The Pilpul Method, Rules of Discourse, and Silencing (Column 317)

With God’s help

Disclaimer: This post was translated from Hebrew using AI (ChatGPT 5 Thinking), so there may be inaccuracies or nuances lost. If something seems unclear, please refer to the Hebrew original or contact us for clarification.

Riding the momentum from the previous column, I’ll continue to deal a bit with flaws in public discourse. I wish to address the phenomenon of rules of discourse, many of which are associated with the principles of political correctness (though not all). But before that, I’ll precede with a discussion that also has independent importance.

Between Ponevezh and Slabodka

Before I begin, I’ll note that everything described here refers only to the illustrious city of Bnei Brak. The Jerusalemites (students of Hebron, Mir, and Ateret) need not be offended.

In the past, when I taught at a yeshiva in Yeruham and also at a kollel in Bar-Ilan, I would open almost every academic year with a comparative description of two important yeshivot: Ponevezh and Slabodka (full disclosure/denunciation: I am close to the first stream). I told my students that in my anthropological observations during my Bnei Brak period I found two main differences between them: (1) The number of Roshei Yeshiva and ramim (maggidei shiur) who emerge from Ponevezh is incomparably greater than those who come out of Slabodka. (2) The Ponevezh method of study is algorithmic, while the Slabodka method is more intuitive and less analytical. The point of this description was to show the connection between these two characteristics. But before continuing to that, I’ll illustrate what these things mean.

During my years in Bnei Brak, I would go during vacations and festivals to hear lectures given by various Roshei Yeshiva around the city. I greatly enjoyed those classes and accumulated not a little erudition and scholarly skill from them (that was the core of my breadth-learning). By the end of my stay in the holy city of Bnei Brak I reached a point where, when a lecture began, I could tell you how it would proceed and even how it would end: which sources would be brought, what the difficulty would be, which nafka minot (practical ramifications) would be offered, and what the conclusion would be. And I am really not exaggerating. Clearly I didn’t immediately know all of those details, and sometimes it wasn’t entirely precise. But this is a description very close to the truth. I’ll note that most of those Roshei Yeshiva were Ponevezh-types or close to it. By contrast, during my time in Kollel Chazon Ish (which is more identified with the Slabodka camp; actually it’s the other way around—the Slabodka people are identified with the Chazon Ish) I found the opposite phenomenon. It was impossible to predict where the lecture would go. The speaker would raise possibilities to this side and that, not building a systematic and highly analytical structure. I couldn’t connect to their non-systematic, non-orderly thinking there. I really saw them as a kind of balabatish (layman-ish).

The algorithmic method of the Ponevezh people was created by Rabbi Shmuel—by default, Rabbi Shmuel Rozovsky—who combined the teachings of his two mentors, R. Chaim of Brisk and R. Shimon Shkop, and fashioned the yeshiva “ra’ayid” (that is, the canonical form of analyzing the sugyot, sources, distinctions, and divisions one should say in every topic). At first this was an oral Torah that passed into the world through his students, and the written Torah was only the “notebooks” of R. Yosef Rozovsky (his brother, who taught at “Or Israel”). After some time, printed volumes of lectures (shiurim) by Roshei Yeshiva and ramim appeared; then this spread more widely and became established, turning into an algorithmic scholarly template. I have a telling story in this regard.

