Political Memes

you find both primary options equally acceptable.

i don't finde them equally acceptable, but i find them both unacceptable.

Throwing your vote away on a third party is equivalent to not voting.

election misinformation. my vote must be counted just as everyone else'.

in a show of good faith, i'm about to break from my usual rhetorical style. i hope you find this explanation helpful

Duverger’s Law is a tautology because, from a critical rationalist perspective, a tautological statement is one that cannot be empirically tested or falsified—it’s true by definition. Duverger’s Law states that a plurality-rule election system tends to favor a two-party system. However, if this law is framed in such a way that any outcome can be rationalized within its parameters, then it becomes unfalsifiable.

For example, if a country with a plurality-rule system has more than two parties, one might argue that the system still “tends to” favor two parties, and the current state is an exception or transition phase. This kind of reasoning makes the law immune to counterexamples, and thus, it operates more as a tautological statement than an empirical hypothesis. The critical rationalist critique of marginalist economics, which relies on ceteris paribus (all else being equal) conditions, suggests any similarly structured law should be viewed with skepticism. For Duverger’s Law to be more than a tautology, it would need to be stated in a way that allows for clear empirical testing and potential falsification, without the possibility of explaining away any contradictory evidence. This would make it a substantive theory that can contribute to our understanding of political systems rather than a mere tautology.

The last time I encountered someone claiming that something didn’t have predictive value “because it’s a tautology” was a creationist saying the same of evolution

i don't know the exact context you're referencing, but i do know that trying to pigeonhole me with creationists is underhanded.

stating that something is a tautology implies that you believe it’s true.

i believe anyone may claim that the price of a good can be described as the point at which temporal demand met temporal supply, but that doesn't make it a useful observation. it's not even disprovable, as there is no way to test it. so there is no reason to believe it's actually true.

a tautology is also an appropriate term for any post hoc explanation of material facts that gives no insight into how the future will happen.

duverger's "law" is storytelling, it's not science.

Performative ethics without pragmatics is moral masturbation.

deontological ethics are preferred by professional philosophers and are the basis of most ethical systems. most people grew up with an understanding that "the ends justify the means" can be used to justify some pretty horrific shit.

under FPTP systems, voting third party is equivocating support for both primary parties.

no, it's not.

it is a tautology and saying that it's not doesn't change that. it has exactly no ability to predict the future outcome of any election.

Splitting your responses is rhetorically ridiculous.

if you don'twant to talk to me, please don't