? I’m seeing light sort of going on here, but it’s difficult, isn’t it? Okay, so this commits the, this is a non sequitur, whereas that’s not, that’s a case of a paradox of entailment. And the difference between them is that 2 plus 2 equals 4 is a necessary truth, it cannot be false, so how could the premise be true and the conclusion false? But if it can’t be the case that the premise is true and the conclusion false, then it satisfies the definition of validity, whereas this doesn’t. Okay, here’s another non sequitur. Every year, many people are supported through life by their religious beliefs.

[译文 11]

那么为什么这对这个不构成问题呢？结论是必然为真的，这就对了。所以这是一个悖论的原因在于，前提与结论完全无关，但它满足有效性的定义，因为如果不存在任何可能的情况让结论……如果不存在任何可能的情况让结论为假，怎么可能存在一种情况让前提为真而结论为假呢？如果 Q 不为真，P 和 Q 怎么可能都为真呢？如果 Q 是必然假的，那么 P 和 Q 怎么可能都为真？P 的真假就变得无关了，对吧？P 的真假对整个主张来说是多余的。你跟上了吗？我看到大家似乎有点开窍，但这很难，对吧？好的，所以这个犯了一个……这是一个不相关推理，而那个不是，那是一个衍推悖论的情况。它们之间的区别在于，2 加 2 等于 4 是一个必然真理，它不可能为假，所以怎么可能前提为真而结论为假呢？但如果不可能前提为真而结论为假，那么它就满足有效性的定义，而前面这个就不满足。好的，这是另一个不相关推理。每年，许多人都靠他们的宗教信仰来维持生活。

[段 12]

Therefore, their religious beliefs must be true. OK, does that premise give any support at all to that conclusion? No. I mean, perhaps your religious beliefs really do help you live a good life, live a life that’s satisfying to you. That doesn’t necessarily mean they’re true. Because false beliefs, if you believe false beliefs are true, they’re going to give you everything that they would give you if they were true, if you see what I mean. Okay, so thosetrue, if you see what I mean. Okay, so those are two non sequiturs, and we can see why a non sequitur is an invalid argument, that there’s easily a possible situation which that’s true and that’s false, therefore it’s not valid. Again, the truth of that bears no relation to the truth of that, so again, the two arguments are not valid. Okay, how do arguments like this work? I mean, one of the things we’ve got to, we’re forever falling for fallacies. I mean, we argue incorrectly. We either make fallacies, we argue fallaciously ourselves, or we fall for the fallacies that other people offer us. Have I talked to you about the principle of charity? The principle of charity tells you that your interlocutor’s silliness is less likely than your bad interpretation. Okay, what does that mean? Okay, what’s your name? I was thinking of the lady in front with the nice necklace.

[译文 12]

因此，他们的宗教信仰一定为真。好的，那个前提给那个结论提供任何支持了吗？没有。我是说，也许你的宗教信仰真的能帮助你过好的生活，过一种令你满意的生活。那并不一定意味着它们为真。因为如果你把错误的信仰当成真的，它们会给你它们如果为真所能给你的所有东西，如果你明白我的意思的话。好的，所以那是两个不相关推理，我们可以看到为什么不相关推理是无效论证，因为很容易找到一种可能的情况让这个为真而那个为假，所以它不是有效的。同样，这个的真与那个的真没有任何关系，所以同样，这两个论证不是有效的。好的，像这样的论证是怎么起作用的呢？我的意思是，我们必须面对的一件事情是，我们永远都在被谬误所蒙蔽。我的意思是，我们不正确地论证。我们要么自己制造谬误，以谬误的方式论证，要么就接受了别人提供给我们的谬误。我跟你们讲过慈善原则吗？慈善原则告诉你，你的对话者的愚蠢不如你的糟糕解释更有可能。好的，这是什么意思？好的，你叫什么名字？我在想前面那位戴着漂亮项链的女士。

[段 13]

You’ve probably got a nice necklace too. Okay, Margaret. Margaret and I are arguing. Margaret says something that I think is blindingly obviously stupid. Okay, now I’ve got two possibilities. I can think Margaret’s just said something blindingly obviously stupid. I’m not going to talk to her anymore. You know, she’s obviously not worth talking to. because she said not P whereas surely P isShe said not P, whereas surely P is obvious. Now, what the principle of charity tells me to do in that case is to say, well, that’s interesting. Margaret says not P. I think not P is definitely false. Therefore, I must have misunderstood Margaret because her silliness is far less likely than my misunderstanding her argument. Are you with me? okay so instead of saying to Margaret you must be joking how stupid can you get or anything like that or just saying to myself oh right okay thanks Margaret nice to see you etc I’m walking off um I say to Margaret that’s interesting you think not p I think p why do you think not p and you give me your reasons and I give you my reasons for thinking of p and we have a proper argument, we discover actually that P and not P are not, in this case, inconsistent, that we’ve both got a slight misunderstanding. Let me give you an example.

[译文 13]

你可能也有一条漂亮的项链。好吧，Margaret。Margaret 和我在争论。Margaret 说了一句我觉得显而易见很蠢的话。好吧，现在我有两个选择。我可以认为 Margaret 刚才说的就是一句显而易见很蠢的话。我不再跟她说话了。你知道，她显然不值得再谈。因为她说非 P，而 P 显然是对的。她说了非 P，可 P 显然是显而易见的。那么，宽容原则在这种情况下告诉我的做法是，嗯，这很有意思。Margaret 说非 P。我认为非 P 肯定是错的。因此，我一定误解了 Margaret，因为她的愚蠢远不如我误解她论点的可能性大。你们跟上我的思路了吗？好，所以与其对 Margaret 说你在开玩笑吧，你能有多蠢，或者说类似的话，或者只是对自己说哦好吧谢谢 Margaret 很高兴见到你然后转身走开——我说的做法是，我对 Margaret 说，这很有意思，你认为非 P，我认为 P，你为什么认为非 P？请你给出你的理由，我也给你我支持 P 的理由，我们进行一场真正的辩论，我们发现实际上 P 和非 P 在这个情况下并不矛盾，我们都存在一点误解。我来给你举个例子。

[段 14]

I don’t know why I use this example, but I always do, so I’m going to do it again. Two rats in a cage. They both come from different cages, and in one of those cages, one of the rats was given an electric shock every time a sound was made. The same sound resulted in the other rat being given a food pellet. So the experiments are finished, they’ve now been put in the same cage and this sound happensput in the same cage and this sound happens, sound sounds. Now what’s going to happen? One rat’s going to rush shaking into the corner of the cage waiting for an electric shock and the other rat is going to be rushing up to the food bowl looking for a food pellet, isn’t it? Okay and then they look at each other and think you’re mad, you know, why have you done that? What they, if they were talking to, this is why I don’t know I understand why I use this example, if they were able to talk to each other, they would then discover that actually they both over-generalized, didn’t they? Because one’s experience was that whenever that, this, and the other’s experience was whenever that, that, they assumed that’s all the experience there was in the world. And in fact, they’ve now got two counter-examples to that.

