Fundamentals of critical argumentation / Douglas Walton.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Walton, Douglas N., author.

Series:

Critical reasoning and argumentation.

Critical reasoning and argumentation

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Reasoning.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xvi, 343 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2006.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Fundamentals of Critical Argumentation presents the basic tools for the identification, analysis, and evaluation of common arguments for beginners. The book teaches by using examples of arguments in dialogues, both in the text itself and in the exercises. Examples of controversial legal, political, and ethical arguments are analyzed. Illustrating the most common kinds of arguments, the book also explains how to evaluate each kind by critical questioning. Douglas Walton shows how arguments can be reasonable under the right dialogue conditions by using critical questions to evaluate them. The book teaches by example, both in the text itself and in exercises, but it is based on methods that have been developed through the author's thirty years of research in argumentation studies.

Contents:

Arguments and dialogues

Dialogues

Arguments

Questions and statements

Arguments in dialogues

Generalizations

Chaining of arguments

Criticizing by questioning or rebuttal

Criticizing and argument by asking a question

Disputes and dissents

Concepts useful for understanding arguments

Inconsistency

Three kinds of arguments

Syllogisms

Complex propositions

Some other common forms of deductive argument

Probability and inductive argument

Plausible argumentation

Arguments and explanations

Argumentation schemes

Appeal to expert opinion

Argument from popular opinion

Argument from analogy

Argument from correlation to cause

Argument from consequences and slippery slope

Argument from sign

Argument from commitment

Ad hominem arguments

Argument from verbal classification

Argument reconstruction

Single and linked arguments

Convergent arguments

Serial and divergent arguments

Distinguishing between linked and convergent arguments

Extended arguments

Enthymemes

Cleaning up a text of discourse

Persuasion dialogue

Commitment in dialogue

Other types of dialogue

Simple and complex questions

Loaded questions

Responding to tricky questions

Relevance of questions and replies

Detecting bias

Loaded terms

Point of view and burden of proof

Biased argumentation

Verbal disputes

Lexical, stipulative and persuasive definitions

Philosophical and scientific definitions

Normal and troublesome bias

Relevance

Probative relevance

Dialectical relevance

Relevance in meetings and debates

Relevance in legal argumentation

Fear appeal arguments

Threats as arguments

Appeal to pity

Shifts and relevance

Practical reasoning in a dialogical framework

Practical inferences

Necessary and sufficient conditions

Disjunctive reasoning

Taking consequences into account

The dilemma

The closed world assumption

Lack of knowledge inferences

Real world situations.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

1-139-93107-5

1-107-14616-X

0-511-80703-1

0-511-13911-X

0-511-14044-4

0-511-56622-0

0-511-13969-1

OCLC:

437160067