IGOR Ž. ŽAGAR (Educational Research Institute & Univ. of Maribor, Slovenia)
Fallacies: Do We “Use” Them or “Commit” Them?

Zagar poses two questions . First, an epistemological one: do we (everyone, politicians, the media…) commit fallacies, or do we (intentionally) use them? Second, a methodological one: when we (philosophers, sociologists, discourse analysts…) detect a fallacy, on what conceptual grounds do we differentiate between committed and used fallacies? Is there a difference?

Eg1: "France is hexagonal" is only roughly true.  It's not really true, but roughly so.

Eg2: "Eisenhower won that battle" is only roughly true.  The soldiers won the battle… but it's still acceptable.

So: assessing good arguments (e.g., validity) requires a formal system to be brought in.  They are translated into the system and evaluated according to that system.  The question is whether we are using the appropriate criteria.

Eg3: If A just wants to get B to accept p.  A knows B accepts q, so A gives B the argument: 'q, therefore p.'  Relative to the criterion of rhetorical success, A's argument is good.

Can there be a classification of fallacies? Are they too unruly to classify?  Are there fallacies at all?  If some fallacies seem unavoidable and ever present, then perhaps we should be concerned about classifying it a fallacy.

Eg4: Skepticism about induction becomes acceptance of inductive principles. Asserting from the consequent as abduction.  Vicious circles to coherent systems.

Some conclusions: we don't need to be inflating fallacy theory with more fallacies. Rather, we need to understand the right criteria to understand the various forms of argument we see.  Context-dependence (kn owledge of the speakers, circumstances, purposes of discussion) of fallacy assessments, and once we do that, we see that appraisal and acceptability varies.

Q1: One can evaluate arguments relative to context (e.g. in Walton's work and from the pragma-dialectical perspective) and see lots of fallacies.  Sure, context matters, but we can see fallacies still in the contexts.  Say, they break the conventions of the speech events. Or they are obstructive moves in the contexts.

Q2: Are you really contesting fallacy theory uberhaupt?  Just b/c arg form X is unavoidable in context C, does that really mean that X isn't fallacious? 

Q3: Take Bacon's Doctrine of the Idols.  It's a story of the development of superstitions.  Aren't these observations useful?  We need to cultivate a package of habits that are attentive to these vices.

Q4: Isn't this a false dilemma?  It's either a perfect crystaline form for evaluation or all subjective?  Don't most theories of argumentation work on working out a tertium quid?

Q5: What about equivocation?  Isn't that a fallacy, even on the subjectivist account?

Q6: Isn't reasoning a rule bound excercise?  Fallacies are cases where we break the rules.

Geoff Goddu, U. Richmond

"How Many Premises Can an Argument Have?"

Opening question: Is it possible for an argument to have either zero premises or an infinite number of premises?

Goddu's answer is that regardless of how you conceive of arguments  (as sets of propositions, sentences or speech acts), you should accept that an argument could have an infinite number of premises. Goddu's case: arguments that prove that there is a one-to-one relation between all numbers and even numbers (they can have an infinite number of premises).

The zero premise case is more complicated. On certain conceptions there are good reasons to accept the possibility of zero premise arguments, but on other conceptions there are good reasons to reject this possibility.  Goddu's case: Sorensen arguments of the form:

Is there an argument that there are no-premise arguments? Yes: here's one.

————

C Therefore, there are arguments with zero premises.

Cute!

Q1: Can there be arguments with non-denumerably infinite premises?

Q2: Doesn't this misrepresent what arguments are about, namely, making  a transition in thought?

Q3: Aren't demonstrations of tautologies (e.g., with CP or IP) arguments with no premises?

Q4: "Why p?  Just because!"  Can' that be a zero-premise argument?

Karen Tracy, University of Colorado-Boulder

"Reasonable Hostility"

Some background questions: Is there such a thing as reasonable hostility?  Is that an oxymoron?  If there is such a thing as reasonable hostility in argument, then are the constraints of civility improper in some cases?

A rough version of reasonable hostility. First, there's a difference between speaker-hostility and listener-perception of hostility (you can get a non-hostile question, but perceive it as hostile).  Second, reasonable hostility must be to a perceived wrong, but not to initiate a wrong. Third, whatever hostility manifested must be from care for the issue, not hating a speaker.  There must be the required face-work in the midst of that hostility.

