STASIS
The word stasis is of Greek origin; it is translated in Latin as quaestio, and, “in modern parlance”, as issue (Nadeau 1964, p. 366).
In medicine, a stasis is defined as “a slowing or stoppage of the normal flow of a bodily fluid or semifluid” (MW, Stasis); a stasis results in congestion, that is, in “an excessive accumulation especially of blood or mucus in an organ” (MW, Congest).
As used in rhetorical argumentation, the word stasis is a medical metaphor; medicine is a valuable source of examples and an important analogical resource area for argumentative theory see natural sign. In medicine, a state of stasis occurs when the bodily fluids are blocked, and the medical arts must be applied to restore the proper flow of fluids. Similarly, in the field of human action and interaction, a situation of stasis occurs when the consensual circulation of discourse is blocked by a contradiction or a doubt, and the argumentative arts must be employed to restore the normal, cooperative flow of dialogue. Nadeau defines the situation of stasis as “a position of balance or rest” established between two opposing discourses (id., p. 369).
In a state of stasis, the equilibrium is that of an aporia: “the Greek verb aporein describes the situation of the person who, faced with an obstacle, finds no way through finds no passage”; the associated psychic state is embarrassment (Pellegrin 1997, art Aporia). In philosophical usage, an aporia is an unresolvable contradiction.
1. The classical theory of stasis
The first systematic formulation of a theory of stasis is found in Hermagoras of Temnos (late 2nd century BC; Benett 2005). The technique of stasis was used by rhetoricians before Hermagoras, but he was the first to formally identify and name the concept along with four basic types of stasis (Nadeau 1964, p. 370). This theory is best known through the treatise On Stasis of Hermogene of Tarsus, a Greek rhetorician of the second half of the second century (Hermogene, AR; Patillon 1988).
Hermogene distinguishes between:
(i) On the one hand, misconceived questions, on which no argumentative debate can be built, either because their answer is obvious, or because they are undecidable; these questions are “incapable of stasis” (id., p. 385); in other words they cannot be discussed rationally.
(ii) On the other hand, are the well-conceived questions, which can be discussed rationally.
Hermogene organizes the different kinds of general, well-conceived questions as follows (after Patillon, p. 57 sq.).
– Stasis of conjecture: Is the fact established?
– Stasis on the definition, on “the name of an act” (Nadeau, p. 393): Someone robs a private person in a temple; is he a temple plunderer?
– The next step is the qualification of the act; it can be rational (discussed on the basis of good reason) or legal (discussed on the basis of an existing law).
The legal qualification is discussed along the following lines (from Patillon, p. 59).
The accused does not admit to the maliciousness of the fact: antilepsis (“contradiction, objection”, Bailly, [Antilepsis])
The defendant admits to the maliciousness of the fact: opposition
• He accepts responsibility: compensation
• He rejects responsibility:
— and blames the victim: counter-accusation
— and blames someone or something else:
≠ who or what can be guilty: report of accusation
≠ who or what cannot be guilty: excuse
3. The authentic “rhetorical question”
A stasis is a question, the knot of a conflict that articulates a judicial action in order to resolve it. The Rhetoric at Herennius defines the first stage of a judicial encounter as the determination of the question that constitutes the cause (Ad Her., I, 18, 17):
The issue [constitutio] is determined by the joining of the primary plea of the defense with the charge of the plaintiff (Ad Her., I, 18, 11)
Quintilian explains that the first thing he does to resolve an argumentative situation is to find the quæstio, the question, or the issue. The question “arises” when a statement made by one party is contradicted by the other party. Notice that the following text assumes that adultery was a crime; that it was legal to kill an adulterer; and, apparently, that the executioner was prosecuted for killing the man while also killing the woman:
5. So, first of all, then, (and this is not difficult to determine, but must be examined first and foremost) I settled what each party wished to establish, and then by what means, in the following way. I considered what the prosecutor would say first: either an admitted point or a contested point. If it was admitted, the question could not be in it. 6. I would then proceed to the defendant’s answer and consider it in the same way. Sometimes, too, what was elicited there was admitted. But as soon as there was any disagreement, the question arose.