[译文 14]

我不知道我为什么用这个例子，但我总是用，所以我就再用一次。笼子里有两只老鼠。它们来自不同的笼子，在其中一只笼子里，每次出现一个声音，那只老鼠就会受到一次电击。同样的声音出现时，另一只老鼠则会得到一颗食物丸。实验结束后，它们现在被放进了同一个笼子，这个声音响起——放进同一个笼子，这个声音响起，声音响了。现在会发生什么？一只老鼠会浑身发抖冲向笼子的角落，等着电击，而另一只老鼠则会冲到食盆前找食物丸，对吧？然后它们互相看着对方，心想你疯了吧，你为什么那样做？如果它们能够交谈——这就是为什么我不知道我为什么用这个例子——如果它们能够彼此交谈，它们就会发现其实它们都过度概括了，对吧？因为一只的经验是每当那个，这个，另一个的经验是每当那个，那个，它们就以为那就是世界上所有的经验了。但事实上，它们现在有了两个反例。

[段 15]

One is they’re in a cage where the sound goes off and nothing happens, and the other is that there are places in the world where something completely different happens. And it’s only if they talk about it that they’ll discover that. So arguing is the lifeblood of cooperating in the search for truth. If you want to know what the truth is, you cooperate with other rational animals, in other words, other people like us. And if you find that there’s a contradiction, don’t assume that the other person is wrong. because the only rational thing to assume is that one of you is wrong and even that might be false.is wrong and even that might be false but it certainly might be you and it’s the principle of charity that you observe when you argue in order not to do the irrational thing and to assume that the other person is wrong rather than assume that you’ve misunderstood them so that’s what the principle of charity is and what happens in this case in in the case of non-sequiturs is that the principle of charity can take you, get you into the wrong place, because you might not notice the irrelevance. I mean, that can happen. If, for example, large apartment, large building, you might think the two larges there is enough to make it relevant, and you’ll let the argument go through.

[译文 15]

一个是它们在笼子里声音响了但什么都没发生，另一个是世界上有些地方发生的事情完全不同。只有当它们谈论这件事时，它们才能发现这一点。所以，争论是在追求真理的合作中的命脉。如果你想知道什么是真理，你就和其他理性的动物合作，换句话说，像我们这样的人。如果你发现有矛盾，不要假设对方是错的。因为唯一合理的假设是你们中有一个是错的，而即使这样也可能是错的。是错的，即使这样也可能是错的，但它很可能是你，宽容原则正是你在争论时应当遵守的，以免做出非理性的事，假设对方是错，而不是假设你误解了对方——这就是宽容原则的内容。在这种情况下，在不相干推论（non sequitur）的情况下会发生什么呢？那就是宽容原则可能会把你带到一个错误的地方，因为你可能没注意到那种不相干。我是说，这种情况是可能发生的。比如，在一个大公寓、大建筑里，你可能以为那两个"大"就足以构成关联，你就会让论证通过。

[段 16]

You wouldn’t be right to do that, but it maybe is understandable. But sometimes when people are arguing, you might think, well, hang on, I’m sure that was irrelevant, but it can’t have been because Margaret’s too rational to allow an irrelevance to go through, a non sequitur like that. Or you might just want to not admit that you can’t see the connection. So the thing to do is to, A, be aware that there should be, just in any conversation, the implication is that there’s a connection between premises and conclusion, like the sea is at the salt, Melbourne’s in Australia. When I gave you the context, you could see the connection. so if you can’t see the connection ask for it so don’t be too generousSo don’t be too generous because it’s possible that this person is putting forward a non sequitur. And certainly don’t be too proud to ask for the relevance if you can’t see it. OK, here’s an ad. So this is the second fallacy of relevance. So the second one is attacking the person. It’s the second one we’re looking at. There are many more than this. You might attack the person making the argument rather than the argument that’s made. And this is called an ad hominem fallacy. And you may have heard, was it Miliband, on the Today programme the other day talking, now who was he talking to?

[译文 16]

你那样做不算正确，但也许是可以理解的。但有时当人们在争论时，你可能会想，嗯，等等，我确信那是无关的，但不可能是这样的，因为 Margaret 太理性了，不会让一个不相干、一个非 sequitur 那样通过的。或者你只是不想承认你看不到其中的联系。所以要做的事情是：第一，注意在任何对话中，应该存在，暗示着前提和结论之间是有联系的，比如海是咸的，墨尔本在澳大利亚。当我给你上下文时，你就能看到联系。所以如果你看不到联系，就去问它——所以不要太大方。所以不要太大方，因为有可能这个人提出了一个非 sequitur。而且如果看不到关联，绝对不要因为骄傲而不去询问它的关联性。好了，这里有一则广告。所以这是第二个相关性谬误。第二个是攻击人本身。这是我们正在讨论的第二种。这样的谬误还有很多。你可以攻击提出论点的人，而不是攻击所提出的论点。这叫做 ad hominem 谬误。你可能听说过，是 Miliband 吗，前几天在 Today 节目上谈的，他现在在和谁谈？

[段 17]

Talking to William Hague. And he accused William Hague of an ad hominem fallacy. He said you’re arguing against the man, not against the argument. You’re stopping the man, not the ball or something, he said. It was a very good example. Okay, here’s an ad hominem fallacy. Nick Griffin is leader of the BNP, therefore his claim that some people worry about immigration is rubbish. Now, I actually heard that fallacy loud and clear the other night on Question Time. I’m sure you did too. Does the truth of the fact that Nick Griffin is leader of the BNP bear at all on the claimsall on the claim, the truth of the claim, that some people worry about immigration? I mean, could it be the case that Nick Griffin is leader of the BNP and some people worry about immigration? Of course it could, couldn’t it? Yes. Okay, here’s another one. Von Daniken, you may not even remember him. He was the chap who wrote books about people coming from space and building the pyramids and so on. his books about ancient astronauts are worthless because he’s a convicted forger and embezzler now he is actually a convicted forger and embezzler does that mean that his books are worthless okay so could this premise be true in this conclusion false yes could this premise be true in the conclusion false so the arguments are useless aren’t they they’re both invalid there are possible situations in which the premise is true, conclusion is false they’re not good arguments.

[译文 17]

和 William Hague 谈。他指责 William Hague 犯了 ad hominem 谬误。他说你是在攻击人，而不是在攻击论点。你是在阻挡人，而不是球，或者类似的话，他说。那是一个非常好的例子。好，这是一则 ad hominem 谬误。Nick Griffin 是 BNP 的领袖，因此他关于有些人担心移民的说法是垃圾。我前天晚上在 Question Time 上清清楚楚听到了这个谬误。我相信你们也听到了。Nick Griffin 是 BNP 领袖这一事实的真假，与"有些人担心移民"这一主张的真假有关联吗？我是说，有没有可能 Nick Griffin 是 BNP 的领袖，同时有些人的确担心移民？当然可能，对吧？是的。好，再来一个。Von Daniken，你可能都不记得他了。他就是写关于外星人来到地球建造金字塔之类书籍的那位。他的书是关于古代宇航员的，毫无价值，因为他是被定罪的伪造者和贪污犯——那么现在他确实是一个被定罪的伪造者和贪污犯，这是否意味着他的书毫无价值？好，那这个前提为真时，结论是否可能为假？是的，前提为真时结论是否可能为假？所以这些论证都是无效的，对吧？它们两者都是无效的，存在前提为真、结论为假的情况，它们不是好的论证。

[段 18]

Now it’s very important when thinking about ad hominem fallacies to distinguish between ad hominem tax and ad hominem fallacies and the difference between the two is this, you can attack somebody’s right to say something so you can cast doubt on why they’re saying what they’re saying by saying something about who they are, what you can’t do is cast doubt on the truth of what they’reWhat you can’t do is cast doubt on the truth of what they’re saying. So here’s the difference between the two. Here’s the ad hominem attack. Nick Griffin is a self-professed racist, so you should take care when listening to his claims about immigration. Now that just seems sensible, doesn’t it? That’s an ad hominem attack. That’s not a fallacy at all. All you’re doing is warning somebody that this person has a vested interest in making you believe something. so you should take his claims with an extra pinch of salt. But it doesn’t say anything about the truth of the claim. So here, well, the only thing it says about the truth of the claim is that you should be aware of the truth of the claim because this person wants you to believe that and of course that’s not a good enough reason for believing it. Nick Griffin is leader of the BNP, therefore his claim that some people worry about immigration is rubbish that is a fallacy.

