Argument ad reverentiam, Lat. reverentia “respectful fear’.

Respect is a feeling projected by authorities, whatever or whoever they may be. If organizations and individuals are legally invested with due authority in order to carry out a mission, then, in this role, they claim respect, whatever one’s private opinion may be about their relevance or efficiency.

The claim to respect is in principle distinct from the claim to obedience; one can be constrained to obey by the use of lawful violence; showing respect is essentially a supplement to compliance. This means that interactions with common authorities are ruled by specific conventions of politeness, such as the concluding formula “Yours respectfully”, used to convey this due conventional respect to the authority addressed in a formal letter.

As an inner sentiment, respect has to be earned. Nonetheless, a behavior, intentional or not, can be felt as disrespectful, and, if a public servant or a police officer is involved, it might be qualified as an insult and punished as such. The argument from respect is basically used to justify a sanction for a lack of respect. S. Authority; Modesty.

Any person who is in a position of authority and feeling that his prerogatives are not respected might invoke the argument from respect. The problem arises when this claim to authority is not recognized, or is considered to be oppressive, as may be the case of religious authorities. At a more abstract level, the right to respect is claimed for all beliefs in general, and for one’s own beliefs in particular. Disrespect is qualified as a provocation, a scandal, a blasphemy that gravely hurts the believer’s feelings, and a complaint can be filed in court to uphold the right to respect.

“Odious profanation of a Christ on the cross”

An argumentative situation involving an argument from respect developed around a photographic work by the American artist Andres Serrano, entitled Immersion Piss Christ. The work features a crucifix dipped in the artist’s urine. It was vandalized on Sunday, April 17, 2011, at the Yvon Lambert contemporary art collection in Avignon, France.

The Archbishop of Avignon issued a statement protesting the exhibition of this work, and so justifying the destruction. The argument of (lack of) respect is invoked in the following passage:

Are not the local authorities, among other things, under the obligation to ensure respect for the faith of believers of every religion? Yet such a work remains a desecration which, on the eve of Good Friday, when we remember Christ who gave his life for us while dying on the Cross, touches us deeply in our hearts.

The argument is then repeated and amplified (our emphasis):

— The odious profanation of a Christ on the cross (Title)
— Can art be in such bad taste for no other reason than to serve as an insult?
— I have to react to this odious picture which flouts the image of Christ on the cross, the heart of our Christian faith. Any attack on our faith hurts us, any believer is affected deep within his faith.
— Given the gravity of such an affront
— For me, as a Bishop, as for every Christian and every believer, this is a provocation, a profanation that hurts us at the very heart of our faith!
— Did the Lambert collection not perceive that these pictures seriously wounded all those for whom the Cross of Christ is the heart of their faith? Or did they want to provoke believers by flouting what for them is at the heart of their lives.
— A serious desecration, a scandal affecting the faith of these believers.
— [These pictures] seriously harm the faith of Christians.
— A behavior that hurts us at the heart of our faith.
Infocatho, [Odious Profanation of a Christ on the Cross], 2011[1]

In some countries, blasphemy laws punish what they qualify as contempt and disrespect towards the State’s religion; blasphemy is punished as any other crime. Campaigns against blasphemy laws develop a counter-discourse positing that such laws are medieval and obscurantist; that they are incompatible with the basic democratic principle of freedom of expression; and that they make all philosophical and historical inquiry about religious belief impossible.

Some other countries have laws prohibiting hate speech or discriminatory speech, especially intended as guarantees of the equality of rights for minority communities, religious or others.

The argument of (a lack of) respect was at the heart of the case concerning the cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad published in 2005 in a Danish satirical weekly journal. This case culminated in the 2015 terrorist attack on the French satirical journal Charlie Hebdo, resulting in the shooting of 11 journalists and collaborators by two Islamist terrorists.

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[1] “Odieuse Profanation d’un Christ en Croix”, Infocatho. http://infocatho.cef.fr/fichiers_html/archives/deuxmil11sem/semaine15/210nx151europeb.html 09-20-2013

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The proof by repetition is sometimes metonymically designated under the Latin name of its effect, arg. ad nauseam, Lat. nausea “nausea, disgust”.

Any meaningful or pragmatically relevant segment can be repeated for a variety of purposes: something may be repeated because it has not been clearly heard or understood; the second speaker may repeat the end of the first turn to link it with his or her second turn, etc. Repetition may consist in repeating an initial phrase or speech act word for word, as is the case in formal quotations. Alternatively, repetition might slightly reformulate something which can be heard everywhere, as a well-known argumentation borrowed from a script. Conscious, strategic repetition of slightly modulated core contents is the key of traditional methods in education; repetition of the same action is the basis of learning-by-doing.

