
The Four Dog Defense (2011) - weinzierl
http://acronymrequired.com/2011/10/the-four-dog-defense.html
======
kragen
The author seems to be entirely ignorant about the reasons why this style of
argumentation is required in court cases — it's because, by presenting all the
arguments at the beginning, we can prevent legal cases from dragging on over
decades or centuries, resolving them in mere years, or even less in some
cases. As several commenters have pointed out, if you do not raise an argument
when you are initially presenting your arguments, you cannot then introduce it
when the judge or jury rules against you, essentially necessitating a new
trial.

Also, they seem to want to take not just trichloroethylene but also
formaldehyde and styrene off the market entirely, because they are toxic.
Formaldehyde, aside from its direct uses for things like glues and tissue
preservation, is one of the most basic chemicals in the chemical industry, and
although it's undeniably toxic, its lethal dose is around 100 mg/kg, so you
need several grams of it to kill someone. If we outlawed the sale of all
substances with this level of toxicity (or greater), not only would we no
longer have a chemical or drug industry, we would also be outlawing most
spices.

In view of the catastrophic effects their favored policies would have, the
dangerous level of ignorance behind this article should be a call to attention
for us. How can we ensure that the voices of people like this are excluded
completely from the process of policymaking? Clearly it would be disastrous
for this person to have any influence over regulatory regimes that affect
other people, and indeed they may even be a danger to themself — like the
woman who decided to surgically remove her own silicone breast implants.

~~~
mannykannot
In these cases, all of the arguments were false, the defendants knew they were
false, and they were able to significantly delay justice by employing all of
them. Furthermore, each successive claim denies the premises of all those that
precede it, and in a purely rational world, it would be reasonable to say that
only one could be presented. I am not advocating that the law should be
changed in this regard, as I am pretty certain that there would be cases in
which such a change would be used to prevent valid defenses being made, but
there is certainly nothing wrong with pointing out that this is happening.

> like the woman who decided to surgically remove her own silicone breast
> implants.

As red a herring as I have seen lately.

------
52-6F-62
Just[0] reminds me of what some people attribute as the 'narcissist's
prayer'[1].

[0]

> _First of all, I don 't have a dog._

> _And if I had a dog, it doesn 't bite._

> _And if I had a dog and it did bite, then it didn 't bite you._

> _And if I had a dog and it did bite, and it bit you, then you provoked the
> dog. "_

[1]

> _That didn 't happen._

> _And if it did, it wasn 't that bad._

> _And if it was, that 's not a big deal._

> _And if it is, that 's not my fault._

> _And if it was, I didn 't mean it._

> _And if I did... You deserved it._

~~~
scrpn
How to deal with someone that behaves like this, when leaving is not an
option?

~~~
darrelld
You use the gray rock method on them. Essentially you do not emotionally
engage with them, be as boring as possible so they move on to other targets
for narcissistic supply.

I was tangled up with a narc for over 18 years and didn't know what I was
dealing with. It's one of the most soul-crushing things if you don't know
what's going on. When figured out what I was dealing with, it was like waking
up out of a coma.

------
slavik81
If people buy into this too much, you can win arguments just by pushing your
narrative before anyone has all the facts.

A news report comes out as, "dozens dead at nightclub shooting," and someone
posts, "I bet it was a muslim. We need to kick all of them out". The first
response is, "We have no idea who was behind this." Or, even worse, maybe even
an outright denial if there's some initial evidence that suggests they're not
Muslim.

Days later, once more evidence has been collected the police confirm the
perpetrator was a Muslim radical. From that point on, every argument against
discrimination gets tarred as being apologism and backpeddling. Sound
arguments are dismissed merely because they followed after a valid argument
that turned out to be unsound. Racism wins the day.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with making more than one argument if we
have a good reason to believe each is valid. Just following that pattern does
not mean anything about whether it's correct or not.

~~~
jjoonathan
Yes!

Racism is a moral issue but the liberal political tribe likes to frame it as a
logic issue. Sometimes it _is_ a logic issue, but often it's not, and as a
tribe we need to develop the self-restraint to differentiate.

It's entirely possible for uncomfortable statements like
"P(terrorist|muslim)>P(terrorist)" or "P(criminal|black)>P(criminal)" to be
true but worth ignoring for the sake of the greater good if following up on
them would trample individual rights. Sometimes discarding information against
your immediate self interest is the right thing to do! Lady Justice doesn't
wear a blindfold as a fashion accessory.