Throughout my studies in the “Netivot Olam” yeshiva, I learned with one rabbi, who himself was a devoted student of R. Shmuel Rozovsky (who had passed away less than a decade earlier). One year we studied tractate Sukkah, and in the middle of the year the first volume in the series “Shiurei Rabbi Shmuel” (the daily shiurim—as distinct from the later series “Chiddushei Rabbi Shmuel” which contains the general lectures) on tractate Sukkah was published. When we began to read the book, an embarrassing situation arose. The shiurim we had heard from our maggid shiur were almost identical to what appears in the book. It was clear that our ram was copying from Rabbi Shmuel’s shiurim without attribution. We hesitated whether to raise the issue with him, and in the end, as the senior student, I mustered up the courage, approached him, and asked him to explain. He was astonished to hear that the book had been published, and then he was overjoyed. He told me he had never learned tractate Sukkah with Rabbi Shmuel. It turned out that the shiurim he himself had constructed and delivered on the tractate were identical to Rabbi Shmuel’s shiurim on those sugyot, without any direct connection between them. He had independently produced Rabbi Shmuel’s shiurim without knowing them. He was happy to hear this, since this empirical test proved to him that he had succeeded in internalizing his teacher’s method (the algorithm). I’ll note that in my eyes, imitation is neither an aspiration nor the pinnacle of success—only a very important stage along the way (see below). But for him it was an unexpected confirmation of his scholarship and the success of his learning. I tell this so you’ll see what algorithmic learning means and how deeply it is embedded and sticks to the learner.

Let’s return now to my opening talks. After the description, I would tell my students that there is a connection between those two traits: because the Ponevezh method is algorithmic, it succeeds in producing far more competent scholars. Imitating Rabbi Shmuel requires much toil and no small measure of talent, but not everyone has to be Rabbi Shmuel to reach a high scholarly level. One must work hard and internalize the method, and then one emerges as a Rosh Yeshiva (a bit exaggerated, but that’s the general idea). It’s an assembly line—a factory for Roshei Yeshiva and scholars—shaped in the image and likeness of Rabbi Shmuel. By contrast, those who study in the Chazon Ish’s manner each follow his own path. Someone who is not himself a Chazon Ish won’t advance much and will continue to flounder in his gut-level arguments this way and that (that’s what I saw at the Chazon Ish kollel, and I fumed). Systematic, algorithmic study succeeds in getting the best out of people and bringing them to a scholarly level close to the model they imitate. By contrast, the Chazon Ish demanded that his students learn with straight reason in their own way, and that is not a tried-and-true recipe for growth in Torah unless you yourself are an exceptional talent (and toil with great dedication) like the Chazon Ish. Not for nothing is it common on my tongue that there are two types of Chazon-Ish-niks: those who do everything that appears in the Chazon Ish’s books (usually the relatively new residents of Rashbam Street toward the Lederman synagogue), and those who do what they themselves think (R. Gedaliah Nadel and his circle, the older residents of Rashbam Street), just as the Chazon Ish himself did.[1] Needless to say, in my eyes there is no doubt that the second type are the true Chazon-Ish-niks (I myself, of course, am a Chazon-Ish-nik of the second type in all 248 limbs and 365 sinews, even if this appalls those of the first type; let the ear hear and the soul not faint).

And now, to my standard, predictable conclusion: both sides are of course mistaken. The proper prescription for success, as I told my students, is to start in Ponevezh and finish in Slabodka. When you begin your learning, it’s worthwhile to cleave to a great person and adopt his method—try to internalize his algorithms, actually imitate and apply them again and again in every sugya—until you reach strong scholarly skill. But after that you must move from the solid base you acquired and build—on top of it (and not in its stead)—your own upper story. As the Hasidim say: you must be Zusha and not Rabbi Shmuel (even if you don’t possess gifts like those of Rabbi Shmuel). Ponevezh’s mistake is that they start correctly but don’t believe in constructing the next story. Slabodka’s mistake is that they begin straight from story B without building it on a firm, solid foundation. It seems to me this is a paradigm for every Torah innovation (and beyond). It’s not right to build it instead of the previous stories but on top of them. Tradition has importance, though you know well that in my view it is not the end of the road. Tradition is dynamic. It must not be paralyzing, but it is certainly not superfluous. Note well.

