[pierrebai]

I wish I'd find it curious the extreme negativity toward the essay, but unfortunately it fits with my world view of people in general: they'll approve of things that concord with their own opinions and interpret everything through the prism of what they already believe.

The essay is labelled ad-hominem by many, even though it provides a cogent argument and multiple supporting facts. Of course, to take an example, the question of the enterpreneur as a luminary and an exploiter depends greatly on what you already believe. I happen to already think that Facebook, Google and co are exerting bad influence, holding and using information they collect about everyone to their own advantage. Others, like Uber, are easy to be thought as direct exploiters.

The attacks on Arc and Bel and succinctness are also argued with factual arguments. (Arguments that I happen to agree with; bias, bias...).

In the end, the essay posits a simple thing: that behind all the pseudo-theoretical posturing underlying PG essays, they are mere opinions pieces.

[SoylentOrange]

I would like to add for the folks saying this is an ad-hominem that using Paul Graham’s own “hierarchy of disagreement” pyramid [1], this is at least at the level of Refutation, putting it 4 solid rungs above Ad-Hominem.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(programmer)#/medi...

[jdlshore]

I’m going to hijack this comment to repost a link to “The Ad Hominem Fallacy Fallacy,” a favorite essay of mine. Anybody who thinks this article is an ad hominem should read it. It’s short and fun.

https://laurencetennant.com/bonds/adhominem.html

[wellpast]

To the ‘ad hominem fallacy’ people: the opening paragraph states its entire motivation and thesis: Pg’s recent ‘reactionary’ political views and then purports to figure this out.

Then it mentions nothing more about said views instead - yes - launching into an ornate argument about PG’s technical ideas from a decade ago to conclude that PG is an ‘unserious intellectual’, with the hope that its original thesis has been settled.

That’s ad hominem - don’t be fooled by the bloated, foot-noted middle.