A fallacy is a common mistake in an argument due to poor reasoning. The argument has to actually not be sound, i.e. it must be based on false premises or on invalid reasoning for there to be a fallacy. I don't see any mistakes in the reasoning of the article.
Challenge accepted.
Go ahead,
listen for yourself, beginning at 20:19 — and behold the spectacle of an otherwise intelligent man and gifted teacher sounding every bit as anti-intellectual as a corporate middle manager or used-car salesman. He proudly proclaims his irritation with "asking deep questions" that lead to a "pointless delay in your progress" in tackling "this whole big world of unknowns out there." When a scientist encounters someone inclined to think philosophically, his response should be to say, "I'm moving on, I'm leaving you behind, and you can't even cross the street because you're distracted by deep questions you've asked of yourself. I don't have time for that."
"I don't have time for that."
With these words, Tyson shows he's very much a 21st-century American, living in a perpetual state of irritated impatience and anxious agitation. Don't waste your time with philosophy! (And, one presumes, literature, history, the arts, or religion.) Only science will get you where you want to go! It gets results! Go for it! Hurry up! Don't be left behind! Progress awaits!
Even before directly responding to the argument, Sir Linker has constructed a tiresome straw man, the sort that I have come to expect out of political ideologues and religious apologists - and judging by some of his other articles, he seems to like defending theism. Apparently, we are to be appalled that a scientist would discourage us from asking questions... except that interpretation flies in the face of everything else he's ever said. People should certainly ask questions, but that's not some kind of a priori duty, but a means to an end. A greater understanding of the reality we face is beneficial to our long-term survival and development as a species, and asking questions is the main driver of that undertaking. However, some questions serve to terminate thought rather than further it.
The free will debate is a classic example of a thought-terminating question. It's a concept that's ill-defined but inspires lots of emotional investment into one conclusion or another. Many people appeal to some kind of intuition that tells them that they ought to have free will. Some may even go as far as to suggest that science can't explain X or Y, all to make room for some naive definition of free will that isn't rigorous but nonetheless does the job of making them feel better. Some others, however, oh, they've gotten some philosophical training, you see, so they're a little bit smarter than the average bear. They'll just come up with a rigorous definition that seems correct to them, in essence forcing free will to exist or not
by definition. And now they can brag to their friends (or academic peers) about how their definition has solved the free will problem, and anyone who hasn't heard of this brilliant solution by definition will be called a philistine, ignorant and clueless. Oh, but some people are even smarter still, and refuse to play that game. They declare that it's pointless to make yourself right by definition. Who's to say that we should all agree with one definition or another? Congratulations, you've successfully trounced all the definition-gamers and made them look like fools. Philosophy cred +1!
Some people may notice that nowhere in that paragraph is an answer that can be applied to anything. And like I said before, application is an extremely low standard that can include, y'know, finding more questions to ask! We haven't answered whether to punish people, or how to punish them. We haven't determined what moral responsibility is. We haven't determined what the meaning of life is. I thought this kind of thing was what the free will debate was supposed to be for!
This kind of thing is why people like Neil DeGrasse Tyson is irritated by "deep questions". He's been in government meetings, proposing more funding for basic science research. But politicians are masters in philosophical word manipulation, and thus what seems like a modest proposal to increase 0.5% to 1% becomes embroiled in some ideological battle or another about how evil/incompetent the state is or something or other. These "deep questions" turn out to be anything but, ironically missing the forest for the trees.
If what you crave is answers, the study of philosophy in this sense can be hugely frustrating and unsatisfying. But if you want to understand yourself as well as the world around you — including why you're so impatient for answers, and progress, in the first place — then there's nothing more thrilling and gratifying than training in philosophy and engaging with its tumultuous, indeterminate history.
