The “skeptic” tries to scare you away from the belief in their very first opening remarks: for example, pointing out how UFO cults beat and starve their victims (when this can just as easily happen if aliens are visiting the Earth). The negative consequences of a false belief may be real, legitimate truths to be communicated; but only after you establish by other means that the belief is factually false—otherwise it’s the logical fallacy of appeal to consequences.
This can be legitimate for a reporter wanting someone to read the story, and to show why the subject of the story matters practically.
Perhaps, but to the same extent, we should discount reporters’ accounts as informative or worthy of being taken as serious arguments. In other words, you want to play-a the grownup game, you play-a by the grownup rules; if your editor says you can’t, too bad, go sit at the kids’ table.
This can be legitimate for a reporter wanting someone to read the story, and to show why the subject of the story matters practically.
Perhaps, but to the same extent, we should discount reporters’ accounts as informative or worthy of being taken as serious arguments. In other words, you want to play-a the grownup game, you play-a by the grownup rules; if your editor says you can’t, too bad, go sit at the kids’ table.