Critical think ing I: Dimensions of argu ment

2.2.1 Orientation

I have been talking about argu ments, but not yet provided a defin i tion. An argu ment is:

A system of propos i tions compris ing one or more premises advanced by an arguer in support of a conclu sion.

(Bowell and Kemp, 2015: 289)

‘Premises’ are a set of reasons given in an argu ment for why a reader or listener should buy into its conclu sion. We produce argu ments, then, to try to persuade a reader or listener of our point of view. Crucially, since it is based on reasons, the attempt to persuade has a rational basis. In turn, if the reader or listener decides to align with the point of view of the argu ment, this is because they have been ration ally persuaded by what they view as good reasons (Bowell and Kemp, 2015: 185–192).

Critical think ing refers to the learn ing of tech niques to improve our capa-cit ies to eval u ate argu ments effect ively. A byproduct of crit ical think ing is that we improve our ability to produce ration ally persuas ive argu ments.

Critical think ing is recog nised inter na tion ally as an import ant ability; there are numer ous text books devoted to teach ing it (e.g. Bowell and Kemp,

2015; Butterworth and Thwaites, 2013; Cottrell, 2011; Fisher, 2011;

Jackson and Newberry, 2016; van den Brink-Budgen, 2010).¹ The crit ical eval u ation of argu ment has, in fact, featured in many curricula over the centur ies, being trace able in the West to Ancient Greek philo soph ers.

Contemporary approaches to the crit ical eval u ation of argu ment are still framed via inter sect ing dimen sions of argu ment – logical, rhet or ical and dialect ical – which bear some resemb lance to how Aristotle under stood these terms.²

2.2.2 Logic

One way in which we can eval u ate an argu ment is to look at the quality of its logical struc ture. Consider the follow ing:

Premise 1: All human beings are talen ted musi cians Premise 2: The US pres id ent is a human being _________________________________________________

Conclusion: The US pres id ent is a talen ted musi cian.

The conclu sion follows on from 1 and 2. Or put more academ ic ally, the conclu sion can be deduced from 1 and 2 – the premises of the argu ment.

The above argu ment is deduct ively valid. But there is a problem with it. The first premise is obvi ously untrue. So, deduct ive valid ity is not the only criterion for judging the quality of the logical struc ture of the argu ment. The premises also need to be true. When the argu ment is both deduct ively valid and has true premises, its reas on ing is said to be sound. Here is a sound argu ment:

Premise 1: All human beings are mortal Premise 2: Morrissey is a human being _______________________________________

Conclusion: Morrissey is mortal.

Since this is a sound argu ment, we can say it is also ration ally persuas ive – because its reasons (premises) are true and the argu ment is valid. This kind of tight deduct ively valid argu ment is referred to as a syllo gism. In this type of reas on ing, it is ulti mately the form which matters rather than the content.

The above argu ment fits into a more abstract gener al ised pattern which could apply to a gargan tuan number of other argu ments:

Premise 1: All Xs are Y Premise 2: Z is X _________________________

Conclusion: Z is Y.

A strong root for syllo gistic reas on ing is Aristotle’s thought, partic u larly his book, Prior Analytics.

While we commonly use deduct ive logic in every day think ing, trying to crit ic ally eval u ate an argu ment using abstract syllo gisms such as the above can be rather straight jack et ing. The every day situ ations we want to assess may be too messy and partic u lar for the gener al ised pattern of a syllo gism to capture. Moreover, there are many contexts when we cannot be 100 per cent sure of the premises, but all the same we are convinced by the conclu-sion. An example: the remains of the last Plantagenet king of England, Richard III – the inspir a tion for the eponym ous Shakespeare play – were lost for five centur ies. In February 2013, it was confirmed that a skel eton found under a Leicester car park was that of Richard III. This conclu sion was based on a combin a tion of evid ence from radiocar bon dating, compar-ison with contem por ary reports of his appear ance, and a compar compar-ison of his DNA with two matri lin eal descend ants of Richard III’s eldest sister. With the passage of time, there is no way of knowing with 100 per cent certainty that these are his remains. But, given the number of differ ent experts involved, and differ ent tests conduc ted, it is extremely plaus ible, a certainty of 99.9(recur ring) per cent, to conclude that these are the remnants of Richard III. The argu ment a tion theor ist Douglas Walton refers to this kind of argu ment as a plaus ible deduct ive argu ment (Walton, 2006: 69–75).

Compared to a syllo gism, a plaus ible deduct ive argu ment involves a looser form of deduc tion where each premise would be qual i fied with some thing like ‘assum ing that this premise is true – and there is nothing to suggest other wise’.³

Related to Walton’s outlook, the branch of argu ment study known as informal logic developed from the 1970s onwards as a recog ni tion that every day argu ments need more flex ible criteria for judging their logical quality (Blair and Johnson, 1987). Since it is often diffi cult to tell if premises are 100 per cent true, informal logic avoids the criterion of sound ness.

Instead, it uses three broad criteria to determ ine a good argu ment: accept-ab il ity, relev ance and suffi ciency. Premises must be relev ant to whatever claim is being made, should furnish suffi cient support for the claim being advanced and be ration ally accept able. Acceptability is regarded as a more real istic criterion than truth.

