Science Forums 2

[CraigD]

It’s hard for me to decide if the original post of this thread asks a question about informal logic, or US law, policy and politic, so I’ll go with the safe assumption that it asks questions about both.

The informal logic question
The straw man fallacy, which I think can be more aptly termed, the “straw man rhetorical technique”, as the quote from its wikipedia article states, is an informal fallacy, meaning it’s not an error in formal, mathematically provable logic, but a catch-all name for vaguer, more complicated sociological and perceptual phenomena. A key feature of a SMRT is that it requires intentionality on the part of its author, who must not only “substitute a superficially similar” but significantly different proposition in place of his opponent’s actual proposition, but must be aware of the difference, not merely be making an error due to misunderstanding his opponent.

Considering Coberst’s proposition,

Originally Posted by coberst

The straw man fallacy is an often used fallacy in the United States because American citizens have a low level of intellectual sophistication.

“American citizens have a low level of intellectual sophistication” is an example of a statement so poorly qualified – lacking modifier such as “some” and “all” – that it’s ambiguous, and subject to be interpreted as “All American citizens have a low level of intellectual sophistication”. This interpretation is an example of a formal fallacy of distribution, where an attribute of some member of a collection is assumed to be true of all members.

If we interpret its second clause as “many American citizens have a low level of intellectual sophistication”, then Coberst’s proposition has richer meaning, because the assumed lack of intellect of most Americans implies that most of them are unable to recognize the SMRT’s misrepresentation of an original proposition, so the technique is “often used” by a few Americans to persuade many.

The US law, policy and politic question

Originally Posted by coberst

One recent use of this fallacy is that Guantanamo detainees are terrorists and thus too dangerous for detention on American soil.

As a question of US law and policy, the current controversy over the Guantanamo Bay detention camp is, I believe, at heart one of Constitutional Law.

Were the people imprisoned at GITMO imprisoned in a US state or federal jail or penitentiary, they would be subject to State or US law, which in turn must conform with the US Constitution. As article 1 section 9 of the Constitution states

The privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it

and as neither case of rebellion in nor invasion of the US is at present existent, these people would be legally entitled to be either charged in a US court with a crime or released. There is simply no provision in US law that allows people to be imprisoned without being charged with a crime or incapacity (eg: insanity or senility), regardless of how dangerous or bad they are.

If charged, Amendment 8 would apply, which states

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

As nearly all of the GITMO detainees were arrested outside of the US, many without witnesses to any criminal act by them, it’s unlikely that many of them could be charged with a crime in US court.

Some US politicians have argued that the moving of GITMO detainees to US jails and penitentiaries would pose a risk to public safety, not so much because detainees might escape, but because supporters of them might attempt to break them out, or use bomb threats or hostage taking to force their release. These politicians, IMHO, are guilty of the making emotionally charged appeals to fear that obscures more important legal issues.

I agree with the position of the ICRC as quoted in the GITMO wikipedia article:

Every person in enemy hands must have some status under international law: he is either a prisoner of war and, as such, covered by the Third [Geneva] Convention, a civilian covered by the Fourth Convention, [or] a member of the medical personnel of the armed forces who is covered by the First Convention. There is no intermediate status; nobody in enemy hands can fall outside the law.

In believe that in rejecting this position, US officials blundered badly in the legal reasoning that supported the use of GITMO, an error that may have severe and long-lasting consequences, and which I believe should be addressed and remedies as soon as possible.