While most repetitions are unplanned and remain unnoticed, the argument by repetition or proof by repeated assertion is part of a strategy to impose on people a unilateral, uncritical vision of things. The focus is put upon a single key statement, presented not as a claim but as an obvious necessary truth, repetition creating a feeling of self-evidence.

Although called “argument”, this process is characterized by the absence of argument. It offers no reason, good or bad, to support the claim; reasons are not implied or contextually retrievable but are carefully ignored. Such strategic repetition can therefore be considered to be argumentative only if an argument is defined by its effect, persuasion. Repetition is instrumental to persuasion, which could itself be seen as a disposition, or a readiness to repeat under appropriate circumstances. Note that repeating a whole complex argument results in an argument by repetition rather than any other kind of argument: “we will win because we are the strongest”.

The sociologist Gustave Le Bon emphasized the power of repetition to gain people’s assent:

Pure and simple assertion [affirmation], kept free of all reasoning and all proof, is one of the surest means of making an idea enter the mind of crowds […]
Affirmation, however, has no real influence unless it be constantly repeated, and so far as possible in the same terms. It was Napoleon, I believe, who said that there is only one figure in rhetoric of serious importance, namely, repetition. The thing affirmed comes by repetition to fix itself in the mind in such a way that it is accepted in the end as a demonstrated truth. […]
To this circumstance is due the astonishing power of advertisements. When we have read a hundred, a thousand times that X’s chocolate is the best, we imagine we have heard it said in many quarters, and we end by acquiring the certitude that such is the fact. (Le Bon [1895], p. 126-127)

This last remark shows that repetition produces an illusion of legitimation by the authority of great number, S. Consensus.

From the point of view of the evaluation of arguments, this form of repetition is regarded as a fallacy, and even as the fallacy par excellence, since it imposes the acceptance of a statement not only without justification but against all justification.

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1. “Ignorance of refutation”, a fallacy of method

Lat. ignoratio elenchi. The Greek word [elenkhos] means: “1. Argument to refute … 2. Proof in general” (Bailly, [elenkhos])”. The Latin title of Aristotle’s Sophistical Refutations is De Sophisticis elenchi (Hamblin 1970, 305).

The fallacy of “ignorance of refutation” (ignoratio elenchi) is defined in the context of the dialectical game, where a participant, the Respondent (or Proponent), is committed to a statement, and the partner, the Questioner (or Opponent), tries to lead the Respondent to a contradiction, to thus refute the statement he or she (the Respondent) had previously accepted. The dialectical game considers only contradictory propositions (one and only one of them is true). The opponent must conform to the rules of the method in order to truly refute (and not in appearance) the primitive affirmation, S. Dialectic. The fallacy of ignorance of refutation is independent of language, it occurs “because the terms ‘proof’ or ‘refutation’ have not been defined, and because something is left out in their definition”. (Aristotle, R. S., 167a20, §5), S. Fallacy: Aristotle. In other words, the misconception of refutation is a general term covering all methodological errors occurring in a dialectical game.

This concept may be extended to any argumentative language game: “the arguer argues and does not know how to argue; thinks something is being proven or successfully refuted, when this is not the case; his or her practical concept of argument is flawed, etc.” This basically occurs when the argument does not respect the principles of relevance: on the one hand, the argument must be relevant to the conclusion (internal relevance) and, on the other hand, the conclusion must be relevant as a reply to the question (external relevance), S. Argumentative question.

2. Relevance of the argument for the conclusion

In the context of a dialectic game, the Respondent asserts P. Starting from P, the Questioner deductively constructs a chain of propositions ending with proposition not-P. So, the Questioner claims that this chain proves proposition not-P. Apparently, the Respondent has been refuted, and the Questioner has won the game. But the Respondent claims that the chain of proofs backing not-P is not valid because the arguments put forward do not actually support this conclusion; so, the Respondent claims that the Questioner actually failed to demonstrate not-P.

This schematizes the general situation when an arguer claims to have refuted the opponent ex datis, that is using only beliefs and modes of inference supposedly admitted by the opponent. In the same way, in an ex datis or ad hominem procedure, the opponent can resist the refutation by breaking the inference chain leading to the conclusive step s/he is supposedly compelled to concede. In other words, he or she argues that the arguments are not relevant to the conclusion. This issue actually involves all the program of criticism of argumentation.

