Borislav Ivanov is BACK!

fburton

In money bridge each player gets a bridge playing robot for a partner.

[similar to a chess engine in chess but in bridge the robot can bid or play one hand very well but the next hand bid or play really badly]

The chess playing robot is called "gib" and each player has a separate "gib"

The problem with the gibs [there are a lot of them] is that they are not consistent at all. Their over all strength is equivalent to maybe a 1700 player in chess. But on any one hand the gib can play at say 1000 strength  to maybe a 2300 strength.   Unlike chess engines which do not have such a difference from one move to another or one game to another.

Gibs are not programmed very well. 

Thanks for the explanation, ponz111 - bridge is a game I know very little about, and "money bridge" was completely new to me.

A slippery slope is not a fallacy, but it can be one. You will have to decide that every time you see a slippery slope. Two famous situations in which slippery slopes do not have to be fallacies:

1. juridicial precedents,

2. that butterfly in China causing a storm in Chicago.

The whole thread about Borislav Ivanov is about a valid slippery slope argumentation:

if we are not able to stop cheating in chess done by players on a low level when they are suddenly performing better than the best chess players in the world (indifferent if Borislav Ivanov is a cheater or not), how can we then rely on the trustworthiness of chess performances by the GMs? Isn't that the end of the game?

That is a valid slippery slope argumentation. A slippery slope becomes a fallacy when you can not prove the possible existence of a causal relationship between the starting premisse and the far fetched conclusion.

If your friend could point out to the staff of chess.com where his variation was published in a book, then would I expect that his ban will be undone.

"A slippery slope is not a fallacy, but it can be one."

Slippery slopes are always a fallacy on the internet.  "It's just a slippery slope to [blah]" is an internet meme that means "[blah] is inevitable".  If I could wipe that phrase off the face of the earth, I would do it.  Of course, even worse would be to hear someone's logical justification of their slippery slope. 

"If your friend could point out to the staff of chess.com where his variation was published in a book, then would I expect that his ban will be undone."

Well, you can expect all you want but the reality is different.  I bet that almost nobody has been resurrected from that cheaters list (of course that is because nearly all of them were cheating and I play with cheaters here all the time.  Try playing 15/10 chess at the 1800 level or so here.  IM Danny Rensch had an 1800 rating playing 15/10 chess...). 

We agree on the troubles with cheating.  On chess.com, I just want to play chess because there is no money involved in it and no adult should feel especially proud of beating me at chess. 

15/10 at any rating

@chiaroscuro62: haha, very funny to say that an argumentation is a fallacy when it is on the internet. Ok, ok, I can do that too: I never heard a good counter argument against my statements on the internet. That is why I am always right. :-)

Good to read that we agree on something. :-)

You are surely right Loek.  There is no question that a slippery slope with logical connections etc can be a decent argument.  I never see it and think it is the second most misused phrase on the internet which is why I would never use it ("hypocrite" is the worst). 

We have another point of agreement: it is very hard indeed to make proper use of a slippery slope. I tend to avoid it too, because I do not consider it a strong type of argumentation. It fails easily to the first counter argument of Schopenhauer: exaggeration.

Every classroom teacher can cite examples of a slippery slope that can be demonstrated. Whether logical or not may be debatable, but in classroom discipline, if you give kids an inch, they will take a mile.

Arguments are either persuasive or not, and are embedded in human discourse involving facts, logic, metaphors, and stories -- the rhetorical Tetrad.

Limiting ourselves to the so-called logic of slippery slopes is just an excuse for speaking narrow-mindedly.  Schopenhauer, notwithstanding.  Sorry.

Thanks for the breath of sanity, @Ziryab.  Simple and straightforward.  You persuade.

@zborg: it is a beautiful example of Ziryab and very straightforward, but it is not an argumentation. Chiaroscuro62 and I did never say that the practice of a slippery slope did not exist outside the field of argumentation. The analogy of a slippery slope comes from the real world in which it can be proven to exist.

Just as there is no unicorn is there no analogy of the fallacy of the double horned unicorn. It is highly unlikely that what does not exist in the real world, will be used as an analogy for a common fallacy, because our brains work on association. It is difficult to make associations with something that does not exist.

But if you would like to make use of the fallacy of the double horned unicorn, be my guest. :-)

A nothing is as good as a something about which nothing can be said.

You sorely need to write more concisely, @Loek.  Please make a note of it.

If a, then b. Not an argument. Hmmm.

I have no idea what they are going to do, but I have a feeling you are right.

@zborg: I didn't reacted to those sentences:

Limiting ourselves to the logic of slippery slopes is just an excuse for speaking like a pinhead.  Schopenhauer, notwithstanding.  Sorry.

because I can't make any juice of it. I did not see any relation to what was written before. If that is the price of concise writing, then will I prefer to write some more elaborate. I love to exchange information.

The sentence 'You sorely need to write more concisely, @Loek' has two opposites messages for me:

1. you should write shorter posts,

2. I think that you want to write shorter posts.

I think that the sentence

A nothing is a good as a something about which nothing can be said

should be:

A nothing is as good as a something about which nothing can be said.

Am I correct?

I guess that you gave it a try to present an argument in the shape of the double horned unicorn? Beautiful!

@ziryab: Your example is a description of a causal relationship, but it is not a logical argument.

I suppose that's an important distinction. But wouldn't most slippery slope arguments be considered simple observations by both speakers and those persuaded?

If we let government manage health care, we will become socialists.

Simple cause -- effect to most Americans.

(I realize that as a nation we reveal appaling deficiencies in our factual grasp of the world and in our logic.)

Focus on a typo.  Great thinking Brainiac, @Loek.

But thanks for the correction.  No one is as logical as your Lordship, but it sure sounds like a Dutch disease.  

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/spell-check?page=4

@Daeth (from about 9 months ago) was great example of an engine user, who engendered massively long threads on the London System, with an early h4 by white.

Thousands of posts ensued before he admitted to the deed and was banned.  He (apparently) loved the limelight in the forums.

My new favorite circular argument:

Someone does not believe you that you can find two thirds of a number by multiplying the number by 2 and dividing by 3.

1*n=n

(2/3)*n+(1/3)*n=n

(2/3)*n= n-(1/3)n

2/3n=2/3n

Therefore, to find two thirds of any given number, multiply that number by 2/3.

The reasoning is circular. In case you failed to notice, subtracticing 1/3 multiplied by n from n to get 2/3 of n assumes that multiplying n by one third of n results in one third of n. Thus you assumed what you set out to prove was true was true in the proof itself. I like this example of a circular argument because it contains all true statements, is considered commonsense by everyone over the age of 8 and most people will fail to notice the logical fallacy.

Logic is not all its cracked up to be.

is logic?