PandaJoe

I think this is the appropriate forum for this...

Anyways, I was thinking about the appeal to popularity fallacy, and wondering if it would apply in a scientific setting. For example, if I were to say that a significant number of biologists supported theory X, and therefore adds to it's credibility. Would this be a case of argumentum ad populum? The way I see it, this sort of reasoning is usually fallacious because it is an argument that is based on the number of people who agree with a statement, not the statements own merits. However, in this case, the scientists appealed to are qualified to speak of the statements merits.
The way I see it, an appeal to popularity is similar an appeal to authority. As long as a qualified authority is used, neither can be applied.

Dominus Paradoxum

I would agree. But remember that qualified authorities are only able to speak on their qualified special subjects.

Bugs

It depends if there is any dispute among the relevant scientists. If a number hold a different view then the argument is fallacious.

Assuming they all agree, I don’t think it is an appeal to popularity because they agree based (presumably) on the preponderance of evidence. They could still be wrong, of course.

Sharif

It all depends on how you make your argument or appeal. If all my argument consisted of was : "I believe dualism is true and so does Descartes, therefore I am right". I would consider this a pretty bad appeal to authority.

If you actually make a case for a position and illustrate in what sense qualified authorities agree, then that is just an effective argument. It has to be more than an straight appeal, it has to correspond to the content of your argument. I also think that it helps to provide a quotation or an idea from the authority and then expound upon it rather than letting it be your actual argument.

Basically it's a fallacy when one frames their argument in the following structure:

I think this, very many people think the same, therefore I'm correct or
I think this, this expert thinks the same, therefore I'm correct

theyeti

Arguments from authority are different because in these cases, the people being appealed to are assumed to have some sort of expertise in the subject. The argument from popularity suffers because the majority of the people can be assumed to be ignorant about most technical issues. If the people being appealed to can be demonstrated to have some sort of expertise, then it's not simply an appeal to popularity.

Arguments from authority are, strictly speaking, fallacious. This is because the experts can still be wrong, and of course past experience tells us that they have been wrong on a number of occasions throughout history. However, as a heuristic, deferring to authority is perfectly legitimate. This is what courts do all the time; they bring in expert witnesses whose authority is considered to be the final say on the matter. All things being equal, the consensus of the experts is more likely to be correct than the opinions of various non-experts. When one lacks the necessary background to resolve a dispute on technical grounds -- as is the case with your typical judge and jury -- then the proper thing to do is to give provisional consent to what the acknowledged experts say.

Where the argument from authority really goes wrong is when the purported authority either isn't a recognized authority, or holds a minority view not considered legitimate by the majority of experts. If you look at creationist arguments from authority, they almost always fall into one of these two categories. You either have a person who is not an authority, like "Dr." Kent Hovind. Or you have someone whose credentials are sound, like Duane Gish, yet their arguments are considered crap by thousands of people whose credentials are equally sound. (Saddly, this happens in many criminal trials as well; cranks can make a good living testifying for lawyers.) IMO, appeals to authority are only legitimate when you find consensus for a particular issue, and even then they're not a strictly sound method for adjudicating a dispute. They're only a useful heuristic when better methods are not available.

theyeti