3. Relevance of the conclusion as a reply to the Question

In the general case, the proponent commits himself to P, the opponent constructs from P a chain of propositions, at the end of which the proposition Q is reached. The proponent therefore claims that “Q = Not-P”. The proponent argues that proposition Q is not contradictory to P, and that, accordingly, it has not been rebutted. The arguments may be relevant to the conclusion, but the conclusion does not disprove the original thesis.

To argue that an intervention is externally irrelevant is to argue that it misses the point, is off-topic, etc. It may also be denounced as an attempt to put the adversary on a false trail, S. Red herring; the accusation of paralogism is reinforced by a suspicion of sophistry.

Criticisms of internal relevance and external relevance are cumulative. They invalidate a speech by saying that it does not back its conclusion, and that, besides, the conclusion has nothing to do with the issue.

4. The question is not relevant to the “real debate”

The dialectical framework is binary, the proposition to discuss is expressed in a simple and explicit proposition, and the methodology of a refutative discussion is well defined. Since the question is “P or not-P?”, claiming that the opponent’s conclusion does not logically contradict P, is to claim that it is not relevant to the debate.

The situation can be equally clear in an ordinary discussion. A student contests, that is, wants to “refute” the grade he has received: “if you don’t up my grade, I’ll fail the exam; please, I badly need just three extra points!”. The argumentation by the consequences is quite valid, but the negative consequences of the bad grade are irrelevant to the determination of the grade (according to the classical scientific and educational regimes at least). The student’s conclusion is irrelevant, failing to acknowledge the real issue: “what mark does my assignment deserve in itself?”. The student’s question is different from the teacher’s question, and the teacher is the master of the question.

Things may be more complicated. When the proponent refutes the rebuttal by saying, “what you disagree with has nothing to do with what I am saying”, what he actually says can be difficult to pin down, and may be constantly reformulated and reinterpreted S. Resumption of speech. On the other hand, even when the original claim and its intended rebuttal have been previously set down in writing, the link between the two does not necessarily have the clarity of the binary contradiction. For example, does S2 refute S1, or merely show that the issue is complex:

S1: — Speculators buy raw material in advance just to speculate on future price variations. Such operations on raw material should be banned by law.
S2: — Nonetheless, it is essential for companies to purchase in advance the raw materials they need, to cover themselves against price fluctuations.

Finally, in ordinary argumentation, the issue itself may be controversial. When none of the participants is the (natural or conventional) master of the question, each key participant will be tempted to give a definition of the question, and, will, accordingly reject the opponent’s answer as irrelevant to the real issue:

S1: — That’s not the question!
S2: — This is my answer to the problems that really arise. You’re not asking the right question.

The accusation of fallacy of conclusion irrelevant to the question under debate can be answered by a counter accusation of a fallacious, wrongly framed question, irrelevant to the “real” debate.

The function of the participating third party, be it the judge, the (universal) audience or the informed participants, is to construct, manage and decide upon the question, and accordingly, to determine what is or is not relevant in the debate.

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A relation is a two-place predicate R associating two objects, a and b, denoted by “aRb”. Relations are characterized by three general properties, symmetry, transitivity, and reflexivity.

— Symmetry, or Reciprocity: The same relationship holds between “a and b” and “b and a”.
— Reflexivity: The relationship connects an object to itself.
— Transitivity: The relationship connecting a to b and b to c also connects a to c.

1. Symmetry, or reciprocity

A relation is symmetric or reciprocal if it relates both a to b and b to a. In other words, both “aRb” and “bRa” hold. If a loves b, b does not necessarily love a: a love relationship is not symmetrical. “Meeting” is a symmetric relationship. The following argument is neither more nor less logical than any other, but it would make a valid point in any detective novel; it can only be rejected by accusing Peter of lying:

If Peter confessed to having met Paul at the bar, we must assume that Paul met Peter. Paul cannot deny the obvious.

2. Reflexivity

A reflexive relation relates a being to itself, noted “aRa”. “— being contemporary of —” is a reflexive relationship: a is its own strict contemporary. For the average person, the causal relationship is not reflexive; only God is causa sui, his own cause.

The reflexive relation can be used ad hominem. The principle “charity begins at home” for example forces the reflexivity of the relationship “a makes charity to b”; all the same, the love of others can be used to encourage self-care:

You who love the whole of humanity, you should try to love yourself as well!