[译文 18]

现在在思考 ad hominem 谬误时，非常重要的是要区分 ad hominem 攻击和 ad hominem 谬误，两者的区别是这样的——你可以攻击某人说话的权利，你可以通过说一些关于他是谁、他是什么的话来质疑他为什么要说这些——你不能做的是质疑他所说内容的真实性。你不能做的是质疑他们所说内容的真实性。所以这就是两者之间的区别。这就是一个 ad hominem 攻击。Nick Griffin 是一个自称的种族主义者，所以你在听他关于移民的主张时应该谨慎。这看起来很合理，对吧？这是 ad hominem 攻击。这根本不是谬误。你所做的只是警告别人，这个人有既得利益想让你相信某些事。所以你应该对他的主张多加一分怀疑。但它并没有对其主张的真假说任何话。所以这里，嗯，关于该主张的真假它唯一说的是，你应该意识到该主张的真假，因为这个人想让你相信那个，而当然那不是相信它的充分理由。Nick Griffin 是 BNP 的领袖，因此他关于有些人担心移民的说法是垃圾——这就是一个谬误。

[段 19]

If you attack a person instead of what he says, and your attack on the person is actually irrelevant to the truth of what he says, in other words, your attack might be a correct attack, you’re not saying something false about this person, but the truth of what you’re saying has no bearing at all on the truth of what he is saying, that’s a fallacy. what you could be saying is warning somebody so I’ve forgotten yourSo I’ve forgotten your name again. Ashley comes to me and tells me that, oh, so-and-so came and told her that the coffee is ready in the common room. And I say, yes, but I know why he told you that. That’s because he likes everyone else to go to the common room first and then discover it’s actually being served upstairs today. and he gets all the chocolate biscuits. I mean, when I’m doing that, I’m giving her a reason for why he said something. It doesn’t actually bear on the truth of what’s there, but it’s a good reason not to be sceptical about whether the coffee’s being in the common room. You’d want to check with someone else that the coffee was in the common room before you went there, perhaps. Or you wouldn’t come down from Hewitt House in order to get coffee from the common room on the basis of what Ashley said or what this person said.

[译文 19]

如果你攻击的是一个人而不是他所说的话，并且你对人的攻击实际上与他所说的话的真实性无关，换句话说，你的攻击可能是正确的，你关于这个人所说的并非假话，但你所说的话的真实性与他所说的话的真实性毫无关系，这就是一个谬误。你所说的可能是在提醒别人，所以我又忘了你的名字了。Ashley 来告诉我，某某人过来告诉她咖啡在公共休息室已经准备好了。然后我说，是的，但我知道他为什么告诉你。因为他喜欢让其他人都先去公共休息室，然后才发现今天其实是在楼上供应的。这样他就能拿到所有的巧克力饼干。我的意思是，当我这样做时，我是在给她一个理由，解释他为什么那样说。这实际上并不影响事情本身的真实性，但这是一个不去怀疑咖啡是否在公共休息室的好理由。你可能想在去之前跟另一个人确认一下咖啡是否真的在公共休息室。或者你不会仅仅因为 Ashley 或者这个人所说的话就特意从 Hewitt House 下来去公共休息室喝咖啡。

[段 20]

Okay, so that’s the difference between ad hominem. So I don’t know if that’s answered your question. Yeah, I mean, an ad hominem is an attack on the person making an argument, not on the argument he’s making. And therefore, the attack, even if the attack is justified, it doesn’t question the argument itself. so those were fallacies of relevance now moving on to fallacies of vacuity ok the first one is a circular argument that we’ll be looking at when you argue in a circle you subordinateWhen you argue in a circle, you cite in support of a conclusion that very conclusion. So your premise or your conclusion is amongst your premises here. Second fallacy we’re looking at here is the fallacy of question begging. And thirdly, a self-sealing argument. So let’s start with circular arguments, then come back and look at these again. A circular argument, the conclusion is one of the premises. and the difference between that and a question begging argument is that here the conclusion actually is one of the premises, exactly the same thing, and here the conclusion is assumed by one of the premises. So you haven’t actually got the conclusion amongst the premises but you’ve got amongst the premises a premise that assumes the conclusion. So here’s an example of a circular argument. All whales are mammals, therefore all whales are mammals.

[译文 20]

好的，这就是人身攻击的区别。不知道这是否回答了你的问题。是的，我的意思是，人身攻击是攻击提出论点的人，而不是攻击他所提出的论点。因此，即使这种攻击是合理的，它也没有质疑论点本身。所以那些是相关性谬误，现在我们要转向空洞性的谬误，第一个是循环论证，我们之后会讲到。当你进行循环论证时，你在支持一个结论的论据中引用了那个结论本身。所以你的前提或者你的结论就在你的前提之中。我们这里要看的第二个谬误是乞题谬误。第三个是自封闭论证。让我们从循环论证开始，然后再回头看这些。循环论证中，结论是前提之一。它和乞题论证的区别在于，这里结论实际上就是前提之一，完全相同的东西，而这里结论是被其中一个前提所假定。所以你实际上并没有把结论放在前提之中，但你在前提中放了一个假定结论的前提。这里有一个循环论证的例子：所有鲸鱼都是哺乳动物，因此所有鲸鱼都是哺乳动物。

[段 21]

Now is that argument valid? Yes. Well done. You’re absolutely right, it is valid. All circular arguments are valid. How could there be a possible situation in which that’s true and that’s false if they’re the same thing? If that’s true, that’s got to be true, hasn’t it? So there’s no possible situation in which that’s true and that’s false, therefore that argument is valid. So circular arguments are always valid, and what that tells you is that there’s got to be more to a good argument than validity. and what’s more truethan validity and and what’s more true premises because that is actually a true premise as well so that’s a sound argument but it’s not very good is it it wouldn’t convince anybody of anything but do you remember last week I got myself into a bit of a tangle by trying to draw truth tables on here and convince you that once you’ve got a premise once you’ve got a conclusion in amongst the premises. It doesn’t matter what you add to the argument, it remains valid. This is called the monotonic property of entailment. If I add lots of other premises to that, the circularity will no longer be as obvious as it is now, will it? But actually, you are validity detected. That’s what you are in virtue of being rational animals. So somebody stands up in Parliament and gives a circular argument that’s long and convoluted and so on.