The Pilpul Method, Aristotle’s Logic, and Yeshiva-Style Learning

Why did I bring all this? Apart from the intrinsic importance of this preface, it comes to show the advantages of algorithmic thinking. There’s an interesting booklet by Dov Rappel called The Debate over Pilpul, where he describes the pilpul method that flourished in Poland and Lithuania in the late Middle Ages and early modern era (“the method of distinctions,” associated with R. Yaakov Pollak, R. Shalom Shakhna, R. Heshel, and their students). Among other things, he notes there that the exponents of this method had a well-defined toolbox containing a set of fixed distinctions and divisions with names familiar to all aficionados of the genre. When you encountered a certain baraita in the Talmud, your study partner or ram could say, “That’s a Regensburger,” and didn’t need to add a word. Everyone would understand there is a specific type of difficulty here (for example, that a precise inference from the reisha yields the opposite of the inference from the seifa). Likewise, at the stage of answers you could hear statements like: “That’s a Ravensburger,” “Augsburger,” “Nuremberger,” and the like. This is a shorthand way to say that the distinction or division is such-and-such, without the need to spell it out.

This is a fixed, algorithmic structure of difficulties and answers that appears in many places and in diverse sugyot irrespective of content. Pilpul learners were equipped with a set of such terms/principles, and that saved them from having to explain their intent to one another anew each time. But it’s not only a didactic aid. This algorithmic toolbox also helped them formulate questions and answers themselves. Now one no longer needs to think up the difficulty or the answer independently, but can scan the toolbox and choose the rule that fits the situation. Of course I don’t mean that everything was done algorithmically and no talent was required. That would be an exaggeration. But it certainly helps the average learner reach difficulties and answers he probably wouldn’t have reached on his own.

This recalls, in a way, Aristotle’s conceptualization of the laws of logic. There too Aristotle noticed that across different domains of thought—irrespective of content—there are fixed formal structures that recur, and they can be conceptualized and addressed in their own right. Thus he built his logical toolbox (the set of syllogisms) and placed it at everyone’s disposal. Now I can flip through that toolbox and employ it in any field I wish without having to (and without being able to) reinvent the wheel. So too with yeshiva (Brisker) learning. There as well there is a fairly defined toolbox of questions and answers—an array of principles of Talmudic (and general intellectual) analysis—that recur across sugyot and contexts: siman vs. siba, cheftza vs. gavra, the fulfillment of the mitzvah vs. the act of the mitzvah, two-tiered halakhic structures (shnei dinim), and more. Now every learner can draw on tools from this toolbox that stand ready for him. One need not possess R. Chaim’s genius to do so.

A boon with a barb: “seeing far” or “seeing right through”?

Such a toolbox gives the educated and skilled learner the ability to use its tools and reach achievements beyond his measure (that is, beyond what he’d reach alone). Thus a dwarf can sit on the shoulders of giants and utter bold and complex innovations on various sugyot—even ones he has never studied. Someone who has gone through the intensive press of Rabbi Shmuel Rozovsky can deliver a very good general shiur on any sugya in Shas without having seen it beforehand (tried and true). You can imagine the air of importance in 15th-century Poland when a learned man would wave off a questioner with, “Why, that is an Augsburger,” a mild scorn and condescension on his face (as if: who doesn’t know that?! How can there be an idiot who asks such a simple question?!). So too in a 20th-century Lithuanian yeshiva or in 21st-century Israel: “Fine, that’s two dinim,” or: “This is a cheftza matter and that is a gavra matter.”

But there’s a barb here. People lacking real ability can appear to be great intellectuals by quoting and using various principles and terms. That would still be tolerable, since they are indeed saying something correct (even if they didn’t invent it). Yet it also happens that they employ these learned rules in an entirely mechanical way that doesn’t fit the circumstances. Sometimes the use of these rules elicits a chuckle from anyone who understands the matter. But the perplexed student sits opposite them, ashamed, admiring the know-it-all who brandishes the toolbox and moves within it as if at home. Such people may be dwarfs sitting on giants—but not always on their shoulders; sometimes on their hips. So they don’t necessarily “see far,” but sometimes rather “see right through” (i.e., transparently). Below we’ll see two types of using rules of discourse: one I’ll call “seeing far” (proper use) and the other “seeing right through” (demagogic misuse, or silencing).