The competence of an adviser can be challenged by inciting him to make a reflexive application of his talents:

Physician, heal thyself!

Such replies correspond to the ad hominem variety setting up practices against words.

3. Transitivity

A relation is transitive if, when it relates a to b and b to c, it also connects a to c; in other words, “aRb and bRc” imply that “aRc”.

If a loves b, and if b loves c, then a does not necessarily love c; a relationship of love is thus not transitive. The relation “— be the father of —” is not transitive, but “— being an ancestor of —” is transitive. If a is an ancestor of b and if b is an ancestor of c, then a is an ancestor of c.

Inferences based on the transitivity of a predicate apply whenever at least three objects are positioned on a graduated scale:

If a is bigger, older, richer … than b
and b larger, older, richer … than c,
Then a is bigger, older, richer … than c.

Inferences based on these properties are part of the unnoticed evidences exploited by everyday reasoning and argument. They are sometimes considered to be “quasi-logical”, S. Quasi-logic; but being sound and valid does not preclude being an argument.

4. Conversion

S. Conversion

Lat. A conjugata argument, Lat. conjugatus, “related, of the same family”

Three types of argument are based on the fact that two words are materially related, depending on the nature of their relationship:

An etymological link S. True Meaning of the world.
A morphological link, S. Derived Words.
A phonic or graphic resemblance, S. Ambiguity.

Synonymy and antonymy are semantic relations.

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All the components of written or spoken discourse in a given situation can be used or manipulated by the opponent in order to present this discourse as untenable, S. Destruction.
The word refutation is used to designate a reactive speech act covering the explicit forms of discursive rejection of positions, opinions, charges or projects. The possible use of  rejection or denial as a synonym of refutation rdoes not imply the absence of argument. As non-preferred second pairs, denials and rejections are also characterized by the presence of accounts. In fully argumentative interactions, refutation is in particular characterized by its explicitness and careful elaboration.

From a scientific point of view, a proposition is refuted if it is proved to be false; the calculation from which it derives contains an error; it affirms something that is contradictory to the observed facts.
From the point of view of ordinary interaction, an argumentative line is contextually refuted if, after being discussed, it is given up by the adversary, either explicitly or implicitly. Accordingly, the question itself disappears, and the interaction progresses to another structuring topic.

As a reactive speech act, refutation can be dealt with in only a verbal (face to face) or written (text to text) dialogue. Monological discourse knows only the concession, there are no refutative subordinate clauses, and concessive clauses reduce the refutation to an objection.

1. Structural refutation

Each component of the propositional argumentative model may be targeted by the act of refutation, S. Argumentation (III)); Layout.

1.1 Turning down the argument

An argument supporting a conclusion may be rejected in different ways.

(i) The argument is declared false:

S1 — Peter will surely arrive on Tuesday; he has been invited to Paul’s birthday.
S2 — But Paul’s birthday is on Monday.

(ii) The argument is rejected as irrelevant to the conclusion, S. Relevance:

S1 — He is very intelligent, he read all of Proust’s work within three days.
S2 — Intelligence has nothing to do with reading speed.

(iii) The argument can be accepted as such, recognized as somehow relevant to the conclusion but may be dismissed as too weak, or of poor quality:

S1 — The President has spoken, the stock market will go up.
S2 — Yes, and what he says goes! (said sarcastically).

The rejection of the argument may lead to a new argumentative question (sub-debate), about the truth, strength or relevance of the former argument.

Turning down the argument does not mean renouncing the conclusion. This is often the case in factual argumentation:

S1 — Peter will surely arrive on Tuesday, he wants to be there for Paul’s birthday.
S2 — Paul’s birthday is on Monday, but sure, Peter will arrive on Tuesday, I bought him his flight tickets.

Nonetheless, in ideological debates, only the most ascetic arguers will refute questionable or bad arguments made in favor of conclusions which they consider to be good or virtuous.

1.2 Turning down the backing

The backing invoked, implicitly or not, is declared false:

S1 — Pedro was born in the Malvinas Islands, so he is an Argentine citizen
S2 — The Falkland Islands are British territory.

The adverbs exaclty, precisely (not) can substitute one backing to another (Ducrot & al., 1982), S. Orientation:

S1 — Noodles for dinner!
S2 — Again! We had noodles for lunch!
S1 — Exactly, we need to finish the leftovers, we don’t want to waste food.

The resulting stasis is produced by the conflict of two topoi:

Dietary, or gustatory pleasure principle: « you have to vary one’s diet« .
Economy principle, against the waste « food should not be thrown« .