[译文 21]

这个论证有效吗？是的。说得很对，完全正确，它是有效的。所有循环论证都是有效的。如果它们是同一回事，怎么可能有一种情况使它为真而另一个为假？如果那个为真，那这个必定为真，对吗？所以不存在前提为真而结论为假的可能情况，因此这个论证是有效的。所以循环论证总是有效的，这告诉你一个好的论证不仅仅是有效性。还有比有效性更重要的，还有真实的前提，因为那实际上也是一个真实的前提，所以那是一个可靠的论证，但它不是很好，对吗？它不会说服任何人任何事情。但你们还记得上周我试图在这里画真值表，想说服你们一旦你在前提中有了一个结论。无论你在这个论证里加什么，它仍然是有效的。这叫做衍推的单调性。如果我在其中加入很多其他的前提，循环性就不会像现在这样明显了，对吗？但实际上，你已经察觉到了有效性。这就是你作为理性动物的本质。所以某人在议会中站起来给出一个冗长而复杂的循环论证。

[段 22]

It’s a valid argument, and you hear that. You can tell that it’s a valid argument, that there’s no possible situation where the premises are true and the conclusion false. But what you don’t see is that it’s only valid because it’s circular. Do you see how it happens? So nobody would put forward an argument like that, but if they embed that premise in with the, sorry, that conclusion in with the premises, they’ve set up a situation in which there’s no possible situation where all the premises are true and the conclusion false, how could there be? Because it doesn’t matterfalse, how could there be? Because it doesn’t matter what other premises are there, if all the premises are true, the conclusion must be true as well, because the conclusion is one of the premises. So circular arguments are always valid, and some circular arguments like this one are sound, but that doesn’t make them good. There must be more to a valid argument, sorry, to a good argument than just soundness. In the final analysis, the point of an argument is to persuade someone of something. So it’s to persuade you. If you don’t believe P, and I think you should believe P, I think P is true and therefore you should believe it, I put together an argument in the hope of convincing you that P.

[译文 22]

这是一个有效的论证，你听了之后就能判断出来。你能看出它是一个有效的论证，不存在前提为真而结论为假的可能情况。但你看不到的是，它之所以有效仅仅是因为它是循环的。你明白这是怎么发生的吗？所以没有人会提出这样的论证，但如果他们把那个结论混在前提中，他们就建立了一种不存在所有前提为真而结论为假的可能情况的情况，怎么可能存在呢？因为不管其他前提是什么，如果所有前提都为真，结论也必须为真，因为结论本身就是前提之一。所以循环论证总是有效的，有些循环论证像这个一样是可靠的，但这并不使它们成为好的论证。一个好的论证必定不仅仅是可靠性。最终，论证的目的是说服某人相信某事。所以是为了说服你。如果你本来不相信 P，而我认你应该相信 P，我认为 P 是真的所以你应该相信它，我就组合一个论证，希望说服你 P。

[段 23]

So what I want from an argument more than anything else is that it should be persuasive. But I don’t want it to be persuasive because of a fallacy. I actually want it to be a good argument as well. And therefore, I want it to be sound and valid. But if it’s sound and valid and not persuasive, it’s pretty useless for any practical purpose. So you actually can’t have a productive argument with somebody unless you agree with them. Didn’t anyone tell me why that might be the case. Productive disagreement always depends on agreement, which is why if you’ve really got two sides who absolutely disagree,why if you’ve really got two sides who absolutely disagree on everything, you may as well forget it. Why should productive disagreements depend on agreement? I can only argue with you if you’re prepared to accept my premises. If you reject my premises, then I can’t draw anything from those premises that’s going to convince you of anything, can I? So I’ve got to convince you of at least one of my premises before we can even get started. Of course, what I might do is say, will you agree to take this for the sake of argument and then take you through the arguments? But of course, if you still don’t accept the premise, really, you’re never actually going to accept the conclusion of my argument, are you?

[译文 23]

所以我对一个论证最想要的就是它应该说有说服力。但我不希望它因为谬误而有说服力。我实际上也希望它是一个好的论证。因此，我希望它既可靠又有效。但如果它可靠且有效却没有说服力，对于任何实际目的来说它都没什么用。所以实际上你无法和一个与你意见不一致的人进行有成效的论证。没有人告诉我为什么可能这样吗？有成效的分歧总是依赖于一致，这就是为什么如果你们真的有两方在所有事情上都绝对不一致，那就别谈了。为什么有成效的分歧要依赖于一致？我只能和你争论，前提是你愿意接受我的前提。如果你拒绝我的前提，那么我就无法从这些前提中推出任何能说服你的东西，对吗？所以我必须至少先说服你接受我的一个前提，然后我们才能开始。当然，我可以这么说：你愿意为了论证而暂时接受这一点吗？然后带你走完论证过程。但当然，如果你仍然不接受那个前提，实际上你永远也不会真正接受我论证的结论，对吗？

[段 24]

So in order to disagree productively, you’ve got to agree on something. You’ve got to agree on the premises. okay so that’s a circular argument and it’s a valid one but it’s no good and it’s no good because there’s no possible situation which the premise is true and the conclusion false but that’s because the conclusion is amongst the premises okay let’s look at begging the question here’s an argument it’s always wrong to murder human beings capital punishment involves murdering human beings, therefore capital punishment is wrong. What’s question-begging about this argument?begging about this argument. Exactly. To talk about capital punishment as if it were murder, just to assume that capital punishment is murder, is to assume your conclusion, isn’t it? I mean, most people would say that actually capital punishment isn’t murder, because murder is illegal killing, whereas capital punishment is legal killing, isn’t it? Judicial killing. so by talking as if capital punishment and murdering human beings are interchangeable here you’re actually begging the question aren’t you you’re begging the question well hang on a second you know why should I believe capital punishment is wrong on the basis of these two premises I don’t accept that one at all because you’re just assuming your conclusion here are you with me? So when you say that an argument is a fallacy, you’re not necessarily saying it’s invalid, but you are saying there’s something wrong with it.

[译文 24]

所以要进行有成效的分歧，你们必须在某些事情上达成一致。你们必须在前提上达成一致。好的，那就是一个循环论证，它是有效的，但它没有用，因为它没有前提为真而结论为假的可能情况，但那是因为结论就在前提之中。好的，让我们来看乞题。这里有一个论证：谋杀人类永远是错误的；死刑涉及谋杀人类，因此死刑是错误的。这个论证中乞题的地方在哪里？正是如此。把死刑当作谋杀来谈，只是假定死刑就是谋杀，这就是在假定你的结论，不是吗？我的意思是，大多数人实际上会说死刑不是谋杀，因为谋杀是非法的杀戮，而死刑是合法的杀戮，对吗？是司法杀戮。所以在这里把死刑和谋杀人类当作可以互换的，你实际上就是在乞题，对吗？你在乞题。等一下，我为什么要基于这两个前提相信死刑是错误的呢？那个前提我根本不接受，因为你只是在假定你的结论。你们跟上了吗？所以当你说一个论证是谬误时，你并不一定是在说它是无效的，但你的确是在说它有问题。

[段 25]

There’s something wrong that means it’s not persuasive. It shouldn’t persuade you. Often that’ll be the case because it’s invalid, but not always. And certainly with cases of circularity and question begging, that isn’t the case. Okay, any other question before we move on? No? Okay, let’s, okay, where are the question begging premises in each of the following arguments? Let’s do an, so,Let’s do an… So intoxication… Intoxicated beverages should be banned because they make people drunk. Let’s set out the argument logic book style before we do that. We might need to suppress folks. So what’s the argument here? Think about it for yourself and then put your hand up when you’ve put out the argument logic book style. Yes, being drunk is bad or something like that, or beverages that make people drunk should be bad. That’s probably the right one. Beverages that make people drunk should be banned. Intoxicated beverages make people drunk. Therefore, intoxicating beverages should be banned. What’s the question-begging bit? Which premise would you reject? You couldn’t have a beverage that’s intoxicating without having a beverage that would make you drunk because an intoxicating beverage is exactly a beverage that makes you drunk, isn’t it? The fact is you’re not going to be able to reject that argument because it’s assuming its conclusion in its premises. So beverages that make people drunk should be banned.