Behold, after the preliminaries we’ve reached our topic.

Similar phenomena in the virtual world

In the intellectual world generally, there’s value to general education and familiarity with different schools and modes of thought. There too, familiarity with a broad toolbox can upgrade your ability to understand, argue, and innovate in various fields—even beyond your natural talent. I don’t say this as a criticism but as praise. Part of people’s talent is learning from others and drawing on what’s already known (not reinventing everything from scratch). Thus I’ve often noted that intellectuals tend to cite thinkers and approaches instead of making arguments. When you put forward a claim, they tell you: “That’s Humean” or “That’s Kantian,” and that’s it. No need to elaborate what follows from its being Humean; every educated person is supposed to know.

But as we saw above, here too there are people who use these toolboxes mechanically and incorrectly, all without letting it disturb the air of importance and scorn on their faces as they wave the known rule (which the idiot questioner didn’t know). Sometimes they label a claim “Humean” and don’t bother to explain why being Humean is bad. Sometimes Humeanism really is bad; yet it’s not even true that the claim in question is Humean. The problem with labels and toolboxes is the flip side of their benefit: the mechanical nature saves the need for reasoning (“seeing far”), but that very thing can lead to statements without basis—imprecise and unchecked (“seeing right through”).

We must understand that using such toolboxes presupposes a community aware of them and within which they can be jointly used. Go tell a contemporary Lithuanian learner that “this is an Augsburger.” He’ll open a pair of calf eyes and won’t understand what you’re saying. These toolboxes are the product of a defined community that understands and agrees on them. In the virtual world, communities constantly arise around worldviews and interests irrespective of geography, and thus a path opens for the emergence of almost universal toolboxes. The online community of web surfers or TV viewers are communities like any other, and it’s no wonder that relevant toolboxes develop there as well. It’s also no wonder you’ll find there quite a few instances of “seeing right through,” i.e., quoting a rule mechanically and inaptly just to shut someone up. Before coming to the toolbox at issue in our discussion, I’ll briefly bring several examples of rules of discourse to clarify the phenomenon in additional contexts.

God of the Gaps

The term God of the Gaps didn’t arise in the virtual age. It was already in use by the preacher Henry Drummond in the 19th century. But in my view it’s actually an example of a useful and correct rule of discourse. Believers tend to base belief in God on gaps in scientific knowledge. If science doesn’t know how to explain X, then there’s probably a God (He is the one doing it although it doesn’t accord with scientific laws). Against this, atheists raise the claim that one should not base belief in God on a gap in scientific knowledge. That’s “God of the Gaps.”

This phrase is nearly a mantra. The moment you hear an argument for God’s existence based on a scientific gap or lacuna, the atheist will immediately tell you this is God of the Gaps, and with that he ends the discussion at once. Seemingly this is silencing, since many believers really do think scientific lacunae prove God’s existence. And yet, in my view this is actually a good example of a rule of discourse, because such an argument is indeed problematic. Scientific knowledge is by nature cumulative. Much of what we know today wasn’t known a hundred years ago, and so on backward. Was God more existent a hundred years ago? What will happen if at some point we have complete scientific knowledge—will there then be no room for belief in God? It’s not plausible to base an argument about God’s existence on scientific knowledge at any given time, since it is a changing matter (a passing blemish).

The principle that God of the Gaps is not a legitimate argument is a very useful one for discourse. There’s no point in having to explain anew against each such argument why this type of argument is incorrect. That’s exactly why we have a toolbox and concepts, and it’s enough to pull from the toolbox the principle that this is a God of the Gaps argument—preferably with initials (GOG, the atheists’ Augsburger)—to end the discussion. It is therefore reasonable that our toolbox should include this rule.

