> appeal to authority is not a fallacy when the authority is indeed an expert.
Sure it is.
The point of the fallacy is that an argument should stand on its own merit, and has nothing to do with the person making it. Guess what - experts can be wrong too (e.g. hand washing).
An expert can be wrong, but a layperson is more likely to be wrong. "Experts are wrong" is sometimes common knowledge, but "I know better than experts" is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence.
Appealing to an expert should not be an instant win, but an argument can be valid and useful without being sufficient to end the discussion.
I was worried it was going to be like the salmonella thing where it turned out washing a chicken* is terrible advice because it spreads it everywhere and so it turns out that every time I wash my hands after handling deliveries, I'm now covering my kitchen with Covid sauce. I'm very happy that's not the case.
* I've never washed a chicken, but I've definitely seen and heard the advice before.
In one case I am declaring that something needs to be true, in the other I am declaring that I believe something as true.
The authority fallacy is that a certain position cannot be challenged as some expert are infallible. Similarly to how you believe 2 + 2 = 4 you also believe Aristotle was the arbiter of truth. As an argument it exposes no attack surface because you do not admit criticisms of the position.
It is not a fallacy if you are simply making an assumption of a fact (eg that rats are born out of rotting plants) that can be separately proven or disproven.
Sort of how a dictionary is used, it is not that the dictionary must be true we understand that it is possible for it to be wrong, it is just that we agree not to contest it in most cases for ease of conversation.
> In one case I am declaring that something needs to be true, in the other I am declaring that I believe something as true.
Those are not as different as you seem to believe.
> Sort of how a dictionary is used, it is not that the dictionary must be true we understand that it is possible for it to be wrong, it is just that we agree not to contest it in most cases for ease of conversation.
That is not how dictionaries are used. Dictionaries document how language is used in the recent past by a sufficiently large number of people. They are a trailing indicator of how language is used.
If you description was actually accurate, there would be no new slang (e.g. yeet) and words would not change their usage (e.g. "they" is now also a gender neutral singular).
Dictionaries are a form of consensus, a descriptive consensus rather than normative. In particular the usage of a dictionary (eg in law) is to justify your choices of wording.
In a sense the power of a dictionary is that you are allowed to use those meanings (indeed they mostly contain positive information and rarely what words do not mean)
> If you description was actually accurate, there would be no new slang (e.g. yeet)
Completeness ad accuracy are different.
> words would not change their usage (e.g. "they" is now also a gender neutral singular)
Speech can be sometimes accurate and sometimes less accurate. As a medium the value of speech is what you can express with it, it is in general not a form of art per se.
>> In one case I am declaring that something needs to be true, in the other I am declaring that I believe something as true.
>Those are not as different as you seem to believe.
I indeed believe they are quite different, 2=2 must be true in terms of the statements I understand it to be. Evolution on the other hand is something that I simply believe.
I cannot even fathom[1] what a proof of "not 2=2" could be, as in even if you had one I would be unable to understand it or believe it.
Evolution is something that instead can be disproven, even more than that a huge chunk of why scientist believe it is because experimental result could disprove it but instead keep confirming it.
[1] this is an important logical concept: for a statement of facts to be (at the very least) well formed you must be able to understand what it would be required for a proof and/or a confutation.
Appeal to authority is a fallacy, because "authority says X is true doesn't imply X is true". If an expert says "X is true", it's not true because they're an expert, it's true because they provide evidence that shows that X is true.
Appeal of authority is a logical fallacy, even if an expert is use to argue.
That alone doesn't mean that the expert is wrong, nor does invalidate the argument, as not all the arguments need to be strictly logical (logic <> truth).
can someone be a considered authority without being an expert.
edit:
I am using authority from the example in wikipedia
"One example of the use of the appeal to authority in science dates to 1923,[20] when leading American zoologist Theophilus Painter declared, based on poor data and conflicting observations he had made,[21][22] that humans had 24 pairs of chromosomes. From the 1920s until 1956,[23] scientists propagated this "fact" based on Painter's authority"
Painter presumably was an expert. So not sure why you are saying why its ok if the person is an expert.
Some political appointees could probably be considered an authority by title and not a subject expert. That might hold true for some ambassadors. I guess it really depends on what exact definition of authority you are using.
Parents, older siblings, managers/bosses, almost any TV personality. Also you might have someone who has a profession in the topic at hand, but isn't an expert. Like your older cousin who is a first-year Comp Sci major probably isn't the hacking/security expert you should be appealing to.
Relevant: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Kbm6QnJv9dgWsPHQP/schelling-...