The Questions · the method · analogy
When does a comparison actually prove something?
Every argument leans on a parallel somewhere. Almost nobody checks the one they are leaning on, and there is a test that takes about a second.
If it is a true parallel it runs backwards as cleanly as forwards.
Either it reverses or it is trash.
How cleanly does it run backwards? Does B bring you back to A just as clean?
What this settles
Which converts a matter of taste into a check anybody can run. A pretty comparison carries you one way and collapses on the return trip. A real one is the same road in both directions — and that is the whole difference between an argument and a decoration.
Also asked as
- So how do you tell a real parallel from a pretty one?
- Why is a comparison faster than just reasoning the thing out straight?
Where this is worked out
When Does a Comparison Actually Prove Something?
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Nothing on this page is composed. Every sentence in the answer is drawn from the pieces listed above. Where a claim is compressed, it is compressed from one of them and adds nothing they do not say.
The parallel
When a comparison proves something and when it only decorates — the reversal test, and what a definition is underneath. 1 of the 2 here have been worked through; the rest are on the map and not yet walked.
- What do people actually fight about, when they fight about an idea?answered, not written up