Some examples of hostility (and reasonable hostility) from the Hawaii Same-Sex Civil Union debates.  Some features: Passionate speech, some attention to face but still causing insult (e.g., calling opponents to Same-Sex Marriage bigots, face-saving by opponents to Same-Sex opposition… "it's not about hatred…",  Opponents to same-sex marriage point out that the proponents don't apologize for their tone, Proponents responding that they can't apologize because they've been the ones who are being wronged)

One thing to remember: to distinguish between what's persuasable and what's not. Reasonable hostility must take account of what can and cannot be argued in a culture at a time. 

Q1: What's the role of critical thinking?  What, other than argument, changed the culture so that gay-rights issues are arguable now?

Q2: What's the tipping point between arguable and non-arguable? Or is it a matter of degree?

Q3: Why so much face-work?  Is it because of the fact that an issue is becoming non-arguable?

Q4: Is reasonable hostility a norm, or is it a description of how folks are actually manifest hostility?

Michel Dufor, Univ. Sorbonne Nouvelle

"Epistemic Communities and Arguments for New Knowledge"

Dufor's background presumptions: Communities are epistemic when sharing specific beliefs, interests and arguments. E.g., religious and scientific communities.  The question is how knowledge is produced in these communities.

Dufour's suggestion: Poincare on the difference between justification and intuition in mathematics is a model for mathematical creativity.

Q1: What about Socrates and Meno's slave boy?  Is the slave boy creative, or is the means of demonstration with Socrates only about justification?

Q2: What is the difference between intuition and mathematical induction?  Is there only a difference in modes of presentation?

Robert Pinto, University of Windsor

"Emotions and Reasons"

Pinto argues:  (1) emotions can provide reasons for action because the evaluative attitudes at their core can, together with cognitive attitudes, provide reasons for the conative attitudes (desires and intentions) – which are reasons to act

(2) evaluative attitudes can be rooted in reasons insofar as they arise from a combination of cognitive attitudes together with other evaluative or conative attitudes which (potentially) render them rational.

Q1: Can one fear something without believing it is impeding (e.g., is it right to say that some S can live in fear of cancer without having the belief that it is impending?)

Q2: What is it to value wrongly?  How does one determine that one has done so?

Q3: What about irrational fears/emotions?  E.g., one certainly can fear spiders without having any beliefs about their badness.  One can even fear them despite actively believing them to be good thing!

David Godden, Old Dominion

"Presumptions in Argument: Epistemic versus Social Approaches"

Godden's paper is a response to Kauffield's 'commitment-based' approaches to presumption.  The commitment model is one where there are socially grounded defeasible presumptions about the right sort of ways for people to behave.  The question is whether these 'ought' claims are a basis for making presumptions about how people will behave.

The main issue of contention was whether the moral expectations about people (e.g., that people ought not drive drunk, or that people ought to do their jobs), when defeated (e.g., when you see that S is visibly drunk and behind the wheel of the car, when you see serious dereliction of duty) disappear.  Godden says yes:  he calls them 'busted bubbles'.

Some questions:

Q1: Are presumptions about duties really predictions?

Q2: Surely the duties don't go away when our predictions are defeated.  Is this a matter of what you expect morally vs expect epistemically?

Q3: Should it be Dr. Livingston, I assume?

"Modeling Critical Questions as Additional Premises"

Gordon and Walton's paper had two objectives.  First, to show how the scheme model for argument forms provide a means to explain how critical questions function in argumentative dialogue.  Second, to show how the Carneades system of argument representation can make these critical exchanges explicit.  Arguments from authority were the test case. The critical questions for authority arguments are along the lines of whether the authority is motivated to lie, whether the authority's pronouncements are consistent with other authorities, whether the authority is reliable in this case, and so on.  The questions and answers add premises to the arguments.

A few questions about the paper were:

Q1: Is the dialogical model overplayed here, instead of adding premises, don't questions elicit the expression of suppressed premises?

Q2: How widely used is the Carneades system, and is it a representation of audience-acceptance or is it a representation of argument-assessment?

Q3: What are the consequences for legal reasoning for Carneades' use?

Colin, John and I will be at the Ontario Society for the Study of Argumentation (OSSA) conference this coming weekend.  We're presenting "Tu Quoque Arguments, Subjunctive Inconsistency, and Questions of Relevance."   But that doesn't mean that we won't be posting on the NS.  We'll be posting short discussions of the sessions we attend.  Stay tuned, NS readers!

Oh, and comments on our paper are welcome here.