[译文 25]

有什么地方不对劲，这意味着它没有说服力。它不该说服你。情况常常是这样，因为它无效，但并非总是如此。而且在循环论证和丐题论证的情况下，情况确实如此。好的，在我们继续之前还有其他问题吗？没有？好的，让我们，呃，好的，以下各个论证中的丐题前提在哪里？让我们做一道，所以……让我们做一道……所以，醉酒……含酒精饮料应该被禁止，因为它们会让人喝醉。在我们这样做之前，让我们按照逻辑教科书的方式把论证列出来。我们可能需要压制一些人。这里的论证是什么？自己思考一下，然后把论证按逻辑教科书的方式列出来，举手告诉我。是的，醉酒是不好的，或者类似的东西，或者会让人喝醉的饮料应该是不好的。这可能就是对的。会让人喝醉的饮料应该被禁止。含酒精饮料会让人喝醉。因此，含酒精饮料应该被禁止。哪个是丐题的部分？你会拒绝哪个前提？你不可能拥有一种含酒精的饮料而又不是让人喝醉的饮料，因为含酒精饮料恰恰就是让人喝醉的饮料，不是吗？事实是，你无法反驳这个论证，因为它在前提中预设了它的结论。所以会让人喝醉的饮料应该被禁止。

[段 26]

Intoxicating beverages make people drunk, therefore intoxicating beverages should be banned. It’s a valid argument, but it’s not ever going to persuade you. Well, let’s go back to this one. Let’s go back to… Can you see that… Now, you might be for capital punishment or against it, but anyone who made this argument is clearly against capital punishment, aren’t they? Okay. So, they would be making the argument in order to try and persuade someone who’s for capital punishment or neutral either way to agree with them that capital punishment is wrong, right? Okay. And the problem with the argument they offer is that it’s not going to convince anyone who isn’t already convinced of the argument, is it? Because I might say I’m against capital punishment. Sorry, no, I’m for capital punishment. I might accept that premise. There’s our starting point of agreement. But as soon as we get to that one, I’m going to say, hang on, no. Why should I accept that? you’re assuming that capital punishment is wrong in making that premise. You know, if you change that premise to capital punishment involves killing human beings, that’s fine, but then your argument isn’t valid. The only way you can make your argument valid is by putting murdering in, and then it’s valid because it begs the question. Okay, and therefore it’s not persuasive. So in exactly the same way, If somebody was making this argument, say I didn’t believe whales were mammals, okay, I thought whales were fish.

[译文 26]

含酒精饮料会让人喝醉，因此含酒精饮料应该被禁止。这是一个有效论证，但它永远不会说服你。好，让我们回到这个。让我们回到……你能看出来吗……现在，你可能支持死刑或者反对死刑，但任何提出这个论证的人显然是反对死刑的，不是吗？好的。所以，他们提出这个论证是为了试图说服一个支持死刑或者中立态度的人，让他们同意死刑是错误的，对吧？好的。他们提供的论证的问题在于，它不会说服任何还没被说服的人，不是吗？因为我可能会说我反对死刑。抱歉，不，我支持死刑。我可能会接受那个前提。这就是我们共同的出发点。但当我们到那一点时，我会说，等等，不。我为什么要接受那个？你在那个前提中预设了死刑是错误的。你知道，如果你把那个前提改成死刑涉及杀害人类，那是可以的，但那样的话你的论证就不是有效的了。唯一能让你的论证有效的方法就是加入"谋杀"这个词，然后它之所以有效，是因为它丐题。好的，因此它没有说服力。所以以完全相同的方式，如果有人提出这个论证，假设我不相信鲸鱼是哺乳动物，好的，我认为鲸鱼是鱼。

[段 27]

Whales are obviously fish, aren’t they? I mean, we’ve discussed this before.fish, aren’t they? I mean, we’ve discussed this before. Anyway, they tell me whales are mammals. Okay, so I don’t believe whales are mammals. And you’re trying to convince me. If you offer me this argument and say, well, here’s a good argument for whales being mammals, I’m going to say, no, no, that’s not a good argument at all. Why should I agree with you on that premise? In that premise, you’re just assuming your answer, sorry, your conclusion. So you’ve got a valid argument, but it’s hopelessly unpersuasive. Therefore, it’s not a good argument. And this one is only slightly different in that instead of the premise actually being the same as the conclusion, the premise assumes the conclusion. so if I actually if you’re arguing using this argument against me it’s not going to persuade me of anything is it and that’s what’s wrong with it not that it’s not valid so we’re looking at fallacies of vacuity we’ve looked at fallacies of relevance we’re now looking at fallacies of vacuity and we’ve looked firstly at circular arguments where the conclusion is one of the premises Tell me again why that would convince anyone if you’ve made an argument where the conclusion is amongst the premises? Because it’s valid, and because the fact that the conclusion is amongst the premises may be hidden among all sorts of other premises, so youmay be hidden among all sorts of other premises.

[译文 27]

鲸鱼显然是鱼，不是吗？我的意思是，我们之前已经讨论过这个。鱼，不是吗？我的意思是，我们之前已经讨论过这个。无论如何，他们告诉我鲸鱼是哺乳动物。好的，所以我不相信鲸鱼是哺乳动物。而你正试图说服我。如果你给我这个论证并说，好，这是一个关于鲸鱼是哺乳动物的好论证，我会说，不，不，那根本不是一个好论证。我为什么要同意你这个前提呢？在那个前提中，你只是在预设你的答案，抱歉，你的结论。所以你有一个有效论证，但它毫无说服力。因此，它不是一个好论证。这个论证与前面的论证只有一点不同，那就是前提实际上并不是与结论相同，而是前提预设了结论。所以，如果实际上你用这个论证来反对我，它不会说服我接受任何东西，不是吗，这就是它的问题所在，而不是它无效，所以我们正在研究空洞性谬误，我们已经研究了相关性谬误，我们现在研究空洞性谬误，我们首先看了循环论证，其中结论是前提之一。如果你已经构建了一个结论就在前提之中的论证，再告诉我一遍，为什么它能说服任何人？因为它是有效的，而且因为结论藏在前提之中这一事实可能隐藏在其他许多前提之中，所以你可能没有注意到结论就在那里。

[段 28]

So you just don’t notice that the conclusion is there. Then we looked at question-bagging arguments, and we tied ourselves in knots, or I tied myself in a knot. But the idea here is that instead of the conclusion being amongst the premises itself, there is amongst the premises a premise that assumes the conclusion. That’s the difference between those two. And finally, we’re going to look at arguments that are self-sealing. Okay, a self-sealing argument. Two weeks from today at 2.45 you’re going to be doing exactly what you are doing. Well, it will be a true statement, won’t it? That couldn’t be false, could it? But it’s not a persuasive argument. Why not? It’s completely vacuous. It says absolutely nothing, does it? It doesn’t give you any prediction. It doesn’t limit the possibilities at all. It just tells you you’re going to be doing whatever you’re going to be doing, which has to be true. not persuasive. Here’s one that actually lots of people do think is persuasive. We must respect all moral beliefs therefore relativism is moral relativism is true. This is called vulgar relativism by a chap called Bernard Williams famous philosopher. The reason that’s a self-sealing argument is that is a moral absolute. We must respect all moral beliefs. You cannot derive moral relativism from a moral absolute. If that premise is true, then that conclusion is false.

