Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Hitler's Fallacy

So today in class, we read a short segment of Hitler's Mein Kampf, particularly the section dealing with nation and race. Well, as if we could'nt have alrady guessed, Hitler being the perso he is, obviously writes about his justification of Aryan superiority. However, his arguments are full of fallacies everywhere.

Within the article, Hilter states, "Any crossing of two beings not at exactly the same level produces a medium between the level of the two parents. This means: the offspring will probably stand higher than the racially lower parent, but not as high as the higher one. Consequently, it will later succumb in the struggle against the higher level". In this short segement, Hitler is litterally arguing against interracial marriages, where he states that the interracial kid will be lie in between the two parents, higher than the inferior (Hitler implying the darker skinned parent), but lower than the superior parent (the Aryan parent). Therefore, Hitler argues that, under the will of Nature for a higher breeding of life, interracial marriages cannot happen.

In this section, Hitler is guilty of violating the "begging the question" fallacy. First of all, begging the question is a logical fallacy in which the premises include the claim that the conclusion is true or (directly or indirectly) assume that the conclusion is true. In this case, it is clear that as for Hitler, he is convinced that the non-Aryans are inferior to the Aryan race, although there is no proof that the non-Aryans are indeed inferior than than the Aryan people. Hitler's main thesis for chapter 11 of mein kampf is to prove that Aryan race is better than the non-Aryan race, yet here Hitler falsely assumes, probably for his own personal belief and convenience, that the non-Aryans are inferior. How can Hitler argue that the Aryans are the superior race it, at the back of his mind, he has already taken on the presumption that the non-Aryans are inferior? It seems as if Hitler finds it only natural that a person would think the non-Aryans are inferior, when in fact there is not a single warrant and date to support his testimony.

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