But still, the use of this rule against arguments from the complexity of the world is not always correct. In my book God Plays Dice I explained that this rule is relevant to evidences within the laws. A natural phenomenon that has no scientific explanation (under the existing laws) is not evidence of God’s existence. But the argument from outside the laws (what I called “the argument from the laws”) is not exposed to an attack via GOG. When I base God’s existence on the structure of the laws of nature themselves (and not on an unexplained phenomenon within them), the God of the Gaps claim is irrelevant. The reason is that this scientific “gap” will probably never be filled. It is very likely that we will never succeed in explaining all the laws of nature without resorting to other laws of nature (were we to succeed, we would discover that the laws of nature are definitions or analytic-logical rules rather than synthetic laws of nature). This is an example of a failed use of a correct rule of discourse (“seeing right through” instead of “seeing far”). In this case, using GOG stems from error—or from a desire to silence in order to sidestep engaging the argument itself.

Godwin’s Law

Another example of a rule of discourse—this time from the virtual age—is Godwin’s Law. Mike Godwin formulated this rule in 1990, and it says roughly this: the longer an online discussion continues, the greater the likelihood that we’ll reach an example or analogy from Nazism, and in the end it approaches 1 (certainty). In that formulation, the “law” is descriptive, not prescriptive. In many discussions one side uses extreme examples from Nazism, since that seems an easy and powerful solution that can convince about almost anything.

Behind this rule stands the assumption that the extremity of a Nazi example usually renders it irrelevant to more normal situations. Beyond that, some understand that the point of raising the example is to hurt the other side (by likening his position to Nazism), or that it leverages negative feelings toward Nazism to persuade instead of arguments on the merits. And thus the descriptive law became a rule of discourse. Today, in various online precincts, the accepted rule (and that’s what’s called Godwin’s Law) is: the party to a discussion who reaches an example or analogy from Nazism has lost the debate. Many end the discussion at that point (like Zehava Galon and rape in the previous column).

This is, of course, an obviously faulty rule of discourse. Examples by nature tend toward extremes. When you want to sharpen a concept, you illustrate it in an extreme case where agreement is easier to reach. There is therefore nothing wrong with bringing a parallel or example from Nazism (or from a case of rape) to sharpen some principle or idea—provided the analogy is relevant. For instance, if a person claims that every person should be judged by his own system (and not by an objective yardstick), then it is indeed relevant to ask whether he would say that about the Nazis as well. By the way, he shouldn’t be intimidated by the example; he can certainly answer yes. He can also answer that the Nazis are extreme and he’s speaking only about normal cases (for my part I don’t see the logic there, but it’s only an example). Such a discussion is entirely relevant, and the Nazi example is very good. Anyone who tries to end the discussion by wielding Godwin’s Law as a rule of discourse simply tries to silence the other side rather than engage his arguments. Again, recall Zehava Galon. This is a common escape method for those whose arguments run out when faced with the crushing example against them. In that case he simply takes offense and declares that resorting to Nazis ends the discussion, or violates the rules of political correctness.

I would therefore classify Godwin’s Law as a failed rule of discourse, in contrast to GOG (God of the Gaps). That rule is generally irrelevant and is therefore intended to silence when substantive arguments have run out. It’s the weapon of the weak—or the losers.

The postmodern gagging toolbox

In postmodern discourse (i.e., the moving of lips), there are many faulty rules of discourse whose main point is to look wise and enlightened while at the same time shutting the mouth of your interlocutor without resorting to arguments (Heaven forfend). Concepts and labels like exclusion, condescension, narrative, discourse, marginalized groups, research findings, or “what scholars say” (cf. “homosexuality is not a disease”), in many cases are not substantive arguments but tools for silencing the other side. Instead of arguing, they take offense and accuse you of exclusion, religious coercion, paternalism, and so on. Just to sharpen: the accusation of pragmatism, for example, is in my view a correct and relevant rule of discourse. An argument that bases a claim on its utility or its good outcomes is generally a poor philosophical argument, so raising the label “pragmatism” against it to end the debate is entirely substantive. There are many more rules of discourse; I’ll illustrate one more that was born not long ago and is less known: whataboutism.

