Walton gives a clear method for analyzing and evaluating cases of ad hominem arguments found in everyday argumentation.

Scare Tactics, the first book on the subject, provides a theory of the structure of reasoning used in fear and threat appeal argumentation. Such arguments come under the heading of the argumentum ad baculum, the `argument to the stick/club', traditionally treated as a fallacy in the logic textbooks. The new dialectical theory is based on case studies of many interesting examples of the use of these arguments in advertising, public relations, politics, international negotiations, and everyday argumentation on all kinds of (...) subjects. Many of these arguments are amusing, once you see the clever tactic used; others are scary. Some of the arguments appear to be quite reasonable, while others are highly suspicious, or even outrageously fraudulent. In addition to the examples taken from logic textbooks, other cases treated come from a variety of sources, including political debates, legal arguments, and arguments from media sources, like magazine articles and television ads. The purpose of this book is to explain how such arguments work as devices of persuasion, and to develop a method for analyzing and evaluating their reasonable and fallacious uses in particular cases. The book shows how such arguments share a common structure, revealing several distinctive forms of argument nested within each other. Based on its account of this cognitive structure, the new dialectical theory presents methods for identifying, analyzing, and evaluating these arguments, as they are used in specific cases. The book is a scholarly contribution to argumentation theory. It is written in an accessible style, and uses many colorful and provocative examples of fear and threat appeal arguments that are suitable for classroom discussions. The matters treated will be of interest to professionals and students in law, critical thinking, advertising, speech communication, informal logic, cognitive science, rhetoric, and media studies. (shrink)

In response to the growing recognition of informal logic as a discipline in its own right, this collection of essays from leading contributors in the field provides the formative knowledge and historical context required to understand the development of a so far little studied subject area.

Partly due to the influence of Tarski's work, it is commonly assumed that any good theory of truth implies biconditionals of the sort mentioned in Convention T: instances of the T-Schema "s is true in L if and only if p" where the sentence substituted for "p" is equivalent in meaning to s. I argue that we must take care to distinguish the claim that implying such instances is sufficient for adequacy in an account of truth from the claim that (...) doing so is necessary. The claim that doing so is sufficient is a common component of deflationary theories of truth, while the claim that it is necessary, though often assumed, must be denied by proponents of rival inflationary theories of truth. I discuss the clarification of the debate between these views of truth that results from distinguishing the necessity and the sufficiency claims, and examine the prospects for its resolution. (shrink)

Walton offers a comprehensive, flexible model for physician-patient decision making, the first such tool designed to be applied at the level of each particular case. Based on Aristotelian practical reasoning, it develops a method of reasonable dialogue, a question- and-answer process of interaction leading to informed consent on the part of the patient, and to a decision--mutually arrived at--reflecting both high medical standards and the patient's felt needs. After setting forth his model, he applies it to three vital ethical issues: (...) acts of omission, the cessation of treatment, and possible side effects of treatments. In the final chapter, Walton shows how his method functions in light of the real-life complexities of the clinical encounter and how it bears on ethical questions concerning health-care policy, attitudes toward treatment and toward the medical profession, reasonableness of expectations, and the setting of realistic goals of treatment. (shrink)

Many states recognize a legal right to bodily integrity, understood as a right against significant, nonconsensual interference with one’s body. Recently, some have called for the recognition of an analogous legal right to mental integrity: a right against significant, nonconsensual interference with one’s mind. In this chapter, we describe and distinguish three different rationales for recognizing such a right. The first appeals to case-based intuitions to establish a distinctive duty not to interfere with others’ minds; the second holds that, if (...) we accept a legal right to bodily integrity, then we must, on pain of philosophical inconsistency, accept a case for an analogous right over the mind; and the third holds that recent technological developments create a need for a legal right to mental integrity. (shrink)

The Nature and Status of Critical Questions in Argumentation Schemes.

Journal of Applied Logic, to appear [uncorrected version posted].

International Commentary on Evidence, 2006 Vol. 4, Issue 2, 1-47 . [link to online version posted].

This paper presents a formalization of informal logic using the Carneades Argumentation System, a formal, computational model of argument that consists of a formal model of argument graphs and audiences. Conflicts between pro and con arguments are resolved using proof standards, such as preponderance of the evidence. Carneades also formalizes argumentation schemes. Schemes can be used to check whether a given argument instantiates the types of argument deemed normatively appropriate for the type of dialogue.

This paper shows how the critical questions matching an argumentation scheme can be mod-eled in the Carneades argumentation system as three kinds of premises. Ordinary premises hold only if they are supported by sufficient arguments. Assumptions hold, by default, until they have been questioned. With exceptions the negation holds, by default, until the exception has been supported by sufficient arguments. By “sufficient arguments”, we mean arguments sufficient to satisfy the applicable proof standard.

The Frankfurt School had a highly ambivalent relation to Judaism. On one hand, they were part of that Enlightenment tradition that opposed authority, tradition, and all institutions of the past -- including religion. They were also, for the most part, secular Jews who did not support any organized religion, or practice religious or cultural Judaism. In this sense, they were in the tradition of Heine, Marx, and Freud for whom Judaism was neither a constitutive feature of their life or work, (...) nor a significant aspect of their self-image and identity. (shrink)

This chapter puts Sellars' project of unifying his two images in conversation with that of understanding how the two truth, the conventional and ultimate truth, are related in Buddhism, and in Madhyamaka in particular.