[译文 28]

所以你只是没有注意到结论就在那里。然后我们看了丐题论证，我们把自己搞糊涂了，或者我把自己搞糊涂了。但这里的想法是，结论本身不在前提之中，而是在前提中有一个预设了结论的前提。这就是两者之间的区别。最后，我们要看的论证是自我封闭式的论证。好的，一个自我封闭式的论证。从今天起两周后两点四十五分，你将正在做你正在做的事情。好，这会是一个真陈述，不是吗？它不可能是假的，不是吗？但它不是一个有说服力的论证。为什么不呢？它完全是空洞的。它什么也没说，不是吗？它没有给你任何预测。它完全没有限制可能性。它只是告诉你，你将要做你将要做的事情，这必然是真的。没有说服力。这里有一个实际上很多人确实认为有说服力的例子。我们必须尊重所有道德信念，因此相对主义，道德相对主义是真的。这被一个叫 Bernard Williams 的家伙称为庸俗相对主义，他是一位著名哲学家。那个论证之所以是自我封闭的，是因为它是一个道德绝对命题。我们必须尊重所有道德信念。你不能从一个道德绝对命题中推导出道德相对主义。如果那个前提为真，那么那个结论为假。

[段 29]

And if the conclusion is true, the premise is false. So it’s a bad argument because it goes around in a circle. It’s self-defeating. Actually, that’s self-defeating rather than self-sealing. Yes, that actually should be in a slightly different category. But here’s another one that you may have, variants of it will have caught you out at some point, I’m sure. Global economy is controlled by Jews and any appearance to the contrary is the result of Jewish cleverness. Women are stupid and any appearance to the contrary is just because they’re quite good at covering it over sometimes, you know. So again, a self-sealing argument because you know that you can’t be refuted because whatever happens you’ve got some reason for why what you’re saying is is true so um some self-sealing arguments move back and forth from interesting but false claims for example you might say all human beings are selfish uh and you won’t say well hang on that’s not true lots of people are altruistic they’re they do things for other people and then you say oh yes but they’re still doing it because they want to i mean mother theresa um i mean she wouldn’t have helped all those people unless she wanted to. And you say, well, no, she did it out of duty. And so you say, well, yes, but she wanted to do her duty, didn’t she?

[译文 29]

而如果结论为真，前提为假。所以这是一个糟糕的论证，因为它绕了一个圈。它是自我击败的。实际上，那是自我击败而不是自我封闭。是的，那实际上应该属于一个略有不同的类别。但这里还有另一个你可能遇到的，它的变体肯定在某个时候欺骗过你，我确信。全球经济由犹太人控制，任何相反的表象都是犹太人狡猾的结果。女性是愚蠢的，任何相反的表象只是因为她们有时很擅长掩盖，你知道。所以同样，一个自我封闭的论证，因为你知道你无法被反驳，因为无论发生什么，你都有某种理由说明为什么你所说的是真的，所以一些自我封闭的论证在有趣但错误的断言之间来回切换，例如你可能会说，所有人类都是自私的呃，你不会说等一下，那不是真的，许多人是利他的，他们为他人做事，然后你说哦是的，但他们仍然这样做是因为他们想要，我的意思是特蕾莎修女呃我的意思是不会帮助所有那些人除非她想帮助他们。而你说，不，她出于责任这样做。于是你说，是的，但她想要履行她的责任，不是吗？

[段 30]

I mean, she still wanted to do one.didn’t she? I mean, she still wanted to do what she did. So the only thing she did was what she wanted to do. So she’s as selfish as everyone else. And you know, what’s happening here? Well, what’s happening is that someone’s moving from an interesting but false claim to a true but vacuous claim. And what they’ll do is they’ll move backwards and forwards between the two until you’ve got yourself thoroughly tied in a knot. And what you need to do is separate out the two claims that are being made and show why one of them is meaningless, even if true. So, three ways that an argument can be self-sealing. It can invent ad hoc ways to dismiss criticism. So, if my prediction didn’t work, it’s because there were negative vibes in the room. Okay? you know it’s all your fault it can attack its critics as unable to see the benefits of the position so you know the only reason you don’t see that the world’s been taken over by Jews or women or blacks or whatever is because you’ve been taken in by them or another one there is you know you’re in denial therefore you don’t understand what I’m saying about your appalling desires and what have you It can also redefine keywords. So it’s selfish to always be doing just what you want to do.

[译文 30]

我的意思是，她仍然想做一件。她的意思是，她仍然想做她所做的事。所以她所做的只是她想做的事。所以她和所有人一样自私。你知道，这里发生了什么？嗯，发生在的是，某人从一个有趣但错误的断言转移到一个真实但空洞的断言。他们会在两者之间来回切换，直到你被彻底绕晕。你需要做的是把这两个断言分开，并说明为什么其中一个即使为真也是毫无意义的。所以，一个论证可以通过三种方式自我封闭。它可以发明特设的方式来驳回批评。所以，如果我的预测不起作用，那是因为房间里有负面情绪。好的？你知道，这都是你的错，它可以攻击其批评者，说他们无法看到这个立场的益处，所以你知道你之所以没有看到世界已经被犹太人或女性或黑人或无论什么人接管了，是因为你已经被他们蒙骗了，或者另一个例子是你知道你在否认，因此你不明白我所说的关于你那些令人震惊的欲望之类的话。它还可以重新定义关键词。所以总是做你正好想做的事情是自私的。

[段 31]

Well, it depends how you interpret just what you want to do there. If you interpret, say, even Mother Teresa was doing just what she wanted to do, then you might need to have another look at what you mean by selfish. Okay, finally, we’re going to look at fallacies of clarity. And I want to use some time for question. Sorry, you’ve got a question. In the last three, how do you begin to say that? Well, on the, on this one, as soon as you have the feeling that you’re being moved from between two different propositions, one of which is false and interesting and the other is, is, see if, ask for time out, if you can, because that’s the only way you’re going to do it, and of course this is what you won’t get, and try and identify what the two propositions are. So in this case, you want to say, okay, the meaning of selfish is usually isn’t interested in what anyone else wants, in which case Mother Teresa wouldn’t be selfish because she is interested in what other people want. then you say but then your other claim is that somebody’s selfish only if they sorry some it’s sufficient for being selfish that somebody acts on what they they themselves want and actually that’s not usually the definition of selfish so IAnd actually, that’s not usually the definition of selfish.

[译文 31]

嗯，这取决于你如何解释你到底想做什么。如果你解释说，比如说，甚至连特蕾莎修女也只是在做她自己想做的事，那么你就可能需要重新审视你对"自私"这个词的理解了。好的，最后，我们来看一下清晰性谬误。我希望留一些时间来提问。抱歉，你有问题。在最后三个中，你怎么开始说呢？嗯，在这个上面，一旦你感觉到你正在被从两个不同的命题之间搬来搬去，其中一个是假的、很有趣的，另一个是，是的，那么如果可以的话，请求暂停一下，因为那是你唯一能做的办法，而这当然是你得不到的，然后试着去识别这两个命题分别是什么。所以在这个案例中，你会想说，好，“自私"的通常含义是，不关心其他人想要什么，如果是那样的话，特蕾莎修女就不是自私的，因为她关心其他人想要什么。然后你会说，但是你的另一个主张是，某个人是自私的当且仅当——抱歉——只要某个人按他们自己想要的方式行动就算是自私的，而那通常并不是"自私"的定义。所以，实际上，那通常并不是"自私"的定义。

[段 32]

So identify the weasel word and get out the two definitions and then show that somebody’s flipping between one and the other is the way to do that. Okay, fallacies of the heap. If you have only one penny, you’re not rich. If you’re not rich and I give you a penny, then you still won’t be rich. It doesn’t matter how many pennies I give you, then you won’t be rich. okay is that a good argument no why not I mean is that false no okay is that false is that no it’s not false is it I mean that’s true if you gave me a penny sadly you wouldn’t make me rich it’s all you gave me okay so that’s true and that’s true is that true? okay is this valid? is there any possible situation where those two are both true and this is false? yes okay this is actually not a valid argument at all is it? it’s trading on the fact that many words are vague they admit a borderline cases so any word you can think of like tall fat clever can you think of a few others? Rich is one of them. Yep. Long. Poor. Yep.Poor. Yeah. Any word that admits of degrees, admits of borderline cases, you can construct a heap argument for the fallacy of the heap. And so that’s the fact that words do admit of borderline cases and the idea that a series of insignificant differences can’t result in a significant difference. and of course it’s this one here that’s at fault, because a series of insignificant differences.