1.3 Turning down the conclusion

Conclusions may be dismissed even though some validity is granted to the argument:

S1 — Cannabis should be legalized; the taxes will pay off the National Health Service deficit
S2 — It will certainly increase tax revenues, but it will further increase the number of drug addicts. The prohibition must be maintained.

The counter-argumentation establishes a counter-conclusion leaving the argument it opposes intact, S. Counter-argumentation.

2. Weak refutation protecting the claim

By generalizing of the law of weakness, a weak refutation confirms the attacked position, S. Scale. This principle applies to various interpretative schemes, whose analysis must take into account the whole corpus produced by the argumentative question.

(i) Weak refutation of a poorly re-constructed attacked position

The wise man concludes that the refutation is not worth much, to say nothing of its author, and the problem remains intact.

(ii) Weak refutation of an outstanding exposition of the attacked position

The conclusion is that the attacked position is reinforced by this attempt at refutation. The interpretive calculation is based on the fact that the arguer is qualified.

— The poor refutation is standard, while the quality of the exposition, clearly indicates a good arguer. Since the given refutation is taken to be the best possible (according to Grice’s maxims), and since it is weak or even ridiculous, the conclusion will be that, “since even such an arguer finds nothing else to say, then, the criticized position must actually be correct”, even if this derivation is ad ignorantiam, S. Counter-argumentation.

— The poor refutation is bizarre. It contains obvious errors alerting the careful reader; there is a contrast between the quality and care of the exposition and the scanty character of the refutation. Moreover, this refutation is not put forward in the usual argumentative style of the author. For example, a fine theologian develops in a dialectical and detailed manner, a position condemned by the official authorities of his religion, and refutes it only by arguments drawn from various authorities (which the reader may be aware are considered questionable), so the careful reader is led to think that this oddity is strategic. The speech is apparently refuted, only to be better asserted in reality, the negation serving then to cover the author. This case of indirectness has been theorized by Strauss (1953). If, under special historical, social, or religious circumstances, a discourse is banned, it is nevertheless possible to give it a voice under the cover of its refutation, the negation then serving to protect the speaker from tyrannical authorities.

This strategy of confirmation, or argumentation by weak refutation, is dangerous to maintain. The authorities are not necessarily naive nor uninformed, and they may be well aware of the intended purpose of the pseudo refutation, which will be rightly interpreted as a denial of a belief which is actually held by the speaker: “How can you so be such an expert about heterodox positions and such a fool when dealing with orthodoxy?”.

Such a strategy, based on the opacity of the writer’s intentions, presupposes a double argumentative address, the real intentions can be captured only by a careful reader, while they remain unknown to the hasty reader, who appreciates the weak refutation because it can be easily understood, absorbed and repeated, S. Strategy.

3. Refutation and counter-discourse

The concept of refutation is defined at the very general level of the challenged argumentation. The counter-discourse approach specifies the possible rebuttal strategies according to the specific argument pattern (testimony, authority, definition, induction, causal claim, etc.). The argument pattern is flanked by a counter-pattern, an integral part of the form and substance of the argument considered.

In the Skeptical philosophical style, such a counter-discourses can also be directed at the argumentative type itself, as a general discourse, “against authority, analogy, causality, etc.”, which rejects a priori all forms of argument from authority, etc.

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Herrings turn red when smoked; red herrings were used by fugitives to set dogs on a false trail. The expression is used figuratively in argumentation, where the so-called “red herring” strategy is referred to as a diversion strategy, where a distractor is used to eschew the issue under discussion, and deflect the discussion towards an irrelevant issue, S. Relevance.

In mathematics, the relation of reciprocity corresponds to the relation of symmetry: a relation R is symmetric in the domain in which it is defined, if for all the pairs of elements a and b both aRb and bRa hold. The relation “being the friend of” is symmetrical:

Peter is the friend of Paul = Paul is the friend of Peter = Peter and Paul are friends.

1. Returning and anticipating the good

In natural language, the reciprocal relation is defined on the basis of a set of actions which binds two persons. That is to say that if a does something positive to/for b, then b must reciprocate, doing the same thing to/for a. This is the principle of returning favors. The individuals a and b are equal in this relationship. The principle of reciprocity acts as a constraint:

If you treat me to dinner, I must treat you to dinner.

As a form of natural morality, the imperative of reciprocity is expressed by the principle:

Do to others as you would have them do to you. (Luke Gospel, 6:31)
Do not do to others what you would not have them do to you.

