Originally Posted by Brian Ratliff
I wish that the other thread hadn't disappeared on us. There was some boarish behavior, but HH's IQ/bike lane myth was thoroughly debunked. To review, it turns out that his argument looked like this:
Made up IQ number he believed in = Conclusion he believed in
It is a unique arguement because it is both circular and non sequitur at the same time. Any evidence he brought to the table was anecdotal and utterly disconnected from any IQ numbers. The IQ number was pulled out his arse and the connection between that IQ number and his "anecdotal evidence" was not made.
The circular part is the "I believe it, therefore, I believe it" aspect. The non sequitur part is the boarish behavior = "pro bike lane" => low IQ = "pro bike lane" argument (non sequitur because IQ has no bearing on whether a person is behaving boarishly or not).
In the end, HH had lowered the bar on his argument so far, that all one had to do to refute it completely was to say "this doesn't ring true for me."
The only thing that was debunked in that thread was your claim that I even presented an argument.
But I can restate my original hyper-qualified surmising "wondering out loud" if you want.
Consider that most people have an IQ of 110 or lower.
That might have something to do with explaining why bike lanes have some of the popular support that they have.
That's it, more or less. What the gibberish above has to do with this, much less how it shows that my "wondering out loud" is somehow an argument (an argument concluding what exactly?), and how it debunks it, I have no idea.
There were a few posts about why I chose to wonder about 110 rather than 105 or 115, as if that was relevant to anything.