2.2.3 Dialectic

Another time- honoured dimen sion to argu ment is dialectic. For Aristotle, and also Plato, dialectic is a way of crit ic ally testing ideas, and their consist-ency, in a dialogue. A prot ag on ist puts forth a claim and then responds to a scep tical ques tioner – the antag on ist. In the dialectic, truth is sought co- oper at ively. Plato’s dialogues, where Socrates takes the role of antag-on ist, illus trate well the dialectic (called also the ‘Socratic method’).

Nowadays dialectic is more likely to refer to the dialo gical exchange struc-ture in a debate as well as the proced ural norms for govern ing how par- ticipants respond to one another. Dialectic is fairly obvious in a formal face- to-face debate – whether real or virtual. In written argu ment, dialectic is reflec ted in how the arguer is in crit ical dialogue with an oppos ing stand-point, anti cip at ing its objec tions. Dialogue and dialectic are not neces sar ily the same. Dialectical exchanges are always dialo gical, but dialogues are not always dialect ical. For instance, a chat at a Llandeilo bus- stop about the wet weather is not an instance of dialectic.

Where dialect ical criteria are flouted, then the argu ment could be seen as invalid. For example, from a dialect ical perspect ive, we might take account of whether or not parti cipants in the argu ment had been given equal time to put their points across or if each parti cipant had gone to the trouble to give a fair account of their oppon ent’s posi tion before seeking to rebut it. Douglas Walton flags the dialect ical dimen sion in his defin i tion of argu ment (as well as the logical dimen sion). A success ful argu ment means for Walton:

that it gives a good reason, or several reasons, to support or criti cize a claim . . . there are always two sides to an argu ment, and thus the argu-ment takes the form of a dialogue . . . The basic purpose of offer ing an argu ment is to give a reason (or more than one) to support a claim that is subject to doubt, and thereby remove that doubt.

(Walton, 2006: 1) A well- known approach in argu ment a tion studies which makes the dialect-ical dimen sion salient is pragma- dialectics. Frans van Eemeren and Rob Grootendorst are the main archi tects of this approach. The focus of pragma- dialectics is resol u tion of differ ences of opinion between differ ent parti ci-pants in a debate. ‘Pragma’ refers to ‘prag mat ics’, the branch of linguist ics which studies how language users make meaning in differ ent contexts, such as making a claim or chal len ging a point in an argu ment. In the pragma- dialect ical model, parti cipants employ argu ment a tion to test the accept ab-il ity of each other’s stand points. This is done by adher ing to ten rules which govern the argu ment a tion. These rules reflect the ‘dialectics’ bit of ‘pragma- dialectics’. If any of these rules is flouted, the argu ment a tion is regarded as unreas on able.⁴ Here is one of the pragma- dialectic rules – the stand point rule. This relates to the need not to distort the other party’s posi tion:

Attacks on stand points may not bear on a stand point that has not actu-ally been put forward by the other party.

(van Eemeren and Grootendorst, 2004: 191) Pragma- dialectics does not only have to be trained on face- to-face argu-ments. It could be trained on written argu ment also. It should be noted that

pragma- dialectics is not alone in argu ment a tion studies in flag ging the import ance of dialect ical oblig a tions. This is flagged in informal logic too;

see, for example, Johnson (2003). And an import ant point: while an author is dialect ic ally oblig ated to accur ately repres ent the central element or elements of the stand point they are attack ing, they can hardly be dialect ic-ally oblig ated to engage with every single element of a stand point, partic u-larly where space is an issue, e.g. in a news pa per opinion piece.

2.2.4 Rhetoric

A speaker might persuade by not appeal ing to reasons. The speaker’s utter-ance may contain little rational content, but they still may be persuas ive because of their adept turn of phrase. Consider Adolph Hitler’s use of the

‘blood pois on ing’ meta phor in his Mein Kampf (1925–1926) warning about the alleged dangers of Aryans inter breed ing with Jews:

All great cultures of the past perished only because the origin ally creat ive race died out from blood pois on ing.

Metaphor is also used in Dr Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech in 1963 calling for the end to racial segreg a tion in the USA. For example:

With this faith, we will be able to trans form the jangling discords of our nation into a beau ti ful symphony of broth er hood.

The above use of meta phor is a use of rhet oric. Here is a defin i tion of rhet-oric I follow in this book:

Any verbal or written attempt to persuade someone to believe, desire or do some thing that does not attempt to give good reasons for the belief, desire or action, but attempts to motiv ate that belief, desire, or action solely through the power of the words used.

(Bowell and Kemp, 2015: 46) In every day discourse, ‘rhet oric’ can conjure some thing negat ive or even deceit ful. Politicians are often accused of spout ing rhet oric – attempt ing to press our emotional buttons with words they think we wish to hear when there may be little substance behind the words. For Aristotle, in his enorm ously influ en tial book, The Art of Rhetoric, rhet or ical tech niques are, however, morally neutral (see Aristotle, 2004). This makes perfect sense. It is the purpose of persua sion which may be moral or immoral not the means avail able for achiev ing persua sion. Rhetorical tech niques, such as use of meta phor, can be used for good in King’s case or bad in Hitler’s.⁵

I now consider some diffi culties which we may face when trying to eval-u ate the rational perseval-uas ive ness of written argeval-u ments.

2.3 Critical think ing II: Evaluating written