This principle is applied in the argument:

I’m polite to you, so be polite to me.

The speaker defines him/herself and defines his or her partner as members of the same category, who must be treated in the same way, S. Rule of Justice.

1. Returning and anticipating the wrong:
Reciprocity as retaliation

Eye for eye, tooth for tooth
If your disappointed lover disfigured you with vitriol, the court grants you the right to treat him likewise.

The law of retaliation is a primitive rule of justice that if A has wronged B in some way, then B can legitimately do the same wrong to A. In contemporary times, we might consider nuclear deterrence, based on the certainty of reciprocal destruction, as a concrete application of this principle. This theory corresponds to a particular case of the, “You too!” argument.

Reciprocity as a legal principle allows different states to assert their equal international dignity, and possibly to justify a retaliatory measure:

If country A requires a visa for the nationals of country B, it is right that country B also requires that nationals of country A acquire a visa.

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The concept of argumentative question originates in the notion of stasis, developed primarily by the rhetorical theory of judicial interaction.

The concepts of an argumentative question and an argumentative situation are interdependent. An argumentative situation emerges when two speeches concerning the same topic begin to diverge to some extent. The contact can be made during a remote or face-to-face, oral or written, interaction. Such potentially argumentative situation may evolve into an actual argumentative situation when the divergence is topicalized and ratified by a participant. All these necessary developments delimit an argumentative space, defining what is argumentation, before the appearance of arguments strictly speaking (discursive segments supporting a conclusion).

The existence of a question is at the origin of the paradoxes of argumentation.

1. Proposition, opposition, doubt: A question

The following example, constructed around the recurring question “Should we legalize drugs?” shows how the question assigns argumentative roles, on the basis of the three fundamental argumentative speech acts, to propose, to oppose and to doubt.

• The current state of the law
  

In Syldavia 2022, drug production, importation, exportation, trade, possession, and consumption are forbidden.

This statement corresponds to the state of Syldavian legislation, generally backed by “dominant opinion”, perceived as a matter of course, so needing no argument.

• A proposition

Another discourse is oriented towards a proposition opposed to this prohibition:

P: — The consumption of soft drugs should be legalized, or at least tolerated.

Speaker P steps into the argumentative role of proponent, and opens the debate. All speakers aligned with this proposal serve as allies.

• An opposition

Other speakers oppose the proposal:

O: — That’s staggering!

The speaker O plays the argumentative role of opponent. Speakers willing to hold this type of rejection discourse with respect to the proposition are allies.

• Doubt and question: emergence of the argumentative question

Some participants refuse to align with either position. They are in the position of third parties, synthetizing the proposition vs. opposition relation into an argumentative question, and transforming the discourse confrontation into a full argumentative situation:

TP: — All this is quite perplexing. Should the prohibition of all these drugs they call soft be maintained or not?

The argumentative question is thus generated by the contradiction “discourse / counter-discourse”, hence the schema:

Proposition vs. Opposition → Argumentative Question (AQ)

2. The conclusion as an answer to the argumentative question

When discourse develops into a confrontation, good reasons are needed and quickly provided. The proponent bears the burden of proof and, in order to meet this requirement, must put forward arguments, for example by re-categorizing soft drugs in the same category as alcohol or anxiolytics:

P — Soft drugs are not more dangerous than alcohol or anxiolytics; alcohol is not subject to any general prohibition, and anxiolytics are subject to medical prescription.

This argument supports the slogan:

Yes! We should have at least a more tolerant approach to soft drugs!

Produced under the general scope of the argumentative question, this conclusion gives an answer to this question.

The opponent must show that the proponent’s speech is untenable. First, he rejects the arguments of the proponent:

O: — No! Alcohol has nothing to do with drugs. We know how to drink in this country; alcohol is part of our culture, drugs are not. And if you legalize soft drugs next you’ll have to tolerate hard drugs!

O: — In Syldavia, they tried to legalize drugs, and the experience failed. Enough with social experimentation detrimental to young people!

Conclusion:

— Let us reject this crazy new proposal of legalization!

Secondly, O presents a counter-argument in favor of another position. This may correspond to maintaining the status quo:

— Honest citizens live peacefully thanks to the prohibition; the situation is under control as it is

Under the standard regime, the doxa “goes without saying”; but once the argumentative situation has been opened, it requires justification.

