Fat Lazy Dragons
|
Compo - Fallacies of Composition
(Don't confuse white lies here which mean certain kinds of logical fallacies, with the slang term which means a harmless untruth.)
Jay said, "The white lie that tries to say there is no difference, when there is; we decided to call the white snowflake lie, because even though snowflakes all look the same from a distance, when you look close you see they are different."
Trudy nodded. "The white lie that tries to say there is only two choices, when there are many; we decided to call the white light lie, because even though the light switch says all you can choose is off or on, if you hold a prism up to the light you get lots of colors, not just white."
Jay finished, "And a whole thing being more than its parts, and a part being different than the whole thing; we decided to call the white cloud lie, because a white cloud is nothing but water droplets, but it doesn't act like water. Also, water doesn't act like a white cloud except when it is in a white cloud."
Polar bear hair is clear, not white. It looks white because it diffuses the light. Polar bears are one of the few animals that have black skin.First Encounter in the Evening
Ebony tries to keep the argument from occurring at all by allowing the dragonslayers to try their key on the door. Either the White Dragon has decided being an invisible dragon is better than not existing, or has some other plan or information, like an ambush of some kind in the mountains, or perhaps she knows somehow that the key they have does not match her door. We never find out which it is. The argument that starts when the dragon slayers refuses is more about moral choices than logic.
Ivory, the black bear, demanded. "What do you care? There are already billions of invisible dragons over there. How could one more hurt? Besides you don't even know if the key will work on Compo's door." [white snowflake lie - one more will make a difference.]
Pass said, "It would not be right for us to turn a dragon loose on another world without their permission." [They decide to do what is right, rather than what is expedient.]
Ebony suggested. "She'll be here. It would take an hour for her to be drawn through the door. You could close it behind you very quickly." [a black lie - simple statement that is not true]
Lug objected. "Nope. It doesn't matter how far away she is, it only takes a second." [the truth]
Compo sat down. "I'm not going any where. Go on up to the castle." [force without reasoning]
Trudy said, "OK. We are just going to go on over and have a nice chat with those folks over there." She pointed at the little crowd just inside the town, watching at a distance. [force is answered with force]
Compo stood back up. "Wait." [She knows what happened to the Quiver, the green dragon]
Ivory quickly asked, "What harm would it do for you to just try the door? If the lock unlocked you could just not open it, and lock it back. If it did not unlock, you could go on to Low Check City." [black lie because it is a simple untruth]
Lug objected again. "Unlocked is unlocked. There is no locking it back. The key will disappear, and we will be without protection from you. The only way we could save ourselves would be to open the door." [black lie answered with truth]
Ebony insisted. "You have not answered my question. What harm will one more dragon do among billions?" [white snowflake lie becaue it tries to say there is no difference when there is, blue lie - reptition - Pass has already answered this argument by pointing out that is irrelevant.]
Jay answered. "Whatever harm Compo did, we would be responsible for it. We are not going to do it." [Jay repeats Pass's previous statement of fact. Wrong is wrong and there is a difference]
Ebony went on. "It would be like adding a grain of sand to the desert. There would be no difference." [white snow flake lie and blue lie because it is repeating an argument already answered]
Trudy spoke up. "Haven't we heard this one before? Yes, there would be one difference. Before we opened the door Compo would be here. After we opened the door Compo would be there. The rest of the dragons have nothing to do with it. Compo is the one we would have caused to be there." [Now Pass, Jay and Trudy have all three answered it.]
Compo shivered and then said, "Let me think this over. If you will agree not to talk to any of these people, we can talk it over again in the morning." [Negotiating for time.]
High chattered. "We are not going do what you want us to do." [force]
Compo said quietly, "Major Molar, kill them all." [answered with force]
...
Trudy exclaimed, "Wait! We agree! We agree. We'll wait until morning." [Surrender in the face of superior force is sometimes the best moral choice]
Second Encounter in the Morning
Ivory accused, "You are guilty of being unfair. You told Track, the Blue Dragon that you would leave him alone, if he would let you try his door. Why doesn't Compo get the same chance? It is not fair to her." [Blue - irrelevant, it doesn't matter how they dealt with another dragon and red because it assumes they will agree they are not being fair]
Pass answered, "I was the one that made that offer, but no one else agreed to it, including the Blue Dragon, Track." [Once again the logic master does poorly in action. She causes the argument to go down an entirely irrelevant path. It makes no difference who agreed to what. The dragonslayers are under no obligation to treat all their enemies the same. She also fails to make her opponents prove their conclusion that it would be unfair for the dragons to be treated differently]
Ivory continued. "You are part of the Magician Key and a member of this little group of dragon fighters who are protected by the Magic Key. What you say counts for all of you." [White Cloud - the whole is the same as the parts.]
