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51If P, Then Q: Conditionals and the Foundations of Reasoning. David H. Sanford (review)Philosophy of Science 59 (2): 331-332. 1992.
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26How is it possible that biases are cognitive vices, objectivity is an exemplary intellectual virtue, and yet objectivity is itself a bias? In this paper, we argue that objectivity is indeed a kind of bias but is still an argumentative virtue. In common with many biases – and many virtues – its effects are neither uniformly negative nor uniformly positive. Consequences alone are not enough to determine which character traits are argumentative virtues. Context matters. The opening section addresse…Read more
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26There is more to mathematics than proofs; there are also arguments, which means that mathematicians are human arguers complete with their biases. Among those biases is a preference for beauty, It is a bias insofar as it is a deaprture from objectivity, but it is benign, accounting for the popularity of Cantor's "Paradise" of non-denumerable infinities as a travel destination for mathematicians and the relatively little interest in Robinson's infinitesimals.
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21Although Michael Yong-Set's proposal to approach argumentation theory from a ludological perspective is not yet sufficiently developed to warrant adopting it, there is enough to warrant exploring it further – which is all the reception it needs at this point.
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29For all its problems, there is still much to be gleaned from the argument-is-war paradigm. Much of the conceptual vocabulary that we use to talk about wars is commonly applied to arguments. Other concepts in the war-cluster can also be readily adapted to arguments. Some parts, of course, do not seem to apply so easily, if at all. Of most interest here are those war-concepts that have not been deployed in thinking about arguments but really should be because of the light they can shed on argum…Read more
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The Logic of Conditional AssertionsDissertation, Indiana University. 1983.It has been suggested that to say something of the form 'if P, then Q' is less an affirmation of a conditional than a conditional affirmation of the consequent, Q. If the condition of assertion, P, is true, then Q has been asserted. If the condition of assertion turns out to have been false, it is as if there had been no assertion. Such conditionals have come to be called "conditional assertions." This dissertation is a study of the logic conditionals, focusing on the logic of conditional assert…Read more
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24On What Cannot BeIn J. Dunn & A. Gupta (eds.), Truth or Consequences: Essays in Honor of Nuel Belnap, Kluwer Academic Publishers. pp. 123--132. 1990.
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5Review: Anthony Appiah, Assertion and Conditionals (review)Journal of Symbolic Logic 52 (4): 1051-1052. 1987.
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19The rhetoric of logic reveals, we claim, that arguments are about force, ending only when one side submits. Rhetoricians, it is countered, are content to persuade, settling for agreement when truth is wanted—and all is fair in pursuit of consent. The choice between conceptual rape and seduction is a false choice. It is time to cut against the grain. We are distracted by the rhetoric of logic and gloss the logic of rhetoric. Rhetorical models for pluralistic discourses are vital, but fail as regu…Read more
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8Walking the Tightrope of Reason: The Precarious Life of a Rational Animal by Robert Fogelin (review)Informal Logic 23 (1). 2003.
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37Arguments and Metaphors in PhilosophyUniversity Press of America. 2004.In this book, Daniel Cohen explores the connections between arguments and metaphors, most pronounced in philosophy because philosophical discourse is both thoroughly metaphorical and replete with argumentation. Cohen covers the nature of arguments, their modes and structures, and the principles of their evaluation, and addresses the nature of metaphors, their place in language and thought, and their connections to arguments, identifying and reconciling arguments' and metaphors' respective roles …Read more
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24Finocchiaro, Maurice., Meta-argumentation: An Approach to Logic and Argumentation Theory (review)Review of Metaphysics 67 (2): 428-430. 2013.
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28The Word as Will and IdeaPhilosophical Studies (Dublin) 32 126-140. 1988.According to the semantics in Wittgenstein's Tractatus, a picture and what is pictured must have the same logical form. However necessary that may be, it cannot suffice to make one fact a picture of another. The grounds for the pictorial relation, it is argued, must be found in the transcendental will. Following a suggestion by Ramsey, the semantic resources of the Tractatus are used to construct a new interpretation of propositions as equivalence classes of facts. The nature of the involvem…Read more
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24Rescher's Epistemic Logic, Cognitive Harmony & Realism and Pragmatic EpistemologyInformal Logic 25 (2): 179-184. 2005.
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69Evaluating arguments and making meta-argumentsInformal Logic 21 (2). 2001.This paper explores the outlines of a framework for evaluating arguments. Among the factors to take into account are the strength of the arguers' inferences, the level of their engagement with objections raised by other interlocutors, and their effectiveness in rationally persuading their target audiences. Some connections among these can be understood only in the context of meta-argumentation and meta-rationality. The Principle of Meta-Rationality (PMR)--that reasoning rationally includes reaso…Read more
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63Arguments that BackfireIn D. Hitchcock & D. Farr (eds.), The Uses of Argument, Ossa. pp. 58-65. 2005.One result of successful argumentation – able arguers presenting cogent arguments to competent audiences – is a transfer of credibility from premises to conclusions. From a purely logical perspective, neither dubious premises nor fallacious inference should lower the credibility of the target conclusion. Nevertheless, some arguments do backfire this way. Dialectical and rhetorical considerations come into play. Three inter-related conclusions emerge from a catalogue of hapless arguers and backfi…Read more
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52A new axiomatization of Belnap's conditional assertionNotre Dame Journal of Formal Logic 27 (1): 124-132. 1986.
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21A complex network of reciprocal relations connect arguments and stories. Arguments can occur in stories and stories can be parts of arguments. Further, stories can themselves be arguments. Whether a text or exchange serves as an argument partly depe nds on how we read it, i.e., on the story we tell about it and how well we argue for that story, but the circle is not as vicious as it appears. Or at least, that is the story we present and the argument we tell in this dialogue revisiting the ancien…Read more
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32Commentary on: Katharina von Radziewsky's "The virtuous arguer: One person, four characters"In Dima Mohammed & Marcin Lewinski (eds.), Virtues of argumentation: Proceedings of the 10th International Conference of the Ontario Society for the Study of Argumentation (OSSA), May 22–25, 2013, Ossa. 2014.N/A.
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1Review: Robert K. Meyer, Georg Dorn, P. Weingartner, A Farewell to Entailment (review)Journal of Symbolic Logic 55 (1): 352-353. 1990.
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28Fogelin's Walking the Tightrope of Reason: The Precarious Life of a Rational Animal by Robert FogelinInformal Logic 23 (1). 2003.
Waterville, Maine, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Metaphysics and Epistemology |
Philosophy, Misc |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Philosophy of Language |
Metaphysics and Epistemology |
Philosophy, Misc |