Argumentative questions are distinct from informative questions. The latter permits direct, unequivocal relevant answers:

S0: — When did you arrive? In which hotel are you staying?
S1: — Yesterday, and I stay in Grand Brand Hotel.
S0_2: — Oh, that’s wonderful! And what are you doing tonight?

Whereas the answer to the former necessitates an argument:

S0 — Does the fight against terrorism authorize restrictions upon freedom of expression?
S1 — Yes.
S0_2 — Oh, that’s wonderful. Now, let’s turn to the next question.

3. Argumentative situation: form and structuring rules

3.1 Representation

In a stabilized argumentative situation, proponents and opponents are also called upon to make positive arguments and to refute the antagonistic position. This situation can be roughly represented as follows:

Argument is seen as a mode of constructing answers to a question for which incompatible answers have been given.

Under the coherence assumption, all the semiotic acts produced in this situation are oriented towards the consolidation of the Answer-Conclusion.

The argumentative question is essentially open; the legitimacy (interest, respectability…) of the pro and contra interventions is acknowledged, at least factually. Sometimes the participants agree on a mutually satisfactory answer – conclusion, other times they don’t.

In many cases, an element of doubt remains attached to the surviving, ratified, answer, and the question may re-emerge. In other words, the answer is provisional; it cannot be completely separated from the question and the set of pro and counter-arguments that generated it. The answer is therefore an answer by default; an unstable answer, which may be subject to revision.

Centrality of Third parties

Considering that third parties play decisional roles, it follows that:
1) The development of the exchange will generally alter the original positions as expressed in the opening sequence. The final conclusion will not be identical with one of the positions as expressed at the opening sequence of the interaction.

2) A well-executed, successful argumentative exchange may conclude without a winner and a loser.

3) The loser is not compelled to relinquish their doubts.

Question and relevance
The question sets the relevance principle for argumentative contributions: relevance of the arguments for the conclusion, relevance of the conclusions as answers to the question.

The question, and consequently the relevance of interventions, may themselves  be challenged during the debate. It may be rejected on the basis of being flawed, poorly formulated, or irrelevant in consideration with “deeper” issues. S. Relevance; Refutation.

Burden of proof
The preceding graphic sought to represent the asymmetry between discourse and counter-discourse, established by the burden of proof resting on the proponent. This allocation may change with the participants and the kind of forum where the discussion takes place.

3.2 A Double constraint

Arguments are built under a double constraint; on the one hand, they are oriented by a question, and, on the other hand they are under the pressure of the counter-discourse. This situation is characterized by macro-discursive phenomena, such as the following ones:

 Bipolarization of discourse
Followers are attracted by the question; they identify themselves with the speakers involved; they adjust their language to reflect the words and practices of the lead speakers; in contrast, they exclude speakers and supporters of the opposing discourse (we vs. them).

Crystallization of discourse
Emergence of fixed lexical collocation, of antonymic pairs, tendency to stereotype the positions, especially stabilization of ready-made argument scripts.

Resistance to refutation
Appearance of mechanisms of resistance to refutation. Presentation of arguments in the form of self-argued claims, mimicking analyticity.

3.3 Changing mind, language and roles

Not only at the end of the discussion, but also during the exchange, participants can be persuaded to change their mind, alter their opinion and language, shifting from one role to another.

4. Monologization of the “Question — AnswerS” game

The vision of argumentation as a discussion between incompatible points of views about the same object is operative in both monologue and dialogs.

4.1 Dialogs can be monologized in two different ways

4.1.1 Monologal, non polyphonic interventions

An argumentative intervention developing a series of co-oriented arguments towards a conclusion, the arguer voices just one position, and assumes a demonstrative “no alternative” rhetoric. The monologue is monophonic.

Monophonic interventions ignore the speeches and positions of the opponents. This means that their practical study will necessitate the construction of a corpus bringing together the various interventions supporting the different answers. The plea for P is best understood when referred to some contestation, or neglect of P.

4.1.1 Monologal, polyphonic intervention

In another kind of monologue, the arguer adopts different positions, ands put forward several hypotheses about the same argumentative issue, without advocating any of them in particular. The discourse stages several voices, especially the main competing voice that of the oppoonent. Such a monologue is polyphonic, S. Interaction, Dialogue, Polyphony.

Polyphonic interventions contain a representation of the speech of the other participants. They take over, under various polyphonic modalities, the set of situational discursive data, the question and the opponent’s speech and position, which are re-framed under different discursive regimes, corresponding to different images allocated to the interlocutor and different self-allocated ethos. As a result, the assertion is introduced under an interrogative veil.