Jay replied, "That is not fair. We each speak for ourselves." [Simple truth]
Ebony, the polar bear asked, "How was the Blue Dragon supposed to know that?" [Blue - irrelevant, it does not matter what the blue dragon knew. This is one of the many traps that could have been avoided if Pass had not allowed this irrelevant argument to start with. ]
Jay shook his head. "He did not agree to it, so it does not matter." [Clearly the dragon slayers are allowing themselves to feel guilty over a perceived injustice. They have fallen for a red lie. It would not have mattered if he had agreed to it either.]
Ebony shook his head. "It does matter. How is anyone supposed to trust you, when some of you say things that are not true?" [red lie - assumes they have agreed that some untrue things send by some of the group makes all of them untrustworthy. That has not been agreed to.]
Jay was still shaking her head. "Pass did not know it was not true." [Blue -irrelevant, her intention might keep a lie from being morally wrong, but it does not make it true.]
"Perhaps she did not," replied Ivory, "but when she made the offer she spoke for all of you, and that should have made it true." [Back to the while cloud lie.]
Trudy spoke up, "Something is true or not, regardless of what anyone says about it." [This is a true statement, but it is a little difficult to see what it has to do with the discussion at hand.]
Jay added, "Besides, you do not get to decide who speaks for us. We will do that. Pass made a mistake that turned out not to matter, because the Blue Dragon did not agree." [Jay is still trying to justify Pass. He should be trying to get the argument back on track.]
Compo shivered and then spoke up. "It does matter. It means none of you is to be trusted." [White cloud - even if Pass was not to be trusted, it would not mean that they were all not to be trusted.]
Jay exclaimed, "That is not fair. Just because one of us makes a mistake, does not mean we can not be trusted. Anyone can make a mistake." [Good and valid arguments.]
Compo exclaimed. "You admit it then! All of you make mistakes, and can not be trusted." [This is a rhetorical trick of making an accusation to put someone on the defensive. The conclusion that they can not be trusted has insufficient evidence making it a red lie. Everyone makes mistakes, is no one to be trusted?]
Lug answered. "Sure we admit that we all make mistakes. And certainly, it is up to you to decide who you trust. Was there something else you wanted to talk about?" [Lug lets the air out of their foolish argument.]
Compo accused. "You are all liars!" [Blue - attack on the person, also repetition - also red, since it is an unproven accusation]
Jay exclaimed. "That is not fair!" [Lug's answer was better.]
Trudy agreed. "That is not true! We are not all liars." [Lug's answer was better.]
Compo replied, "So you admit that some of you are liars." [There was a slight equivocation (brown lie) in what Trudy said, but given the context pointing it out was foolish, as her answer shows.]
Trudy shook her head. "I meant none of us are liars." [Good clarification.]
Compo asked, "Which is it then, not true or not fair? [White light lie - there are many other possibilities.] You just proved you are liars, when you can not even agree among yourselves. This little girl can not even agree with herself. First, she says some of you are liars and then she says none of you are liars. Which one of the things she says is true? None of you can be trusted." [Rhetorical trick of not accepting her clarification and blowing her previous equivocation out of proportion.]
High screeched, "I am not a liar. My friends are not liars. You are the liar!" His tail was twitching uncontrollably. [Red lie - accusation without evidence.]
Compo sat down. "Prove it." [Good response to an accusation without evidence.]
High's mouth opened and closed several times but no sound came out.
Trudy said quietly, "I can answer that."
Compo turned to look at her. "Prove you, and these people with you, are not liars."
Trudy answered. "There are so many things wrong with what you are saying I hardly know where to begin. First of all, like the Brown Dragon you are using one word to mean two different things." [Finally!]
Compo replied, "That is not true."
Trudy shook her head. "Let me finish. You throw the word liar around very freely. Sometimes you mean someone who lies all the time on purpose. Sometimes you mean someone who once said something by mistake that was not true." [Good point]
Compo said, "What the difference? If you say something that is not true, you are a liar." [White snowflake lie - saying there is no difference when there is.]
