The question of validity came up only today Sheldon, I have not been talking about validity all this time, its something I had forgotten to mention until now. You are putting words in my mouth.
Yes, but when you claimed logic guaranteed a valid conclusion I may have leaped to a false conclusion in the context of this exchange. So a logically valid argument does not guarantee the conclusion is true. My apologies for my misunderstanding.
No worries it is always a pleasure debating with you.
I apologise if that is the case, and it wasn’t intentional. So I will go back and check.
So firstly the claim I ordinally objected to above did claim logical arguments are guaranteed to have true conclusions, and you have now accepted you were wrong I take it?
Though I admit the word valid was not used in that post, but it surely can be inferred, since it is defined as the quality of being logically or factually sound.
I concede that I omitted the concept of validity from my ramblings haha. But to restate, a valid, sound deductive argument with true premises is airtight.
what can be said is that actually finding true premises in the first place is a different matter entirely and that is why agnosticism as you have so eloquently described it here is so important.
I was not thorough enough and for that I apologize.
Hmm…leaving aside the goal post shifting from the original claim you seem to be contradicting yourself. Your change from “true conclusion” to “airtight” seem like dishonest semantics to me.
You are being too pedantic. By airtight I meant true conclusions. I used that word to avoid sounding repetitive I did not change my position at all.
Then you will need to clarify your position for me, as your post below seems (to me) to contradict your earlier post #56 quoted below that.
Maybe I’ve misunderstood you here?
Arguments don’t have a truth value (arguments are not true or false).
Identifying the fallacy: This is the affirming the consequent fallacy, a formal logical fallacy of the form “If P then Q. Q. Therefore, P.” I have come across this fallacy several times with creationists, often in the form “Humans can only get human babies. Therefore, all human predecessors were human. (And thus evolution is impossible)”
Edit: Sheldon’s fallacy can be reformulated as “A cat is a mammal. I am a mammal. Therefore I am a cat.”
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Although Sheldon thought that was a straw man to his topic, I’ll have ago at answering it:
The word ‘agnostic’ comes from the Greek: A-not/without gnosis= knowledge.
Although the term tends to be usually used when referring to god, it can be used about anything.
Without exception, all believers are agnostic about god(s) . That is because they actually know nothing. Religious belief is based on faith, not reason nor facts.
Jesus himself is reported as saying. John 20:29 "Then Jesus told him, Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Science does not deal in certainties. Every question always remains open.
My favourite example is Newtonian physics vs Einsteinian physics. Newton was not shown to be wrong, merely incomplete. He’s still perfectly fine at the micro, daily level. That’s my understanding. I’m no physicist, so might be wrong. I welcome correction of any factual errors I make.
Come on… when do porcupines get to count themselves among the set of “all humans.” Your conclusion does not follow your first premise.
Anytime we assume true premises guarantee a true conclusion, and create an unsound or invalid argument. Why should theists have all the fun?
Besides “I’m a porcupine” leaves it open to way too many prick jokes. 
One of that methods strongest and most robust principles, it’s inbuilt ability to admit a mistake or omission, and modify or even abandon any idea if the evidence demands it.
Theists invariably fail to understand this, but then that is the problem with the erroneous belief they know any absolute truth.
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On topic:
An interesting new TV series, called ‘Devs’. Science fiction. The premise is that a tech company has built code which enables behaviour to be predicted, initially in flat worms.
They discover that the universe is determinsitic. That people are effectively on tram tracks, from birth to death. That we don’t notice because the tracks are invisible.
Told my nerdy mate about it and he proceeded to debunk the claim of a science fiction TV show. He lost me in unified field theory. Something about unified field theory not accounting for gravity. (???)
Anyway, I’m still enjoying the show. Having loved sci fi since I was about 14, I retain the ability to suspend disbelief.
Am on tenterhooks waiting for the latest TV version of DUNE, due in October.
If you haven’t seen it, check out the trailer:
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I’m a big fan of the novels. I hope this new version will be good.
Which ones?
Frank Herbert wrote five.The first one was terrific. The next three were ok. After that, meh.
Herbert’s son and another bloke have churned out a lot of Dune novels. I have them all in Epub form. Have managed to read a few. Very ordinary in my opinion. Sadly, Dune has become a franchise. I’m hoping the new TV series sticks to the first three books. Sticking to the first one would be better…
Same thing with the Godfather back stories and sequels.
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God Emperor of Dune was my favorite.
Interesting.
My favourite remains ‘Dune’ the first massive novel. Imo a masterpiece. None of the others came even close. Over the years I’ve often wished Herbert had not written any more Dune novels.
I’ve often wondered how much money Frank saw of the millions generated by his brain child.