Whataboutism

Whataboutism is a rule of discourse that disqualifies comparisons. Usually they are made to point out hypocrisy or inconsistency in the claimant (and so it’s part of the family of fallacies that address the person—ad hominem). Suppose Reuven accuses Shimon of doing or thinking X, and Shimon answers that he (Reuven) does that himself. Seemingly this is not a substantive argument, since even if Reuven acts or thinks that way, it doesn’t mean X is an acceptable thought or action; therefore it doesn’t defend Shimon. It’s an irrelevant move meant to shut the critic up when you have no substantive defense. For example: Reuven accuses Shimon of being stingy, and Shimon replies that Reuven himself is stingy. Does that mean Shimon isn’t stingy? Seemingly this is a non-substantive argument that merely silences. In such a case Reuven should answer: that’s whataboutism—i.e., you raised the irrelevant maneuver of “what about you?!”

But of course there are situations in which such a move can be justified. For instance, if one wants to show that this is a reasonable and normative phenomenon found in many people and illustrates it through Reuven himself (who also behaves that way). Alternatively, sometimes the discussion is about the phenomenon itself. For example, people on the Left accuse people on the Right of violent behavior. The claim that the Left is also violent is not germane. But if a person on the Left claims that the Right is more violent than the Left, then it is indeed reasonable to raise examples of violence from the Left, and that would be highly relevant. If the person on the Left replies that this is whataboutism, that would be an unfair use of the rule—meant to silence instead of engage. In most cases, the use of this rule of discourse is “seeing right through,” not “seeing far.”

It is interesting to note that there are expressions of this rule in the legal and halakhic realms. The legal rule that rejects selective enforcement is also apparently related to whataboutism. The legal system doesn’t see it as legitimate to go after person A but not person B who does the same thing (“what about him?!”). Of course, this doesn’t prove that A is fine (listening, Bibi?), but as a legal rule it has logic because it prevents persecution for ulterior motives. Therefore this legal rule says nothing about the substantive status of this type of move as a rule of discourse.

And in the halakhic context, the Sages advise us, “Adorn yourself first and afterward adorn others” (Bava Batra 60b), and seemingly they come to prevent a defense that relies on whataboutism. If you cleanse yourself of the flaw in which you accuse your fellow, he won’t be able to slip away with the claim that you’re the same (if you adorn yourself first, he can’t retort: adorn yourself first!). But note that there’s no statement here that such a defensive claim is legitimate—only an indication that in practice, people have a (bad) tendency to use it. When you come to rebuke someone, you should take into account that people defend themselves with evasive, silencing moves like “adorn yourself first,” and therefore prepare accordingly. That doesn’t mean that when someone attacks me for speaking lashon hara, the argument that he does it too is a legitimate defense. Definitely not (except in the senses I sketched above).

In this critique of whataboutism, Naveh Dromi (called, not coincidentally, the “female Gadi Taub”) raises another point. When Shimon answers Reuven’s critique with “and what about you?!” (what about you?!), and Reuven dismisses it as whataboutism, then even if Reuven’s claim is relevant (in the cases I described above), he still hasn’t explained why there truly is a difference. The example she brings is that when the Left defends the Supreme Court’s acting differently toward settlers and toward other populations by claiming “that’s whataboutism,” it may be right. One can argue that settlers who sit on private land should be evacuated—irrespective of what is done with others (and one can debate that too; not our topic here). But at the same time, note that there is still no explanation of why the Court really acts that way.

Dromi also notes that the accusation of whataboutism usually rises from the Left toward the Right, which brings us back to PC culture and postmodernism.

Back to PC

Why is a rule of discourse like whataboutism used mainly on the Left side of the political-ideological map? One can more generally wonder why this whole discussion is connected to PC at all. After all, rules of discourse—both proper and improper—existed long beforehand, and clearly they are used by all political and ideological sides. Indeed, as I’ve already written, the connection is not direct and not always correct, but still, at least de facto, there appears to be a connection. You can see it in the fact that within PC there are many such silencing rules of discourse—far more than before. Not for nothing does Dromi note that this rule is mainly used by people on the Left.