I don't know if there's a name for this, but he's basically proposed two different consequences for the same conditional: craving answers. To even make sense of the notion of understanding yourself, you have to ask a question. And in order to come to an understanding of that question, you need to give an answer. Though, you don't need to give a direct answer to the question. That's the trap that the free will debaters have fallen into. To try to understand anything, you need to ask questions that can be answered clearly, so that the answers bring up more questions, so that you can try to answer those questions, and so on. Also notice that Sir Linker has committed the exact same crime he accused Sir Tyson of committing. Only philosophy will get you where you (really) want to go! It gets you understanding! Go for it! Meaning awaits!
And now Neil deGrasse Tyson has added another — one specially aimed at persuading scientifically minded young people to reject self-examination and the self-knowledge that goes along with it.
Another straw man, one that couldn't be more transparent.
And with that I turn to some of your statements.
It's thanks to philosophy that we have ways of dealing with this serious problem, which would make scientific endeavors pointless.
This is akin to saying it's okay to live under an illusion. But I don't think many people would be pleased about that at all.
You know the truth though, right? And surely knowing the truth influences the decisions we make!
What is "truth"? How can one be "certain" of whether or not something is "true"? What do such statements even
mean? Some people try to escape this by stating a priori assumptions along the lines of "I exist" and "reality as perceived by my senses exists in some consistent form". But then what does it mean for something to "exist"?
Philosophers can keep trying to answer such questions, encounter more questions, discuss nuances, and so on. But then it occurs to you: What does any of this have to do with anything? What changes if the universe we experience is just some jerk's computer simulation? And where in this whole debate is the clause that's supposed to give meaning to everything I do (including scientific endeavours), where otherwise there is none?
I hate it when people point out a problem and don't bother to propose an alternative, or worse, admit that there is no alternative. This is the ivory tower I keep talking about. I would never advocate that only people who can build cars should be considered good drivers. But that's essentially what you're trying to pull here. Because obviously, if you've never taken a philosophy course, your life has no meaning.
I'd appreciate if you could explain how psychologists can decide questions such as "should I love my son?"
I suspect you're alluding to Hume's is-ought problem. Hume argued that there's no intrinsic function mapping "is" statements to "ought" statements. What a lot of people seem to miss (including some of the supposed philosophically literate), however, is that Hume's objection was not to any attempt whatsoever to map "is" to "ought", but specifically to moral arguments based on unstated a priori assumptions, i.e. rules constituting some kind of intrinsic/objective morality. Morality is ultimately based on preferences that we have due to our biology and our interactions with the world. There's nothing that tells us that pain = bad or death = bad, other than the fact that the vast majority of humans (I'd say "animals" but I'm not confident enough in my biological knowledge to claim such a thing) are psychologically biased against pain or death inflicted on the self - and onto others.
So I'm honestly not sure of what you're trying to demonstrate here, because as far as I know, Sam Harris basically agrees with all this and uses it for his "moral landscape" concept. Moral statements come from our psychological preferences, and our goal is to determine what those preferences are and how to satisfy them as much as possible. In other words, he advocates utilitarianism, or at least consequentialism. He talks about "free will" and how it doesn't exist in the sense that most people think of it, but he could just as easily have talked about his opinions without bringing up "free will" at all. He only brought it up to make a statement about determinism, not to contribute to the debate on which definition of free will is the best.
The efforts of people like Sam Harris have been to demonstrate that scientific disciplines
can answer questions about morality. Although technically some amount of philosophy is required, philosophy on its own - rationalism, in other words - has too often served to muddy the waters, rather than clear them up, for nefarious political purposes.
I can only conclude here that the people who look down on philosophy are just ignorant and clueless--even if you guys have issues with free will and personal identity, not one of you replied to my previous examples about how philosophers influence linguistics and neuroscience and politics. It's plain here what the problem really is: ignorant and clueless people who have no idea on what they're talking about.
I can only conclude here that the only thing you care about with respect to this thread is to defend metaphysics. It's the most reasonable explanation that you'd assume anyone has a problem with your statements about philosophers influencing linguistics, neuroscience and politics. I pointed out the influence of philosophy myself in the OP! It's plain here what the problem really is: your treatment of this debate as a false dichotomy of two sides. Supposedly if I oppose one of your arguments, I oppose all of them.