9. Logical Fallacies: The Strawman

Eight, the strawman fallacy.

This happens all too many times. Strawman fallacy is when a person misrepresents his opponent's position and then proceeds to refute the misrepresentation, the strawman, rather than what his opponent actually claims.

Sometimes evolutionists will say something along these lines, creationists do not believe that animals change, but clearly animals do change, so creationists are mistaken.

Now what's wrong with that argument? What a creationist doesn't believe is that it changes from one kind to another.

The fact that animals change is apparent. I mean, there's a whole industry created for designer dogs, right?

You know, you get a poodle with a labrador, you get a poodle with a bernie, everything's a something doodle, right?

Because poodles don't shed and they're smart and well we got to get the poodle in there. So that doesn't create a different species, still a dog, okay?

So we do believe in change and you know variations in fur, color, height, all that kind of stuff, but the dog doesn't become a cat.

A lot of people will say, well you know chimpanzees have 96 percent the same

DNA as a human being. So my next question usually is, okay would you get a blood transfusion from them?

Think about this, you can't even get a blood transfusion from some other women depending on some other human being based on your blood type.

A, A, B, O, you know there's so many different types even within the human species. If you get a different blood and that could cause major problems.

So just because something has 96 percent the same DNA doesn't mean they share a common ancestor.

What I would say is, well you say they share a common ancestor, I say they share a common creator. So since creationists do believe that animals change, just not from one basic created kind to another, the argument is a straw man fallacy.

The straw man does not refute what creationists actually claim. It may be unintentional or it could be that a particular evolutionist simply misunderstands what a creationist is teaching.

If the fallacy is deliberate, then it's a dishonest approach, yet it's quite common in debates.

Here's an example, they're flat earthers, they don't believe in science, they don't believe in change.

If only these creationists had a brain. As Christians, what is one of the biggest straw men that that people hit us with?

Especially from, I'll give you a hint, Jehovah's Witnesses. You believe in three gods,

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father is God, the Holy Spirit is God, Jesus is God, that's three gods.

Is that what we believe? No, no. We believe in one God in three persons, right?

One essence, one being, three subsistences. So they look at us and they say you believe in three gods, that's a straw man, okay.

So they represent your view this way, you believe in three gods, and then they knock it down.

See, see how easy that was? And that's what you have to be careful for. So basically it goes like this, this is how to do a straw man fallacy.

First, you ignore the real argument, you create a pretend argument, the straw man, you defeat the pretend argument, and you claim victory over the real argument.

Then you do a victory dance. See, our position is better because I just annihilated your whole position.