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Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by jlawson on Friday April 12, 2019 @09:47PM (#19650555)
"Slippery slope" is not a fallacy. Life is full of slippery slopes in terms of behavior.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by dymk on Friday April 12, 2019 @09:57PM (#19650590)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope#Non-fallacious_...

No, that still falls into fallacious usage.

The user doesn't justify why the steps of their assertion follow after the other. Just that they... do.

Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by steve_taylor on Friday April 12, 2019 @10:44PM (#19650791)
No one needs to justify the "why" when we're talking about a very well trodden slippery slope.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by dymk on Friday April 12, 2019 @11:13PM (#19650883)
Fallacies don't just stop applying when it's convenient to elide justification.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by Sir_Substance on Friday April 12, 2019 @11:26PM (#19650932)
That's true. However, we also don't collect history for the fun of it.

Over the course of the last 20 years, we've seen that once a data collection and digital surveillance framework is put in place, the surveillance tends to expand.

Slippery slope arguments, sans good reasoning, tend to be fallacies. However, don't fall into the trap of thinking that an argument backed by historical record is a slippery slope just because it's predicting an outcome. We might call that the "history is all slippery slopes" fallacy. Stating "this has happened before multiple times before, and each time has lead to x" is a very different argument to stating "this has happened, so the logical extrapolation is x".

Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by justatdotin on Saturday April 13, 2019 @02:45AM (#19651458)
if it can be that well trodden, is it really still a slippery slope?
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by mixmastamyk on Friday April 12, 2019 @10:53PM (#19650811)
Overwhelming empirical data across history.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by johncolanduoni on Friday April 12, 2019 @11:11PM (#19650878)
That’s proof of existence of slippery slopes, not of prevelance of hypothetical slippery slopes being realized.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by mixmastamyk on Friday April 12, 2019 @11:25PM (#19650927)
We’re talking about data collection and usage, not possibilities in the universe.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by johncolanduoni on Saturday April 13, 2019 @10:56PM (#19657304)
Exactly, which is why I'd be more interested in concrete commonalities of slippery slopes that were actually realized, and not just a general "history has plenty of slippery slopes".
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by asdfasgasdgasdg on Friday April 12, 2019 @10:21PM (#19650692)
The fallacy is to assume, without evidence, that the slope is slippery. There are plenty of slopes that aren't. Probably most, just you don't think about those because you know they aren't slippery already.

For example, I slept in 'til 8:30 today. OMG, a slippery slope. Next thing you know, I'll be sleeping until 3PM. Til midnight! I will never wake up again. But as it happens, sleeping in isn't a slippery slope. I don't think there's any solid evidence that telemetry is either.

Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by iopq on Friday April 12, 2019 @10:45PM (#19650795)
Umm, it's slippery for me. I haven't had a stable sleeping schedule for over ten years. Send help.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by sitkack on Friday April 12, 2019 @10:38PM (#19650770)
This is exactly why I get up a minute earlier each day. As it is, I am waking up tomorrow at 4:39 AM. Mission accomplished.
Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by TimTheTinker on Saturday April 13, 2019 @02:21AM (#19651400)
(10 years into one possible future)

“... and that was me before we had children.”

Re:VSCodium – An Open Source Visual Studio Code Without Trac... by colordrops on Saturday April 13, 2019 @07:11PM (#19656369)
That's the "hasty counterexample" fallacy.