Trudy answered, "There are two important differences. One is how often you say something that is not true, and the other is the reason you say something that is not true." [Showing the difference is a good response to the white snowflake lie.]
Compo shivered and asked, "How many lies does someone have to tell, before they become a liar?" [White snowflake lie - How many snowflakes does it take to make an avalanche?]
Trudy took a step forward and looked up at the dragon. "It depends on the reason you are trying to call them a liar. If you are their friend and trying to wake them up to a possible flaw in their character one lie is enough to call them a liar, if you say it kindly. If you are trying to determine if a person can be trusted, you need to understand how frequently they say things that are not true. If they say a thousand things a day, one lie a day would not make them untrustworthy, would it? If they say one thing a day, and it is always a lie, it would be a mistake to ever trust them. Anything in between is a judgment call. And that does not even begin to talk about the difference in lies and mistakes, which you do not seem to be able to tell apart, except when you make a mistake. You are certainly free to decide that we can not be trusted, but when you call us a liar, and say we can not be trusted, you are obviously telling a lie." [Excellent]
Compo shivered. Jay noticed that several of the dragon soldiers shivered as well. Most of them had their long arms wrapped around themselves as if they were cold.
Compo shivered again. "It is not a lie. I do not trust any of you."
Trudy asked, "Then why are you trying to make an agreement with us?" [Good question]
Compo shuddered. "You said there were lots of things wrong with what I was saying. I still say you were not being fair making an offer to Track, the Blue Dragon, and not making the same offer to me." [Blue - tries to get them back into her web of irrelevancy]
Jay replied. "Where is the law written that says dragon slayers are supposed to treat all dragons the same?" [Finally Jay finds the right answer]
Trudy continued. "You said that I contradicted myself, when I did not." [Simple truth - way to go, Trudy.]
Compo said, "Yes you did. First you said some of you were liars and then you said none of you were liars. [Blue - again she ignores the clarification of Trudy's equivocation. Also, Red by jumping to a unmerited conclusion.]
Trudy shook her head. "I said we were not all liars. That is not the same as saying that some of us are liars. You are using Begg's, the Red Dragon's, kind of lie. When I said we were not all liars, it could mean some of us are liars, but it could also mean none of us are liars." [Good]
Compo shook her head. "It is not my fault you were not clear." [True, right up until Trudy clarified the first time.]
Jay stepped up beside Trudy. "That is not fair. When you misunderstood her, she did make it clear. What I mean is, that when you took it the wrong way, she told you which of the two possible ways she really meant it." [Exactly]
Compo's wings were close to her body as if she was trying to use them as a blanket. All of the dragon soldiers were shivering. All of them except Major Molar had their arms wrapped around themselves. Major Molar had one hand on his sword handle.
Compo shivered and shuddered. "So which is it, not fair, or not true?" [Again with the White light lie - there are many other possibilities.]
Trudy answered, "Why can't it be both? It is not true and it is not fair." [Excellent]
Jay accused, "I'll tell you what is not fair. It is not fair to lump us all together. You took one little mistake that one of us made and tried to say it was all of us that made it." [Points out the White cloud lie]
Pass added, "I'm the one that made the mistake. I did not mean to say something that was not true." [The logic expert makes a moral appeal. It is not needed. Pass is not accountable to the dragons to treat them all alike.]
Compo said, "You are all in it together. What is true of the whole is true of the parts, and what is true of the parts is true of the whole." [White Cloud lie]
Jay said, "Prove it." [Good]
High laughed.
Compo commanded, "Major Molar, I need another soldier."
Major Molar drew his sword, stepped closer to one of his soldiers. The soldier screamed and held up one arm to stop the blow, and tried to reach for his sword with the other hand. Major Molar swung his blade and sliced the soldier in two pieces, as the soldier screamed in pain. The two pieces rolled around on the ground for a minute as if in pain, and then before their eyes became two dragon soldiers, complete with a sword for each of them. Both of them were a little smaller and thinner than the rest of the soldiers.
Compo said triumphantly. "That is real proof. The whole and the parts are the same." [Blue - irrelevant. Just because dragon teeth have the property of self replication it does not mean that all things do.]
Trudy shook here head. "That proves nothing. A seed grows into a plant but that does not mean there is no difference in them. Potato pieces grow into potato plants with more potatoes. Dragon soldier pieces grow into dragon soldiers, but that does not prove anything." [Exactly]