I think the explanation is that PC culture focuses on words instead of facts (on pointing rather than pointing-to), and tends to settle arguments through words and labels instead of ideas and arguments. In this sense, the phenomenon of rules of discourse whose purpose is silencing—under the guise of enlightenment and intellectualism—is certainly part of this. These are code names for concepts or claims that are not done or can’t be said. Why? Usually simply because I don’t have a good answer to them (cf. “Zehava Galon and Libeskind” from the previous column). But in postmodern terms, I don’t need an answer—since there is no truth and no right or wrong. What matters is what may or may not be said: the rules of the narrative.

A rule of discourse that arises in order to silence is a tool that uses terminological tags instead of arguments, and is therefore expected within a discourse that doesn’t believe in arguments and claims. In this sense there is indeed a phenomenon that belongs to the PC and postmodern age, though of course it existed earlier as well. Godwin’s Law is not tied to PC nor to the internet. That rule is relevant outside the net as well, and yet it’s no accident that it arose in the internet age and is mainly used in PC culture. The same goes for whataboutism. No doubt such moves are as old as human debate. And yet the rule was conceptualized and entered common use in the PC age. This set of rules constitutes a toolbox for the average PC adherent and stands at his disposal whenever he has no substantive answer. In such a case he has nothing left but to pull one of the rules and shut his interlocutor up. Anyone familiar with the genre knows this happens all the time, and these rules are minted at a pace that is very hard to keep up with (“the bastards changed the rules and forgot to tell me”—see the previous column).

A look at logical fallacies

I mentioned that silencing rules were used in the past as well and that they are certainly not the sole province of the postmodern Left. The labels “heretic” or “apostate” in religious discourse serve the same purpose (see column 74). Silencing rules appear in every group framework that wants to protect positions that are hard to defend. In this context, it is fitting to note that many of the fallacies of the “ad _” type that appear at the beginning of every logic book—unrelated to the internet or to postmodernism or PC—are also, in some sense, silencing rules. I won’t go into detail here about these fallacies, but I’ll try to illustrate and briefly explain my claim.

About thirty years ago a friend, his friend, and I planned to write a book on rhetoric and faulty reasoning. We began working on fallacies and quickly discovered that most of them are not fallacies at all. Take, for example, the ad hominem fallacy (attacking the person) and in particular appeals to authority, which are a special case of ad hominem. For instance: Reuven says that even Einstein believed in God; therefore it’s reasonable to believe in Him. In logic this is treated as the fallacy of appealing to authority. Einstein has no special authority on belief in God. But it’s important to remember that Einstein was by all accounts a wise man with superb abstract thinking. He excelled in drawing abstract conclusions from reality and possessed an extraordinary metaphysical intuition (e.g., regarding space and time). It is therefore quite reasonable to give some weight to his opinion on such a topic. Suddenly we realized it is simply not right to see such an argument as a fallacy. Of course, Einstein need not be right; but it is an argument with some weight. And so we saw with many other “fallacies” as well (and among other reasons, we eventually abandoned the book).

One must understand that logic books define every argument whose conclusion does not necessarily follow from its premises as a fallacy. But in everyday discourse, such a thing is not necessarily a fallacy. In life we use analogies, inductions, and other “soft” arguments (whose conclusions are not necessary but plausible). In these cases, the conclusion indeed doesn’t follow necessarily, but there’s no reason to dismiss it so long as it is plausible—or at least carries some weight. Our sense then was that, in many cases, people point to these fallacies even in ordinary discourse (not in a strict logical context), and then it appears to be done merely to silence. When someone says that Einstein believed in God—or conversely, someone claims that most people with high academic education don’t believe in God—the targets of these claims immediately dismiss them as appeals to authority. But these are claims that deserve consideration (not necessarily true, of course; there can be other reasons). It’s not right to reject them out of hand and declare them automatically to be a fallacy.

