afazio - Spiritual Authority

[Drake]

Originally Posted by Trapped

The "countless" thing is most certainly not from silence. I have read numerous posts on this forum of people who actually say they are so glad they came across this website and that it helped them. Many often just post that much and then disappear to go on and lead their normal lives out of the LC. The fact that some people exist who overcame the inertia to register and post that information means there are others experiencing the same thing who simply did not put in writing their same experience. This is an argument from fact, sorry not sorry, bro.

Trapped,

This may seem like a minor point in this discourse but it isn’t. The reason that it is a very important point is that many posters in this forum fall into the same false argument from silence. What do you consider countless? You said numerous posts. Numerous is not countless. Was it 5? 10? 100? Even if you point to a 1000 passerby’s that is not countless. The fact is you, I, nor anybody else can point to countless anything. I would not even use the descriptor “countless” to describe the total number of members in the local churches worldwide. Would you? If there are not countless members, current and former, in the local churches, then one cannot reasonably argue that there are countless current and former members coming to this forum! The countless argument fails on the math alone.

Now, if one argues that countless means any number beyond what could be counted on one’s fingers and toes then i’ll concede the point. However, countless in the context of this topic is simply an exaggeration used for underscoring one’s point. I get that but beyond that it is simply an argument from silence. I’ll yield to your “numerous” though frankly I can only recall a dozen or two at the most.

Drake