Ad hominem literally means “to the man” or “to the person”.
It was most certainly an ad hominem question, but given the framing he probably wasn’t intending to discredit the argument with the ad hominem and therefore didn’t commit the ad hominem fallacy.
The fallacy is making an ad hominem attack in order to distract from or discredit the argument without addressing the merits of the argument itself. The traits can certainly be related to the argument, and in fact the more closely related the traits are the more effective the fallacy is at convincing others (e.g. He’s wrong about QFT because he isn’t a physicist vs he’s wrong about QFT because he drinks milk—both fallacies, the first much more effective than the second). That doesn’t mean the ad hominem isn’t relevant nor worth discussing, it only means the ad hominem is not evidence against the argument. The fallacy lies in thinking that it is.
SORRY, idiots! (that’s not a.h. either)
It’s still ad hominem, it’s just not a logical fallacy (but given that the word “idiot” means a person with extra-ordinarily low intelligence, it’s almost certainly incorrect).
Ad hominem literally means “to the man” or “to the person”.
It was most certainly an ad hominem question, but given the framing he probably wasn’t intending to discredit the argument with the ad hominem and therefore didn’t commit the ad hominem fallacy.
The fallacy is making an ad hominem attack in order to distract from or discredit the argument without addressing the merits of the argument itself. The traits can certainly be related to the argument, and in fact the more closely related the traits are the more effective the fallacy is at convincing others (e.g. He’s wrong about QFT because he isn’t a physicist vs he’s wrong about QFT because he drinks milk—both fallacies, the first much more effective than the second). That doesn’t mean the ad hominem isn’t relevant nor worth discussing, it only means the ad hominem is not evidence against the argument. The fallacy lies in thinking that it is.
It’s still ad hominem, it’s just not a logical fallacy (but given that the word “idiot” means a person with extra-ordinarily low intelligence, it’s almost certainly incorrect).