It seems to be known under the name of the equal treatment fallacy in various blogs and articles, although none of them are from particularly respectable sources. Other examples are the right of homosexuals to marry a member of the opposite gender, the right of soviet citizens to criticize the president of the USA, and Anatole France’s famous statement that “in its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread”.
This seems worth adding to a list somewhere or making a more elaborate article about. Anyone?
At least, the label “equal treatment fallacy” seems like it represents well enough most cases and, with those examples, evokes a clear picture. It doesn’t seem to refer to all “variable vs constant” issues following this pattern, but close enough.
It seems like the Linux user (and possibly the Soviet citizen example, but I’m not sure) is… in a broader category than the equal treatment fallacy, because homosexuality and poverty are things one can’t change (or, at least, that’s the assumption on which criticizing the equal treatment fallacy is based).
Although, I suppose my interpretation may have been different from the intended one- as I read it as “the OSX user has the freedom to switch to Linux and modify the source code of Linux”, i.e. both the Linux and OSX user has the choice of either OS. Obviously the freedom to modify Linux and keep using OSX would be the equal treatment fallacy.
It seems to be known under the name of the equal treatment fallacy in various blogs and articles, although none of them are from particularly respectable sources. Other examples are the right of homosexuals to marry a member of the opposite gender, the right of soviet citizens to criticize the president of the USA, and Anatole France’s famous statement that “in its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets, and steal loaves of bread”.
This seems worth adding to a list somewhere or making a more elaborate article about. Anyone?
At least, the label “equal treatment fallacy” seems like it represents well enough most cases and, with those examples, evokes a clear picture. It doesn’t seem to refer to all “variable vs constant” issues following this pattern, but close enough.
Nice! I wanted to mention that one but you beat me to it :-)
It seems like the Linux user (and possibly the Soviet citizen example, but I’m not sure) is… in a broader category than the equal treatment fallacy, because homosexuality and poverty are things one can’t change (or, at least, that’s the assumption on which criticizing the equal treatment fallacy is based).
Although, I suppose my interpretation may have been different from the intended one- as I read it as “the OSX user has the freedom to switch to Linux and modify the source code of Linux”, i.e. both the Linux and OSX user has the choice of either OS. Obviously the freedom to modify Linux and keep using OSX would be the equal treatment fallacy.