Design and analysis of algorithms can be a difficult subject for students due to its sometimes-abstract nature and its use of a wide variety of mathematical tools. Here the author, an experienced and successful textbook writer, makes the subject as straightforward as possible in an up-to-date textbook incorporating various new developments appropriate for an introductory course. This text presents the main techniques of algorithm design, namely, divide-and-conquer algorithms, greedy algorithms, dynamic programming algorithms, and backtracking. Graph algorithms are studied in detail, (...) and a careful treatment of the theory of NP-completeness is presented. In addition, the text includes useful introductory material on mathematical background including order notation, algorithm analysis and reductions, and basic data structures. This will serve as a useful review and reference for students who have covered this material in a previous course. Features The first three chapters provide a mathematical review, basic algorithm analysis, and data structures. Detailed pseudocode descriptions of the algorithms along with illustrative algorithms are included. Proofs of correctness of algorithms are included when appropriate. The book presents a suitable amount of mathematical rigor. After reading and understanding the material in this book, students will be able to apply the basic design principles to various real-world problems that they may encounter in their future professional careers. (shrink)

Why is beauty consoling? Ancient and Medieval Western philosophy was primarily concerned with beauty in relation to truth and goodness. The theistic religions assume a link between beauty, goodness and truth, all of which are viewed as Divine attributes. This is one reason for the iconoclasm that all three Abrahamic religions share to a greater or lesser degree. Yet, creative fictions of great artistic beauty aspire to a certain truthfulness. A work of the imagination may deepen or purify our emotions (...) such that we gain a clearer understanding of reality. Beauty is consoling because it resolves the contradictions of experience; art can be a conduit to a supreme transcendent unity. The Iconic Imagination is both a reflection on the redemptive potential of art, and an investigation of the traditions of occidental Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and Islam in their confrontations with the particular power of art to represent the transcendent. Throughout, Hedley argues that the malaise of much contemporary reflection upon beauty is a consequence of the marginalisation of beauty's religious dimension. (shrink)

The translation of Pierre Klossowski's Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle finally provides an English-speaking audience with access to one of the most influential texts in the French Nietzsche tradition. First published in France in 1969, Klossowski's text consummated over three decades of intense work and discussion on Nietzsche's most enigmatic and original ideas. Working with Bataille and the famous College de Sociologie, Klossowski published a series of important studies of Nietzsche culminating in Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle which Foucault described (...) in a letter to Klossowski as "the greatest book of philosophy I have read" in addition to Nietzsche himself. Deeply influencing Deleuze, Lyotard, and other major Nietzscheans, Klossowski's work remains a seminal text of the contemporary French reading of Nietzsche. (shrink)

In the current ongoing Terror War, both George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden deploy certain similar figures of speech, fusing their metaphysical and political discourses while reserving the demonology. In his speech to Congress on September 20, 2001 declaring his war against terrorism, Bush described the conflict as a war between freedom and fear. The coming Terror War was, he explained, a conflict between “those governed by fear” who “want to destroy our wealth and freedoms,” and those on the (...) side of freedom. Bush insisted that “you’re either with us, or you’re with the terrorists,” and laid down a series of non-negotiable demands to the Taliban while Congress wildly applauded. Bush’s popularity soared with a country craving blood-revenge and the head of Osama bin Laden. Moreover, proclaiming what his administration and commentators would describe as “the Bush doctrine,” Bush also asserted that his administration held accountable those nations who supported terrorism –- a position that could nurture and legitimate military interventions for years to come. (shrink)

Traditional scholars of philosophy and religion, both East and West, often place a major emphasis on analyzing the nature of “the self.” In recent decades, there has been a renewed interest in analyzing self, but most scholars have not claimed knowledge of an ahistorical, objective, essential self free from all cultural determinants. The contributors to this volume recognize the need to contextualize specific views of self and to analyze such views in terms of the dynamic, dialectical relations between self and (...) culture.An unusual feature of this book is that all of the chapters not only focus on traditions and individuals, East and West, but include as primary emphases comparative philosophy, religion, and culture, reinforcing individual and cultural creativity. Each chapter brings specific Eastern and Western perspectives into a dynamic, comparative relation. This comparative orientation emphasizes our growing sense of interrelatedness and interdependency. Culture and Self includes many Asian and Western philosophical, religious, and cultural perspectives. Chapters focus on Vedanta, Samkhya-Yoga, and other Hindu approaches, as well as Buddhist, Confucian, Taoist and other Indian, Chinese, and Japanese perspectives. Studies present Cartesian and other dominant Western perspectives, as well as Marx, Nietzsche, Sartre, feminism, and other Western challenges to the dominant Western interpretations of culture and self.This volume will appeal to students and readers of philosophy, religious studies, Asian studies, and cultural studies. (shrink)

Introduction I propose in this work, first, to consider the process of doing ontology and, second, to argue for the importance which an understanding of ...

"An Illini book." Includes bibliographical references and index.

Fallacies of relevance, a major category of informal fallacies, include two that could be called pure fallacies of relevance-the wrong conclusion fallacy and the red herring digression, diversion) fallacy. The problem is how to classify examples of these fallacies so that they clearly fall into the one category or the other, on some rational system of classification. In this paper, the argument diagramming software system, Araucaria. is used to analyze the argumentation in some selected textbook examples of pure fallacies of (...) relevance. A system of classification of these fallacies is proposed, and criteria for determining whether an example should be classified as wrong conclusion or red herring are formulated. A key difference cited is that in a case where the red herring fallacy has been committed, even if the argument may go to a wrong conclusion, there is evidence of the use ofa deceptive tactic of diversion. Textual evidence must indicate that the arguer deliberately interjects a distracting controversy to lead the respondent away from the real issue to be disputed. (shrink)