Savion. If an arguments is bad, I can refute that bad argument by showing that it has the same logical form as an obviously bad argument
Baird. Rubbish! That's like saying you can sink a battleship by sinking a toy boat that happens to be painted the same color!
Based just on the arguments presented here, it might be true that an argument can be refuted by showing that it has the same logical form as an obviously bad argument. Okay, it's perfectly true that an argument is refuted if it can be shown that it has the same logical form as an obviously bad argument. The trouble is, this fact is not part of anyone's background knowledge until they've been shown how it works, and it's not obviously true to anyone who just has a general knowledge of logic. So it's more or less something that we have to prove, and since Savion hasn't supported his claim with reasons, he hasn't proved it. Baird, on the other hand, is trying to prove that it's impossible by comparing it to sinking a battleship by sinking a toy boat that happens to be painted the same color. That is, he is trying to prove that you cannot prove that an argument is bad by showing it has the same logic is a bad argument by giving a bad argument and implying that his bad argument has the same logical form as proving that argument is bad by showing that it has the same logic is a bad argument. In other words, he's attempting to use a counter argument by analogy to show that you cannot succeed at a counter argument by analogy. [Think about what it would mean if he succeeded. On second thoughts, don't think about it.] Baird's argument fails because showing that an argument is bad means taking something that has not worked and showing that it has not worked whereas sinking a battleship means taking something that is working and making it not work. This crucial difference means that Baird commits false analogy. (The correct analogy would be showing that a battleship design won't work by showing that an exact scale model of the battleship won't work in conditions that are exactly analogous to the conditions that the full-size battleship will be exposed to.)
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