Grift Tactics

Episode 53 - Grift Tactics

Hijacking Occam's Razor: Escalate the level of complexity about a topic until it reaches a level which is unknown by the other party, then declare that the other party doesn't know what they're talking about. In the confusion, insert your own narrative that is always much simpler. The simpler narrative almost always fails to account for all knowable observations but to most people it is good enough. The trick attempts to hijack Occam's Razor to make it *appear* as though the inserted, simpler narrative is more correct. It fails because for Occam's Razor to apply *all* observations must be accounted for in both explanations.

Gishgallop is a method of speaking in which someone makes a large number of claims in a very short time. Usually the large number of claims cannot possibly be debunked quickly enough and it looks like some are undebunkable to the casual listener. This is also known by other names: Firehose facts. The most effective counter to this is the Miyagi Defense: don't let it happen at all (best defense not be there).

Word salad is a collection of large, unwieldy words that are usually spoken in a smooth stream very quickly and become inaccessible to most audiences. It is used by the pretentious to sound more intelligent than anyone else in the room. Jordan Peterson is the third degree black belt in this style of debate.

Links
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gish_gallop
https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/steve-kirsch-and-brandolinis-law/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_salad
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharon_A._Hill