Appeal: fallacy spotted
From Jay Dyer vs Pastor P Debate Orthodoxy vs Protestantism, Sola Scriptura and Church History.
- #135253:53upheld Jay Dyer epainos: fallacy spotted (+2)
The council upheld the call: Jay Dyer earned 2 points.
“There's 30,000 protestant denominations, therefore, nobody knows which one is correct. That's a fallacy. The fact that there's a bunch of denominations has literally nothing to do with which one is true and which ones are false.”
Diogenes: Instead of merely naming the fallacy again, he demonstrates it by parity of reasoning — running his opponent's own inference form against his opponent's own position to show it proves nothing.- Aristotle uphold: On the record: Jay Dyer has held throughout that mere disagreement among churches/denominations is logically irrelevant to which position is objectively true, and that Pastor P's appeals to schism/consensus/blessing are unsupported assertions rather than arguments; this line is a continuation and sharpening of that standing critique, not a departure. Pastor P repeatedly argued from the fact of disagreement or schism ("who's to say which is right?", "there are thousands of denominations") as though disagreement itself bore on which side is true — a real move made across several exchanges, not a strawman. Jay's line at 53:53 correctly names this as a fallacy and, going beyond mere naming, demonstrates it by parity of reasoning: applying the identical inference form ("30,000 denominations, therefore nobody knows") to Protestantism itself to show the pattern proves nothing regardless of which side wields it. This is grounded in what the opponent actually said and adds a reductio, which is sound philosophical technique, not merely rhetoric.
- Socrates uphold: Read blind, found "fallacy spotted". Pastor P had just argued (and had argued earlier at the schism exchange) that because there are many rival Eastern branches/denominations disagreeing, one cannot say which is right ("who's to say he's right?"). Jay's parallel case—if 30,000 Protestant denominations existed, that fact alone would not tell you which is true—correctly identifies that Pastor P is treating mere disagreement/multiplicity as evidence against the knowability of truth, which is a non sequitur; the number of competing claims has no bearing on which claim is actually true or false.
- Plato uphold: On the record: Jay Dyer has held since the opening that the canon and tradition are established by historical/ecclesial fact rather than by private assertion or by the existence of disagreement, and this line is a direct application of that standing position against Pastor P's repeated 'who's to say' argument, not a departure from it. Pastor P's recorded line of argument (from ~29:00 onward, and restated at 53:xx) was that because there is deep disagreement — East/West schism, thousands of Protestant denominations, competing Catholic priests — nobody can say with certainty which position is right, and this is used to push back against Jay's claim to know the correct canon/tradition. Jay's response, quoted here, correctly identifies that the existence of disagreement (a psychological/social fact) does not bear on which position is objectively true (a logical point about the fallacy of arguing from disagreement to relativism/indeterminacy). This is not mere fallacy-naming in the abstract; it is applied directly to an inference Pastor P actually made in the transcript, and Jay explicitly shows the parity by pointing out the analogous case of 30,000 Protestant denominations. This fits "fallacy spotted" cleanly, and its centrality to the disagreement over canon justifies major severity.
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