Unfortunately, the prevailing tactic seems to be "attack the uncomfortable
fact" rather than "argue from morality when you cannot argue from logic."
People on the fence can see right through this hypocrisy, which by my
estimation is responsible for a significant portion of the unapologetic racism
that has flourished in recent years.

~~~
isaachier
I'm pretty sure you are talking about a different point. The original comment
is about laying out all the arguments upfront to avoid the appearance of back
peddling if the first argument turns out to be false. You seem to be focusing
on the example more than this point.

------
markshead
Obviously, this can be used to simply lie about not having a dog. On the other
hand, it is also the way you deal with any objections that might be raised if
you are dealing with a claim that is wrong on many different levels. Say that
someone posts what they claim is a video showing a Tesla roadster wrecking on
autopilot while the driver was watching a movie.

It is very logical for Tesla to point out if it isn't actually a roadster in
the photo. Further, they can say that even if it was, the roadster doesn't
have autopilot. Even if it was a roadster and the roadster came with autopilot
and the driver was using autopilot, the driver is still responsible for paying
attention to the road and keeping hands on the wheel.

------
AnimalMuppet
There's a reason you see this in legal cases: If you don't introduce claims
and/or defenses at the beginning, you can't add them later. (Yes, you can
amend, once or maybe twice. You can't do it repeatedly.) So you raise all the
arguments you will use, and all the arguments you're going to have to fall
back on if those fail, and all the arguments you're going to have to fall back
on if _those_ fail.

For a recent example: APIs can't be copyrighted. And if they can, it was fair
use. And even if it wasn't fair use, it was _de minimus_.

------
nkurz
I first came across this example in an article about the famous Texas criminal
defense lawyer Richard "Racehorse" Haynes. This is the version he tells:

 _Haynes loves discussing his cases to teach young lawyers about trial
practice. In 1978, he told attendees at an ABA meeting in New York City that
attorneys too often limit their strategic defense options in court. When
evidence inevitably surfaces that contradicts the defense’s position, lawyers
need to have a backup plan._

 _“Say you sue me because you say my dog bit you,” he told the audience.
“Well, now this is my defense: My dog doesn’t bite. And second, in the
alternative, my dog was tied up that night. And third, I don’t believe you
really got bit.”_

 _His final defense, he said, would be: “I don’t have a dog.”_

[http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/richard_racehorse...](http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/richard_racehorse_haynes)

ps. I noticed that the article uses the odd phrase "Doggy-Dog World" instead
of the more standard "Dog-Eat-Dog World". I thought at first this was just a
non-Enlish speaker's mistake, but apparently the corruption has more history
than that: [https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/148120/where-
did...](https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/148120/where-did-doggy-
dog-world-come-from)

------
mfringel
Nearby is the DARVO concept:
[https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/DARVO](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/DARVO)

"DARVO is an acronym that stands for Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and
Offender." [capitalization mine]

~~~
darrelld
Narcissist use this all the time too.

------
bo1024
Based on the comments here, it's hard to place the line between using this
kind of argument in good faith vs bad faith. I'd propose that the line can be
drawn at using contradictory premises.

If you make two arguments, and one depends on not having a dog while the other
depends on having a dog with certain characteristics, then only one of these
premises can be true. So you are making at least one of the arguments in bad
faith.

It gets subtle, though. Compare "I have no dog, and if I do, my dog couldn't
have made those particular bite marks" to "I have no dog, and even if I do, no
dog in the world could have made those bite marks". The first does have
contradictory premises: it can't be true that I have no dog and that my dog's
teeth have certain characteristics different from other dogs. The second does
not have contradictory premises: It's possible both that I have no dog and
that the person was bitten by a non-dog animal.

------
ssaew333
Is this really a technique? I thought it was a core concept of argumentation:
don't unnecessarily cede ground.

~~~
chasing
I don't think this is about unnecessarily ceding ground -- it's about arguing
in bad faith as a tactic for delaying and confusing the issue.

I see it all the time and it's interesting that someone has given it a clever
name.

~~~
jerf
It isn't necessarily arguing in bad faith. It's simply an argumentation
technique, commonly used in high stake situations. My client can't have killed
that person, because they were 1000 miles away. But even if that weren't the
case, they have no motive. But even if they had a motive, they have no weapon.
But even if they have the weapon and the motive, they have strong personal
beliefs against violence.

For the sake of argument, assume all those things are true. That's a perfectly
reasonable argument to use in a court situation. When there's going to be a
final verdict, from which appeal is impossible or very expensive, you are an
idiot if you only bring up the fact they were a 1000 miles away. You marshal
every argument you possibly can. This isn't a dialog; you don't get a (cheap)
response once the verdict is in.

