The central fallacy: the second-worst argument in the world
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In an essay on LessWrong, Connor Williams argues that the flip side of Scott Alexander's 'worst argument in the world' is what he calls the central fallacy. Where the noncentral fallacy attacks a marginal member of a category by associating it with negative core traits, the central fallacy defends a core member by pointing to a marginal member that's actually good. Williams uses Martin Luther King's status as a technical criminal to show how that logic could excuse Al Capone, and he says the fallacy shows up often in AI debates, like comparing car crashes to AI loss of control. He leaves it to readers to spot the pattern in today's political arguments.
Source: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/39vrH3tSiXAGdXfnW/the-cen...
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