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Can you prove any point with linguistics no matter how asinine it is?

00:33 / 13.11.07

Derrida says we're confined to a prison of linguistics and whatnot, yet being that we're stuck in this verbal prison/limited by the words we choose... I am wondering how any moral stance can be given serious value if it's argued by a stupid person with a poor vocabulary and a lack of an ability to prove their point.

If you take a completely ridiculous argument and try to prove i's correct with your verbal skills, chances are there will be people out there who are vulnerable enough to believe you.

Let's say, hypothetically, that a highly intelligent person is a child molester. Would they not be able to prove that it was to molest children with their verbal skills alone? Would they not twist and turn every fact possible and have the masses eat up their perspective? What stops average people with reasonable morals from believing that it's ok to molest children? The lack of intelligent child molesters?

It's easy to convince people of things if you have a convincing argument. I'm wondering if you can, technically, prove any point whatsoever.

If so... what is the point in having morals and/or opinions in the first place? Anyone can come around and change them unless you are dogmatic.

07:58 / 13.11.07

You can argue any point, certainly. But you can't prove anything. Right and wrong are fairly hard to pin down, and if you pick your ethicists then I'm sure you could convince people to do pretty much anything.

But it doesn't prove anything. The signifier is not the signified. Sophistry isn't Truth.

If so... what is the point in having morals and/or opinions in the first place? Anyone can come around and change them unless you are dogmatic.

I don't think there is a "point" to having morals. Yu either believe something or you don't. And, hopefully, people can show you evidence and you can modify your views accordingly. Very rarely does someone rewrite your mind wholesale. Your ethics are a part of your worldview, which should change as you change. The fact they change doesn't invalidate them, it's just a thing that happens.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

09:05 / 13.11.07

The answer to the question Can you prove any point with linguistics? is "no, you can't," largely because linguistics is the scientific study of language.

The answer to can you prove any point by argument? is pretty much what Princess said above. You might, were you a skilled enough debater, persuade your interlocutor that some ludicrous statement was true or some heinous act permissable, as can be clearly seen by the state of the world today. What you can't do is prove your point if your point is untrue.

Good Intentions

00:20 / 14.11.07

Most sophist arguments are pretty spectacularly easy to blow out of the water anyway, as long you keep dotting your i's and crossing your t's. Sophistry normally relies on a lot of wallpaper to make people look past inadequacies in the structure.

If the argument doesn't jump to conclusions in that way, though, it isn't sophistry.