Sneering at people with less formal education is class-based prejudice

Great Debates
106

You could reduce my argument to formal syllogisms, but I think formal syllogisms only recognize universal affirmative, universal negative, particular affirmative, and particular negative. You would have to reduce my defeasible propositions to particulars. If that helps identify my error, have at it:

Main Argument (form: EIO)

  1. Prejudice is never reasonable. (axiom)
  2. Sneering at people with less formal education is generally reasonable.

    (form: IAI)

    1. Speaking to or about people with less formal education, with the attitude that their opinions are inferior, is generally reasonable.

      (form: AII)

      1. Speaking to or about people who are less credible, with the attitude that their opinions carry less weight (are inferior), is reasonable. (ignoring politeness, this is the axiom of credibility)
      2. People with less formal education are generally less credible. [Speaking to or about people with less formal education, with the attitude that their opinions carry less weight, is generally speaking to or about people who are less credible, with the same attitude.]
      3. Therefore, speaking to or about people with less formal education, with the attitude that their opinions are inferior, is generally reasonable.
    2. Sneering at people with less formal education means speaking to or about them with the attitude that their opinions are inferior. (axiom)
    3. Therefore, sneering at people with less formal education is generally reasonable.
  3. Therefore, sneering at people with less formal education is generally not prejudice.

(Click premises to expand/collapse a sub-argument. There are caveats that I didn’t write in for the sake of brevity: politeness, specificity of education or credibility to a given topic, explicit exceptions to general rules.)

Regarding point i: it is fallacious to assume someone is wrong because they seem less credible, when the claim does not rest on credibility. That’s ad hominem. There’s a total disconnect between veracity and credibility. But there’s still a place for reasonable contempt when an opinion is less credible. Sneering is a form of contempt or disdain, but it usually isn’t implied that a person is wrong simply because they lack credibility.

Regarding point ii: it follows from: people with more formal education on a given topic are generally more credible on that topic (than people with less education on the topic). This isn’t fallacious denial of the antecedent. Either A is greater than B and B is less than A, or A is not greater than B and B is not less than A.

An Analogy

A is known to have attained a black belt, B is known not to. The black belt attests to A’s martial arts prowess, granted that strictly speaking, it says absolutely nothing about the martial arts prowess of B. But for all practical purposes, I am justified making an initial assumption that A is a more capable fighter than B on account of A’s certificate alone.

This is because the black belt is evidence of capability which the other person lacks. All other things equal, there is more evidence that A is a capable fighter. People with formal martial arts training are probably better martial arts fighters than people without training. The inverse necessarily follows: people without formal training in martial arts are probably less capable than trained martial arts fighters.

People with more formal education on a given topic are generally more credible (on that topic) if and only if people with less formal education (on the topic) are generally less credible (on the topic). Strictly speaking, yes, there are people without formal education who are more credible on a given topic. Or even most topics. Expertise is only one component of credibility, and education is only correlated with expertise. But my conclusion is conditional. I mentioned the expert and genius exceptions already. Sneering at people with less formal education usually isn’t prejudice.

~Max