Remember (I elaborated on this in my books, especially Two Carts and Truth and Not Stable) that within postmodern discourse, a non-necessary argument is an illegitimate one. If it has premises (as every argument does), or if one can simply disagree with it, that itself is treated as a counter-argument that shuts the door on it. Therefore these folks mainly play with words and definitions without arguing anything. After all, there are no arguments without premises, and there are no claims one cannot dispute (perhaps except for that claim itself).

Undoubtedly among these are genuine fallacies as well—such as appeals to emotion or condemnation of a view (instead of raising arguments against it). For example: to say about a claim in physics that “this is Jewish physics,” or to say about some fact or datum that “this is racism,” and so forth—those are fallacies par excellence, not only in logic. The use of them cannot be considered silencing but rather a substantive argument. That’s the “seeing far” use of fallacies. Not every use of fallacies as rules of discourse is “seeing right through.”

PC itself as a rule of discourse

In light of what I’ve described, it’s easy to see that classifying some claim as PC is itself a kind of silencing rule. Once upon a time, when you raised a politically incorrect claim, some would flash the red card at you: that claim is politically incorrect. Today this is almost gone (as far as I know), and the wheel has turned. Now the term “PC” has become a red card against the PC gang itself (as we said in the previous column: measure for measure). When someone raises a non-substantive claim, he’s accused of being PC and the discussion ends. That is, referring to a given claim as PC itself becomes a silencing rule.

In my opinion this rule of discourse is one of those that are indeed correct at base. That is, PC claims truly are non-substantive and therefore fail, and it’s fitting to raise that as an argument against them. That’s a “seeing far” use of a rule of discourse. Of course, sometimes such claims can be raised as a warning about discourtesy or hurting people. In such a case that is at least legitimate (even if not necessarily admissible), and then it’s not right to dismiss it by saying it’s PC.

But like all the rules we’ve seen, this one also has imprecise uses (“seeing right through”). One example, in my view, appears in Chayuta’s comments among the first responses after the previous column (see my reply to her words here). She argued that there is some place for certain PC rules because they advance positive matters and values (the status of women and Black people), and beyond that she claimed there is room for demands about politeness and avoiding hurting people. She added that only when there is extreme and ridiculous use of PC rules is there room for my critique of the genre. In my comments there I answered that the demand to speak and behave politely is not worthy of being called PC. Rules of etiquette existed beforehand, and it’s reasonable to demand that a person behave politely toward others (by the way, that of course doesn’t mean he’s wrong). That’s not an invention of PC adherents. Codes of politeness become PC only where they are extreme and ridiculous. Therefore the rejection of PC as such is indeed in place.

The whole point in the war against PC is that people use demands for polite conduct in unreasonable, absurd, and ridiculous ways. They manufacture offense out of nothing, for no reason, or declare certain arguments illegitimate (the two types of PC described at the beginning of the previous column) and then demand that I take them into account—thus trying to shut me up. In short: when they demand that I not tell a person to his face that he’s fat and ugly—that’s not a PC rule. That’s an elementary demand of politeness (even if it’s true that he’s fat and ugly. And again: even where the use is justified, the demand for politeness says nothing about the substance). When they demand that people not discriminate against Black people—that’s an elementary demand. But when they demand that we not present data showing that Black people/women/LGBTQ people are disadvantaged or culpable in some area—even when the matter is based on facts and sound reasoning—there, and only there, politeness turns into PC; and as such it should be rejected out of hand. That is a rule of silencing, not a rule of politeness. When they demand that one not mention a case of rape or compare to it—even where the comparison is warranted—that is a PC rule of shutting mouths. Are you listening, Zehava?

[1] By the way, for the adept: one can further divide the second type into two subtypes—those who do what they themselves think because the Chazon Ish said to do so, and those who do so because they understand that this is what one should do, exactly as the Chazon Ish understood.