Talk:Godwin's law/Archive 1

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Ratzinger's Law: "As a person born in Germany grows more famous, the probability of claims they were/are connected to Nazis approaches one"

Only the second article about the new Pope on the ABC web site mentioned the Nazi connection:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200504/s1349102.htm

Mr.Xion

Fitch's euphemistic inversion:

"As an online discussion group becomes more familiar with Godwin's law, the more likely it is that the law itself will be cited to infer an apposite comparison to Nazis or Hitler"

I think I may have found a corrolary - but I don't have a good name for it; maybe the 'watchers' of this entry can help. In discussing religion with Mormons, you run into a similar circumstance... As the length of the debate grows, the probability of the Mormon referring to the non-Mormon as 'anti-Mormon' approaches one. And, as is the case with Godwin's Law, once this has happened, the debate is essentially over with the Mormon automatically having lost. Calling someone 'anti-Mormon' gives the Mormon the self-perceived (or self-deceived) ability to attribute all of their criticisms to the non-Mormon's dislike of the religion and not to actual arguments.

What do people think?

To be honest, what you gave isn't actually a corollary, but a reformation of Godwin's law. The topic changed, but fundamentally it's the same law. Actually, it's a really good example of the kind of thing that's usually added to the article. Unfortunately, it's not really related to Godwin's law, and it's not really notable (especially if it doesn't exist yet).
However, thank you thank you thank you for going to the talk page before adding this. I wish everyone was like you. CXI 15:07, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)


Wouldn't Martin Luther King Jr's letter from the Birmingham jail invoke Godwin's Law? --Namtatw

I doubt that Godwin's law will change much in the next twenty years. One of the reasons the invocation of Nazism is such a potent destroyer-of-reason is that people learned about the Nazi regime when very young. Reasoning about what happened during the Nazi regime thus can bring about patterns of argument last heard in grade school. Until, and unless, the children in school today are taught about, for example, 9/11, in the same fashion, the invocation of such things in a debate will not be analysable in terms of Godwin's law.

I've sometimes wondered if there's a Godwin's Law equivalent statement relating to kiddie porn. These days it seems that the big scary issue on the Internet isn't Nazis anymore, it's child pornography. You want to call your opponent the worst thing you know of? You don't call him a Nazi anymore, you call him a child pornographer. One of the reasons why the RIAA is calling for the destruction of the file-sharing networks is because kiddie porn is supposedly being traded on there. The famous Penet remailer went down in the wake of media accusations of being used to post kiddie porn to newsgroups. Etc., etc., etc. Thanks to Godwin's Law, Nazis are old hat. The new Evil Enemy on the Internet now is kiddie porn -- so surely there's a Godwin's Law-like statement pointing that out. --Modemac 15:11, 19 Jan 2004 (UTC)

There's a growing school of thought that comparisons to 9/11 and related subjects should also be included.

There is a certain intention of the Godwin Law. To combat inappropriate use to stir controvery and to kill discussions.
Comparisons to terrorism are quite common. A godwin terror law often reveals a US centric dicussion, intrestrestingly it is not applied to terrorism comparisons by the US administration.
new meme forming on slashdot with regards to this post, and this comment. it's the same idea as Godwin's, just substituting 9/11 for nazis. relevant corollary, maybe?

Shouldn't this be related to the zero-one theorems in graph theory ? ;-) --FvdP 23:56, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one. - isn't this formulation very weak? One might argue that for non-circular (ergodic on subject-space) discussions, the probability of any subject at all being mentioned will approach one as the discussion lengthens. A 'strong' Godwin's law should read like approaches one exponentially or something ... or maybe I'm missing the point, and the law precisely states that, while (Lebesgue-)all discussions are circular, Nazis are on the trajectory of any discussion :-) Dbachmann 09:03, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Contents

Reinsertion

Revert isn't working, so I'm going to re-insert this paragraph: Note that when discussing with actual Nazis, Godwin's Law should not typically apply, as Hitler is bound to come up on one or the other side of the argument sooner rather than later. It is also interesting that, among Nazis, a "reverse Godwin's Law" exists where, as an argument devolves into a flame war, there is an increasingly greater probability that one or the other side will invoke a comparison to Jews as an insult, much the same as a comparison to Hitler or Nazis is regularly an insulting one. The justification for removing it, 'inaccuracy' is a little bit too vague for such a large slash, eh? Krupo 17:55, Sep 30, 2004 (UTC)

This works, but may need some explanation...I don't know of any online fora where avowed Nazis hang out (and would avoid it even if I did know). Is there an example? - 158.71.25.112 18:08, 1 Oct 2004 (UTC)
  • I suppose the paragraph is partially hypothetical, and partially an unconcious migration into regular F2F (face to face) dialogue. I also suddendly realize there is no article on "F2F," but do we need one? Hmm. Is it really necessary, though, to explain that analysis/observation, though, in light of the difficulty in finding online nazi hang-outs? Krupo 05:34, Oct 3, 2004 (UTC)

Thorndike's Theorum

This subject area is missing, in my opinion, possibly the most pervasive aspect of online discourse. I suggest adding something like the following:

Thorndike's Theorem: As an online argument grows longer, the probability of someone pointing out that one or more of the individuals on the other side of the argument are stupid, retarded, braindead, etc. in order to score points approaches one.