The procedure was like this: ‘You killed a man’ —‘I did kill him”. The fact is admitted, so I pass on. 7. The accused should give a reason why he killed him. He may say ‘It is lawful to kill an adulterer with an adulteress’. It is admitted that there is such a law. We can then move on to a third point, that may be disputed. ‘They were not guilty of adultery’ – ‘they were’. So the question arises.
(IO, VII, 1, 5-7; my emphasis).
The question, that is to say, the point to be judged, is inferred from the nature of the accused’s response to the accuser. If the parties agree, the facts are considered to be established or « peaceful »; if they disagree, they are disputed.
Early inOn Invention Cicero criticizes Hermagoras for taking too general a view of argumentative questions, including philosophical as well as scientific questions: “Can the senses be trusted? What is the shape of the world? How big is the sun?” (On Inv., I, 8, VI). Cicero limits the theory of questions to those belonging to the proper domain of the orator, the epidictic, deliberative, and judicial genres. The concept of question, however has no such predetermined limit.
The concept of stasis as a question is the counterpart in the rhetorical domain of the Aristotelian concept of problem in the dialectical domain (Aristotle, Top., I, 11, 104b-105a10, pp. 25-28); a question is a rhetorical problem. The theory of stasis is the theory of “rhetorical questions” in the proper sense:
The constitutio of the auctor ad Herennium, is thus the functionally dual stasis of Greek rhetoric […] whose psychical counterpart is the articulate question, or, as Sextus Empiricus (Against the Geometricians, III, 4) styled it, the “rhetorical question” (Dieter 1950, p. 360). [1]
This meaning of the term rhetorical question is quite different from the current meaning, which denotes a question to which the speaker knows the answer, knowing that his interlocutors also know the answer, and whose value is that of a challenge to potential opponents. To avoid confusion, we’ll use the term argumentative question, see argumentative question.
4. Example
Faced with the accusation, “You stole my moped!”, the defendant can adopt different strategies that determine the nature of the ensuing debate.
(1) Deny having committed the act; the fact is not established (“conjectural stasis”)
I didn’t even touch your moped!
(2) Acknowledge that was a theft, and blame someone else:
It’s not me, it’s him!
Idem, accusing the author of the accusation:
It’s not me, it’s you, who accuses me, but you destroyed your own moped to get the insurance premium.
This strategy, like the strategy of reorientation of the fact, manifests the tendency to radical refutation, by symmetrical inversion, see reciprocity; causality.
(3) Recognizing the fact, denying that it was a theft, and re-categorizing the action under a more honorable label, see categorization. This can be accomplished by a number of different strategies:
But this is my moped; you stole it from me last year!
But this moped is mine, you pretended to buy it, but you never paid me.
I didn’t steal it, I borrowed it. I asked your permission.
(4) The same, but citing various extenuating circumstances:
The gang leader made me do it.
I was just taking my grandmother to the hospital
(5) The same apologizing:
I made a mistake, Mr. President.
(6) Recuse the tribunal (stasis on the procedure); disqualify the accuser:
It is not for the victor to judge the vanquished.
But who are you to judge me?
It suits you (= the accuser), you the gang leader, to complain about a theft! This should be settled by a good fist fight, as usual.
(7) Admit the fact and claim to be proud of it:
You were drunk, I saved your life by taking your moped, and you should thank me!
Perhaps because of its spectacular character, the last case is known in the rhetoric of figures as an antiparastasis, see orientation.
All these strategies are equally interesting, and all might deserve to be known by a specific name.
Some of these strategies are mutually exclusive, see kettle argumentation.
[1] I couldn’t find this most important reference in my edition.