[译文 32]

所以，识别出那个模棱两可的词，提取出两个定义，然后说明某个人在两个定义之间来回切换就是处理这类问题的方法。好的，堆垛谬误。如果你只有一便士，你就不富有。如果你不富有，而我又给了你一便士，那你仍然不会富有。无论我给你多少便士，你都不会富有。这是一个好论证吗？不是，为什么不是？嗯，这是假的吗？不，好吧，这是假的吗？不，这不是假的，不是吗？嗯，这是真的，如果给了我一便士，悲哀的是，你不会让我变富，你只给了我而已。好吧，所以这是真的，这也是真的，这是真的吗？好吧，这是有效的吗？有没有可能这两个都为真而这个结论为假的情况？有。好吧，实际上这根本不是一个有效论证，不是吗？它利用了一个事实，那就是许多词是模糊的，它们允许边界情况的存在。所以任何你能想到的词，像高、胖、聪明，你能想到一些其他的吗？富有就是其中之一。对。长。穷。对。穷。对。任何允许程度变化的词，都允许边界情况，你可以为堆垛谬误构造一个堆垛论证。所以这就是这样一个事实，即词确实允许边界情况的存在，以及那种认为一系列不显著的差异不能产生显著差异的观点。当然，真正有问题的就是这个，因为是一系列不显著的差异。

[段 33]

If we take blue at this end of the stage and red at this end of the stage, they’re two different colours, aren’t they? But we can go from one to the other in a series of gradations where you would say in each case they’re the same colour, the same colour, the same colour. So A and B are the same, B and C are the same, but A and C are not the same. They’re intransitive. So when you’re making an argument, you should try and avoid words that are grading words, scaling words. And how would you stop these being vague? If John has a nice income, what might you say instead of that? Say it again, some of you. The top tenth percentile of income. Good. John is in the top tenth percentile of income earners or something like that.percentile of income earners or something like that. Yep, okay, cocaine is a dangerous drug. Cocaine is addictive or cocaine… You could say the same sort of thing, yep, or whatever. Exactly, that’s what you’re trying to do is to eliminate the vagueness by being more exact in some way or another. So Mary is a clever woman. You can just say Mary has got three degrees and a PhD or something like that. Jane is a terrific tennis player Jane is what? yes, ok, good dead easy slippery slope fallacy, this is another fallacy of ambiguity humans are rational, sorry in clarity, human are rational because they act for reasons, radiators turn themselves on when it’s cold therefore radiators are rational now don’t laugh because actually lots of people try and convince me of this because I don’t believe animals are rational.

[译文 33]

如果我们在这个舞台的一端取蓝色，另一端取红色，它们是两种不同的颜色，不是吗？但我们可以通过一系列渐变从一种过渡到另一种，在每一步你都会说它们是同一种颜色，同一种颜色，同一种颜色。所以 A 和 B 相同，B 和 C 相同，但 A 和 C 不同。它们是非传递的。所以当你进行论证时，你应该尽量避免使用那些是程度词、等级词的词。那么你如何避免这些词是模糊的呢？如果约翰有一份不错的收入，你会怎么说来代替？说一遍，你们中的一些人。前百分之十的收入。好。约翰处于收入者的前百分之十，或者类似这样的说法。收入者的前百分之十或类似的东西。对，好，可卡因是一种危险的毒品。可卡因是成瘾性的，或者可卡因……你可以以同样的方式说，对，或其他什么。正是如此。你要做的事情就是通过某种方式更加精确来消除模糊性。所以玛丽是个聪明的女人。你可以简单地说，玛丽有三个学位和一个博士学位或类似这样的东西。简是个出色的网球运动员。简是什么？是的，好，非常简单，滑坡谬误，这是另一个含糊性——抱歉是清晰性的——谬误，人是理性的，因为他们为了理由而行动，暖气片在天冷时自动打开，所以暖气片是理性的。现在别笑，因为实际上很多人试图用这个来说服我，因为我不相信动物是理性的。

[段 34]

And people always tell me that I should believe animals are rational because they act for reasons. And some people want to say that even radiators are rational because when it’s cold, they turn themselves on, except in Rowley House. But, I mean, it’s usually the case. And therefore, it has a belief that it’s cold and a desire that it should not be cold and therefore it acts. Why isn’t that rational?acts. I mean, why isn’t that rational? But again, we’re doing the same thing, aren’t we? Because here are radiators down at one end of acting for reasons, and here are human beings up at the other end of acting for reasons, and we’re saying that there’s no difference between the two. So any slippery slope argument can fall foul of that. Just quickly, slippery slope depends on the idea that we shouldn’t distinguish between things that are not significantly different and the belief that if A isn’t significantly different from B and B is not significantly different from C then A isn’t significantly different from C and again that’s true only if you’ve got something that’s transitive and there are many many things that are not transitive. Of course sometimes you I mean one way of avoiding a slippery slope is actually to define something We have to use slippery slopes sometimes, don’t we? When we think about, you know, well, why should we have the age of being allowed to marry at 16 without your parents’ permission or whatever it is?

[译文 34]

人们总是告诉我，我应该相信动物是理性的，因为他们为理由而行动。有些人甚至想说连暖气片都是理性的，因为天冷时它们会自己打开，除非是在罗利之家。但是，嗯，通常情况下是这样的。因此，它有一个天冷的信念和一个不应该冷的愿望，所以它行动。为什么那不是理性的呢？我的意思是，为什么那不是理性的呢？但同样，我们做的不就是同一件事吗？因为这头是暖气片在为理由而行动，那头是人类在为理由而行动，而我们说这两者之间没有区别。所以任何滑坡论证都可能栽在这个上面。简单说一下，滑坡依赖于这样一个观念：我们不应该区分没有显著差异的事物，以及如果 A 与 B 没有显著差异，B 与 C 没有显著差异，那么 A 与 C 没有显著差异的信念，而那只有在你拥有某种传递性的事物时才成立，而有很多很多事物是不具备传递性的。当然，有时你，我的意思是，避免滑坡的一种方法实际上就是给某物下定义。我们有时候必须使用滑坡论证，不是吗？当我们思考，比如，好，为什么我们应该设定在不需要父母允许的情况下可以结婚的年龄为 16 岁或随便什么年龄的时候？

[段 35]

Or the age of being able to drink whatever it is? Actually, I have no idea what it is. 18. 18, is it? Right. What happens between the last day that you’re 17 and the first day that you’re 18 that makes it possible for you to drink on one day and not drink on the other? legally. I mean, this is just daft, isn’t it? Well, it is daft, of course, but here youit is daft of course but here you have to make a cut off point at some point and what the slippery slope is it can say well okay there isn’t an obvious difference but we have to make one somewhere or that we can just make one by regulation or whatever but slippery slopes trade on this particular problem. Here’s another one, Mary had a little lamb he followed her to school, Mary had a little lamb, then she had a little broccoli. We can see that that’s an equivocation. It’s not actually clear what it’s an equivocation on, is it? Is it lamb or is it had? Or little, well, and little, actually, isn’t it? Because had means possessed, whereas in the first one, in the second one, it means ate, doesn’t it? little lamb in the first one is a bit different from little lamb in the second one and so on here’s an equivocation yep okay a feather is light what is light cannot be dark therefore a feather can’t be dark what’s the equivocation there the word light in the first case it means light as a feather weight wise and the second case we’re talking about light as opposed to dark So that’s the fallacy of equivocation.