Axioms of Internet Discussion

quote: "The likelihood of a comparison between the intelligence of a proposition's defenders and that of its attackers is directly proportional to the length of the discussion, and approaches 1 as the number of posts approaches infinity."

That's saying that the comparison never happens; ie. It will only happen if the number of posts is infinity. Doesn't make sense.

Sure it does. Just because the likelihood of something isn't 100% doesn't mean it doesn't happen. --jpgordon{gab} 02:40, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Page bloat

There are a huge number of superflous corollaries and maxims on this page. Most of them are totally irrelevant to Godwin's law except to replace "nazi" with a different word and change the place/topic of discussion. Others are just rewordings of other laws on the list. This was taking up about half of the article with non-notability and vanity. For posterity, I've put them here in case someone has an interest in arguing for their inclusion or putting them somewhere where they're more relevant.

I've also removed the "even if you win you're still retarded" quote, because it's just a pointless copy-over from bash.org, and external links/references (well, okay, there's only one) to the laws outlined below. I included it underneath.

Removed Corollaries

Enki's Corollary
As an online discussion involving law grows, the probability of someone making a comparison involving the McDonald's coffee lawsuit approaches one.
Helmut's Corollary
As an online dicussion about the existence or nonexistence of God grows, the probability of someone mentioning a pink unicorn approaches one.
NialScorva's Law
Given enough time, all legal battles in the tech industry will invoke the DMCA.
Freiler's Maxim
Those that incorrectly invoke Godwin as proof that they have won the debate have in fact run out of relevant points to make, and have, by invoking Godwin, admitted defeat.
Cawley's Corollary
Given enough time, any thread on perl6-language will end up arguing the toss about Unicode operators.
Quiggin's subclause
In an Australian policy debate, whenever anyone refers to North Korea (or Cuba) as the exemplar of a policy which was in fact in force under Robert Menzies, they shall be deemed to have lost the debate automatically.
Sparc's Corollary
When the topic involves future developments, and as the discussion grows longer, the probability of a comment being made about how one's computer still not being able to vacuum one's house approaches one. After which the discussion probably ends in the posting of links to pictures of vacuum cleaners.
James' Corollary
As an online discussion about same-sex marriage grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Britney Spears' marriage approaches one.
Meldrum's Corollary
As a drawn-out online argument grows longer, the probability of someone picking up on typos or punctuation errors in order to score points approaches one.
Gaudere's Law
Any post made to point out a spelling or grammar error will invariably contain a spelling or grammar error. (This law originated in October, 2000 on the Straight Dope Message Board, and was proposed on behalf of Gaudere, a moderator and administrator there. Here is the thread in which it was officially named.) Like Godwin's Law, it has a previous claimant: in a 1990 Usenet posting, Andrew Bell claimed the concept as Bell's First Law of Usenet.
Koenig's Theory
No matter what the original subject of the conversation and regardless of what movie is being discussed, the probability of any and every thread on the IMDb message boards that becomes an ongoing discussion becoming an argument about America (pros, cons, etc.) reaches one.
de Mello Corollary
When the topic involves the corruption of conservative members of government the probability of Clinton being mentioned approaches 1.
First Axiom of Internet Discussion
The likelihood of a comparison between the intelligence of a proposition's defenders and that of its attackers is directly proportional to the length of the discussion, and approaches 1 as the number of posts approaches infinity.
Second Axiom of Internet Discussion
The likelihood of a derogatory reference to the sexuality of one's opponent is directly proportional to the length of a discussion, inversely proportional to the intelligence of the originator, and approaches 1 as the number of posts approaches infinity.
Third Axiom of Internet Discussion
As the length of a discussion grows, the likelihood one of the participants will tell the others that they need to "get a life" approaches 1.
Corollary to the Third Axiom
The person who first makes such a statement is generally the one who has taken the time to read - but not respond to - the entire previous discussion.
Frink's Corollary
We'll hook the frizzatz to the whatzamajigger and Mm-hai bw-ha whoa-hoa the colours children and there you have it.... Mtv.
trans: The thread will wither and die any time Mtv is used as a negative comparative.


Removed References

Ideology criticism

Nazi comparisons are nice to criticise ideological phrases that belong to the common consensus. Eg. the nazi party program said that an intented lie in the media shall be forbidden. The nazi comparison is based on the consensus that nazism is evil among all persons in the debate. Similar in earlier times bible sources were quoted to prove something as it has authorative powers over believers.

The fact why nazi comparisons are used is that they are so powerful.

Godwin's law just says you cannot compare it, but not the comparison itself is wrong. The only thing that's wrong is the intention behind the use of the argument to distract the debate, and that the other side is unable to respond as there is the common consensus behind. Gordon' law is just a workaround but it does not answer the comparison.


  • Under the heading Miller's Paradox, you say "citation to Godwin's" when I think you (or the author) means "citation of Godwin's". One cites something, or encounters a citation of something. On the other hand, one can make reference to something, or refer to it. Could we adjust the scrappy English? Brequinda 11:45, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Unfortunately, that's a direct quote and thus we can't adjust the scrappy english. "[sic]" afterwards might work, but for a minor grammatical point it doesn't seem worth the ugliness. CXI 09:00, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)