I think this is a poor essay, blaming a standard argumentation technique for
the poor behavior of certain industries. The problem isn't the four dog
defense, the problem is the poor behavior of certain industries. I mean,
remove the defense from those industries and what would change? Basically
nothing; one would have to be some sort of very specific meta-contrarian cynic
to claim otherwise. Clearly it's not the real problem.

Also, it's not the "Doggy-Dog World of Politicians"... it's the "Dog-Eat-Dog
World of Politicians". I mention this because frankly it struck me as on par
with the quality of the rest of the essay. Edit: In fact, on reflection, I've
flagged it. It hasn't got much redeeming value.

~~~
chasing
> For the sake of argument, assume all those things are true.

This is about when your client _did_ kill a person and you're using a slowly
receding circle of lies to try to give them as much time as possible to skip
town.

~~~
jerf
No, as the author of my post, I can assure you that my post was quite clearly
about the fact that this style of defense is not intrinsically in bad faith,
evil, or in any sense responsible for the bad behavior of the corporations in
question. I double-checked with myself twice to be sure.

Blaming this defense is like blaming the fact that some companies are bad
actors on the fact that they are using syllogisms. It's not the syllogisms.
It's very weak thinking to think it could be. The problem is not the "four
dog" defense, it's the bad actions themselves.

------
ghostbrainalpha
For anyone who isn't seeing the exact pattern... It's not just 4 arguments in
a row. Here is an easy to use template.

1\. Challenge the __Reality __

 _I did not do the bad thing._

2\. Challenge the __Morality /Legality __

 _I did the thing, but it wasn 't that bad._

3\. Challenge the __Motivation __

 _I did the bad thing, but I didn 't mean to._

4\. Challenge the Relevance

 _I did the bad thing, but so does everyone else, its not a big deal, and why
aren 't we talking about the bigger issues?_

------
restalis
I wonder how attacking individuals in court and casting doubt on the causes of
their sickness could be of any use against the larger picture, i.e. against
the correlation between leukemia cluster and the TCE contaminated area. I also
wonder if another dirty trick would work against such cases, where the
plaintiff side throws the burden of proof on the defendant asking for numbers
deduced from the costly inquiries and how those numbers explain anything in
relation with numbers deduced from a non-contaminated area.

------
csours
This sounds like the inverse of the 5 Whys -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_Whys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_Whys)

------
will_brown
_Arguendo_

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arguendo](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arguendo)

------
jbob2000
At least as it concerns the EPA, this is wholly a problem in the US. In
Europe, new chemicals need to be proven they are safe before they can be used.
In the US, new chemicals need to be proven they are _bad_ before they are
_removed_. It's totally backwards and in my opinion, is the direct cause for
all of this bullshit.

Aside from that, is there a general way to combat the four dog defense?

~~~
js8
> Aside from that, is there a general way to combat the four dog defense?

I always suggest to people that one way to discern a dishonest opinion (if
you're not expert) is that they throw lots of contradictory (or at least
weirdly independent) arguments at you.

For example, an article denying global warming might argue that the Earth is
not warming and that the warming is caused by the Sun. These are contradictory
(if it is caused by Sun, it is warming). Or it is more subtle, they claim the
data from e.g. NASA are fake but use the same data to argue a different point.

In other words, dishonest debaters do not promote a coherent theory, and
instead try to find as many holes in the opponents position as they can (which
is always possible, no real-world knowledge is ever complete). But the real
truth is always coherent, and that's how it can be recognized.

~~~
jbob2000
Recognizing the defense is different than combating it. Or perhaps I
misunderstood - are you saying that the way to combat it is to point out that
they have no coherent theory?

~~~
restalis
Any conversation sits on the premise of quality interaction between the
parties involved. This quality assumes competence and good will, each having
to be over a certain minimal level depending on the subject discussed. When
any of the involved parties determines that there is not or can not be enough
competence or good will, then normally the discussion should either cease or
switch to another level. (At most, you may explain your decision ...if you
have that minimal level of respect towards any of the parties involved in
discussion, that is.)

------
ssaew333
I didn't have contact with any Russians,

but if I did, they were completely proper,

and if they weren't, then their efforts didn't influence the election

and if they did, Why shouldn't I do everything it takes to win?

~~~
dang
Please don't take HN threads further into political flamewar.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
jbob2000
But... the article was posted because it's relevant to our politics right now.

~~~
dwringer
It came up in the comments yesterday about the recent Panera security breach.
Someone speculated that we were seeing the emergence of an infosec version of
the four dogs defense. Presumably someone then felt it was interesting enough
to warrant its own submission.

