This was really interesting. I think I still feel some confusion about why Van Til's arguments are ad hominems...it would seem to me, along the lines of logic you're proposing, all claims of logical fallacy would be claims of some sort of inconsistency. And so, all logical fallacy claims would then be ad hominem. What am I missing?
Van Til’s arguments are ad hominem because they fundamentally attack the man: they use his contradictory assumptions to point out his illogical thinking and self contradiction. I believe he focuses here on the man— the illogical thinker— rather than the beliefs themselves, using the beliefs as downstream evidence to point upstream to the man’s poor quality of thought.
This was really interesting. I think I still feel some confusion about why Van Til's arguments are ad hominems...it would seem to me, along the lines of logic you're proposing, all claims of logical fallacy would be claims of some sort of inconsistency. And so, all logical fallacy claims would then be ad hominem. What am I missing?
Van Til’s arguments are ad hominem because they fundamentally attack the man: they use his contradictory assumptions to point out his illogical thinking and self contradiction. I believe he focuses here on the man— the illogical thinker— rather than the beliefs themselves, using the beliefs as downstream evidence to point upstream to the man’s poor quality of thought.