This paper presents a way in which formal logic can be understood and reformulated in terms of argumentation that can help us unify formal and informal reasoning. Classical deductive reasoning will be expressed entirely in terms of notions and concepts from argumentation so that formal logical entailment is equivalently captured via the arguments that win between those supporting concluding formulae and arguments supporting contradictory formulae. This allows us to go beyond Classical Logic and smoothly connect it with human reasoning, thus (...) providing a uniform argumentation-based view of both informal and formal logic. (shrink)

Can argumentation form the basis for any form of reasoning, informal or formal logical reasoning? We examine this question from the particular perspective of the recent developments in logic-based Artificial Intelligence (AI). We propose that argumentation provides the wider framework encompassing uniformly all reasoning, with strict or formal logical reasoning being a special boundary case. We also attempt to link this unifying role of argumentation with Aristotle’s original investigation of methods and forrmalisms for the systematic study of human reasoning.