[译文 35]

或者设定可以喝酒的年龄是什么？实际上，我一点都不知道那是多少。18 岁。是 18 岁吗？好的。在你 17 岁的最后一天和 18 岁的第一天之间，发生了什么变化，让你可以在一天合法地喝酒而另一天不行呢？我的意思是，这简直是荒唐，不是吗？嗯，那当然是荒唐的，但在这里你必须在某个点上做出一个截止点，而滑坡谬误可以说，好，没有明显的差异，但我们必须在某处做一个区分，或者我们可以仅仅通过规定或其他方式做一个区分，但滑坡就是利用这个特殊的问题。另一个例子，玛丽有只小羊，它跟着她去学校，玛丽有只小羊，然后她吃了点小西兰花。我们可以看出那是一个歧义谬误。其实不清楚它在哪里产生歧义，不是吗？是 lamb 这个词还是 had？还是 little，嗯，实际上是 little，不是吗？因为 had 一处意思是"拥有”，而在第一处，第二处它的意思是"吃"，不是吗？第一个"小羊"和第二个"小羊"有点不同，等等。这就是一个歧义谬误。对，好。一根羽毛是轻的，轻的就不是暗的，所以一根羽毛不能是暗的。这里的歧义在哪里？第一个 case 中的"light"意思是像羽毛一样的轻，从重量上说，而第二个 case 中我们谈论的是与暗相对的亮。这就是歧义谬误。

[段 36]

There are three types of ambiguity. Lexical, so what’s wrong with that one? I thought it was rum, is that rum…What’s wrong with that one, I thought it was rum, is that rum is itself ambiguous. That’s a word that can mean different things. In the second one, Bert was a fat stock breeder. What’s the ambiguity there? Give me the two understandings of that term. Right. Either Bert was fat or the stock was fat. That’s right. So it’s the scope of fat. just so Bert was fat and Bert was a stock breed breeder or is it the fat goes with stock breeder so Bert was a fat stock breeder okay those are the two and then finally cross-reference my wife’s cousin is engaged to for her former husband what’s the ambiguity there so either my wife’s cousins is engaged to my wife’s former husband or my wife’s cousin is engaged to the cousin she the wife’s cousin had before now that she’s marrying for the second time to the same person explain the ambiguities in this sentence these sentences no one likes Oxford and Cambridge students good, ok nobody likes students who’ve been to Oxford and Cambridge or nobody likes Oxford students and nobody likes Cambridge students no one likes Oxford the city or yes no one likes Oxford and no one likes Cambridge students, yes that would be another one every nice girlYes, that would be another one.

[译文 36]

歧义有三种类型。词汇性的，所以那一个有什么问题？我以为是朗姆酒，那是朗姆酒……那一个有什么问题，我以为是朗姆酒，那是朗姆酒本身就有歧义。那是一个可以表示不同意思的词。在第二个中，伯特是一个肥胖的牲畜育种者。这里的歧义是什么？给我那个术语的两种理解。好的。要么伯特是胖的，要么牲畜是胖的。这就对了。所以那是"胖"的范围问题。所以伯特是胖的，并且伯特是一个牲畜育种者，或者"胖"修饰牲畜育种者，所以伯特是一个肥胖的牲畜育种者。好，这就是两种情况。然后最后，交叉指代——我妻子的表妹与她的前夫订婚了。这里的歧义是什么？要么是我妻子的表妹与我妻子的前夫订婚，要么是我妻子的表妹与那位表妹的前夫订婚——那位妻子以前有过的人，而她现在第二次结婚嫁给了同一个人。解释这个句子中的歧义。在这些句子中——没有人喜欢牛津和剑桥的学生。好，没人喜欢去过牛津和剑桥的学生，或者没人喜欢牛津的学生且没人喜欢剑桥的学生。没人喜欢牛津这座城市，或者说，是的，没人喜欢牛津且没人喜欢剑桥的学生。是的，那就是另一种情况。每个好女孩——是的，那就是另一种情况。

[段 37]

Okay, every nice girl loves a sailor. Actually, if you were able to formalise things, you would find it very easy to do this, because this could mean there is a sailor such that every nice girl loves him, or every nice girl is such that there is a sailor whom she loves. You with me? So every girl is such, sorry, there is a sailor such that every girl loves him, or every nice girl loves some sailor. So in the second case, there are lots of different sailors. In the first case, there’s just one sailor who’s loved by all the girls. So that’s a structural ambiguity. Are shoes guaranteed to give you a fit? I can see you’ve got that one. Irritating children should be banned. That’s right. What are we banning? Children who are irritating or the irritating of children? okay what about the last one can anyone tell me what the ambiguity is here this is more difficult you’ll kick yourselves but but you’ll also think that I’ve cheated you why do swallows fly south for winter why do swallows fly south for winter why do swallows fly south for winter why do swallows fly south for winter is that ambiguous okay and and all it was is the intonation there I I managed to give it lots of different meanings. So you shouldn’t think that actuallydifferent meanings.

[译文 37]

好的,每个好女孩都爱一个水手。其实,如果你能把这些形式化,你会发现做这件事很容易,因为这句话可以意味着存在一个水手,使得每个好女孩都爱他;也可以是每个好女孩都存在某个她所爱的水手。你们跟上了吗?所以,这里存在着一个水手,使得每个好女孩都爱他,或者每个好女孩都爱某个水手。那么在第二种情况中,就有很多不同的水手。在第一种情况中,只有一个水手,被所有的女孩所爱。所以这是一个结构歧义。鞋子能保证合脚吗?我看到你已经明白了。恼人的孩子应该被禁止。对的。我们禁止的是什么呢?是恼人的孩子,还是对孩子进行烦扰?好的,最后一个,有人能告诉我这里的歧义是什么吗?这个更难,你们会懊恼地敲自己的头,但同时也会觉得我在捉弄你们。为什么燕子要在冬天南飞?为什么燕子要在冬天南飞?为什么燕子要在冬天南飞?为什么燕子要在冬天南飞?这句话有歧义吗?好的,事实上,所有的不同含义都是通过语调赋予的。我通过语调赋予了它许多不同的含义。所以你不应该认为歧义其实……不同的含义。

[段 38]

So you shouldn’t think that actually that the ambiguity might just be in this in the lexicon in the structure and in the cross references. Sometimes you can put it in just by the tone, the emphasis you give on the words that you use. Right, okay that’s it for the lectures. Thank you. Thank you. Well thank you too.

[译文 38]

所以你不应该认为,歧义仅仅存在于词汇中、存在于结构中、存在于交叉指代中。有时候,你可以仅仅通过语调、通过你赋予词语的重音来制造歧义。好的,讲座就到这里。谢谢。谢谢。嗯,也谢谢你们。