These strategies of polyphonic monologization of the question have been clearly identified in ancient rhetoric, where they are considered to be figures of speech, interrogation (interrogatio), subjection (subjection) and dubitation (dubitatio) (Lausberg, [1960], § 766-779).

(i) The question is framed as having one self-evident answer (interrogatio)

This is the case of the interrogatio, or “rhetorical question” defined classically as a question having an obvious answer.

Now, can such a person make a better president than our candidate? Certainly not.

The speaker takes possession of the argumentative question and gives an answer presented as the only possible, self-evident answer. This operation “disambiguates” the question, by imposing one sole response, S. Ambiguity.

The speaker takes the position of “the one who knows” and embeds the answer in the question. Third parties are framed in the position of allies who also know and applaud; opponents are challenged by a form of reasoning through ignorance. The purpose of the interrogatio strategy is to suggest that “there is no problem with this issue”.

(ii) The question is framed as having one justified answer (subjectio)

Lat. subjectio, “put before, under the eyes”; here “submit to” the audience)

The question is presented as requiring clarification rather than argumentation, as explanatory rather than argumentative, S. Explanation. The speaker takes the place of the investigator or the teacher who asks the right question and resolves it objectively. The interlocutor is framed as the pupil or the judge, sharing the direct question and admitting the proposed answers according to the logic of pedagogical co-construction.

Here is the situation, here is the question, and here are the data. One can think of three different answers, solutions, possibilities… Solution (a) is a variant of solution (b), as we will show. For such and such a good reason, solution (c) must be preferred to solution (b). So, the correct answer is (c).

Doctoral dissertations might approximate this strategy. During the defense, a member of the jury will possibly re-dialectize the monologue, expressing differently solution (a), and reversing the evaluation of (c) over (b)

(iii) The Question is framed as an open question, and the speech builds the answer in real time (dubitatio)

The speaker now takes the place of the third party, the ignorant party who has his or her doubts. In a kind of reversal of roles, the interlocutor is put in the high position of an assistant or counselor. The construction of the solution is now attributed to the interlocutor-counselor, not to the speaker-investigator.

In the three cases, the monologization of the argumentative situation plays heavily upon the preference for agreement. It does not leave the floor to other participants, and can channel their voices towards the speaker’s conclusion.

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Perelman & Olbrechts-Tyteca introduce the class of quasi-logical arguments as the first of the three categories of “association schemes” ([1958], p. 191), that is argument schemes. Quasi-logical arguments can be understood “by bringing them closer to formal thought, logical or mathematical. But a quasi-logical argument differs from a formal deduction in that it always presupposes adherence to non-formal theses, which alone allows the application of the argument” (Perelman 1977, p. 65)

Six schemes are more precisely analyzed, and these bear the same name as their logical counterparts:

Among the quasi-logical arguments, we shall first analyze those which depend on logical relations — contradiction, total or partial identity, transitivity; we shall then analyze those which depend on mathematical relations — the connection between the part and the whole, the smaller and the larger, and frequency. Many other relations could obviously be examined. (Perelman & Olbrechts-Tyteca [1958], p. 194)

Definitions are “typical of quasi-logical argumentation” (id., p. 214):

When they are not part of a formal system, and when they nevertheless claim to identify the definiens and the definiendum, we shall consider them a form of quasi-logical argumentation” (id., p. 210).

The “quasi-logical” label is symptomatic of the method of the Treatise, rejecting “logic” but constantly using it a contrario to define argumentation in general and in particular to characterize the “quasi-logical” super-category of argument schemes. The category includes all the argumentative strategies involving phenomena such as negation, scales, relations and definitional stereotypes. In fact, it is the system of language that is considered to be a quasi-logic.

The arguments in this category are defined by a common characteristic:

[Quasi-logical arguments] lay claim to a certain power of conviction, in the degree that they claim to be similar to the formal reasoning of logic or mathematics. Submitting these arguments to analysis, however, immediately reveals the differences between them and formal demonstrations, for only an effort of reduction or specification of a non-formal character makes it possible for these arguments to appear demonstrative. This is why we call them quasi-logical. (Id., p. 193)

According to the traditional definition, a fallacy is an argument that looks like a valid argument but is not. There is a striking similarity between this, and the definition given in the Treatise: quasi-logical argumentation “claim[s] to be similar” to formal reasoning, but is not.

S. Fallacies; Logic; Collections (III).