[Buddha-l] Prominent Neobuddhist proposes religion based blacklisting for government jobs

[Alberto Todeschini]

Richard Hayes wrote:

"Ad hominem argumentation is considered fallacious. It is classed as an
informal fallacy. All that means is that it does not constitute good
reasoning."

This was the standard understanding for a while, and the definition you
quoted in a previous post was the exact standard one.

In the past few decades, especially since the publication of Hamblin's
_Fallacies_ in 1970 and subsequent studies by argumentation theorists,
logicians, psychologists and cognitive scientists, there has been a
readjustment in how fallacies are understood and the very idea has been
questioned.

Copi's treatment is now obsolete.

As for the ad hominem, there are cases in which it is perfectly
appropriate, and I don't mean the original ad hominem I mentioned in my
other post, I mean the one you refer to. So to make an ad hominem is not
ipso facto to commit a fallacy. It is of course certainly true that
there are all sorts of abuses.

(I can provide some bibliographical details off-list if you want)

Best,

Alberto Todeschini