Extensional pruning 73
both user and hearer, or no reasoned discussion is possible.
There are two ways of committing this fallacy: one is to mislead
at the outset, the other is to retreat to a restricted definition in
order to escape weaknesses in the position.
All we said was that we'd install a switchboard. We didn't say it would
work.
(Nor did they.)Advertisers often take pruning shears over the extravagant
claims they have made.
We'll take your one-year-old car as trade-in, at whatever you paid for it.
(Strictly speaking, you paid one sum for the car, and another sum for
the tax. They are not offering to give you the tax back as well,
whatever you might have thought.)Friends who are free with advice often cut back the meaning in a
similar way, after the consequences have emerged.
Look, I know I said you'd feel like a millionaire. I know lots of millionaires
who feel pretty miserable. Stop complaining.
(You would feel like a swine if you hit him, but you probably know
lots of swine who'd enjoy it.)The extensional pruner announces his activity. Like the bow
wave of an advancing ship, his utterances mark his passage. The
inevitable 'all I said was ...' and 'if you examine my exact words
...' show him to be a man of great qualifications. You recognize
him as the man who never really said at all what most people
took him to be saying. The fine print one always watches for is in
this case in the dictionary.