False arguments and the art of controversy Must read for all Political forum members

[Liqaye]

Reading this just goes to show how much of the argumentation on S.O.L boils down to a load of hypocritical humbug.

 

False Arguments - October 2, 2006

 

 

I had mentioned in an earlier entry a work I greatly admire, Schopenhauer's The Art of Controversy. I find it very appropriate because in it he analyzes the various spurious ways people can construct an argument, how they can manipulate words and strategize rhetorically to cover up their lack of knowledge, or their ideas that have little base in reality. It is a reference book for me. I will quote now, from the opening, and mention a few of the stratagems he examines. I will do this in two parts. I highly recommend reading the entire essay. (I have it in a version entitled The Pessimist's Handbook: A Collection of Popular Essays, published by U. of Nebraska Press, 1964).

 

"Controversial Dialectic is the art of disputing and of disputing in such a way as to hold one's own, whether one is in the right or the wrong--per fas et nefas. A man may be objectively in the right, and nevertheless in the eyes of bystanders...he may come off worst....

If the reader asks how this is, I reply that it is simply the natural baseness of human nature. If human nature were not base, but thoroughly honourable, we should in every debate have no other aim than the discovery of truth; we should not in the least care whether the truth proved to be in favour of the opinion which we had begun by expressing or of the opinion of our adversary. That we should regard as a matter of no moment, or, at any rate, of very secondary consequence; but, as things are, it is the main concern. Our innate vanity, which is particularly sensitive in reference to our intellectual powers, will not suffer us to allow that our first position was wrong and our adversary right. The way out of this difficulty would be simply to take the trouble always to form a correct judgment. For this a man would have to think before he spoke. But, with most men, innate vanity is accompanied by loquacity and innate dishonesty. They speak before they think; and even though they may afterwards perceive that they are wrong, and that what they assert is false, they want it to seem the contrary. The interest in truth, which may be presumed to have been their only motive when they stated the proposition alleged to be true, now gives way to the interests of vanity: and so, for the sake of vanity, what is true must seem false, and what is false must seem true."

 

 

Has anyone put it better? Not in my mind. Anyway, after some more eloquent discussion of why people resort to rhetorical stratagems, he gets to the stratagems themselves.

 

I--The Extension. This means taking your opponents' arguments and carrying them further, beyond what they had intended, to other subjects, to other areas of discussion, giving them as wide a sense as possible and so exaggerating them to the point of caricature, or falseness. At the same time, you keep your own arguments narrow and limited in scope. The more general things become, the easier it is to find weaknesses and points of attack.

 

II--Begging the Question . This is a kind of a rhetorical shell game. You subtly shift the subject in question, or the argument of the opponent, to something related but easily refuted. This is also known as petitio principii. In essence, you begin with a false premise, such as all liberals want us to pull out of Iraq, and from the false premise you derive logical and sound conclusions. I cannot emphasize how common this is--in the media, among political strategists of all sides, and those who make very eloquent arguments against my books by beginning with premises I had never iterated.

 

III--The ad hominem attack . The most common one of them all. It centers around personal attacks, at the man himself, his character. This can be done overtly or subtly. This can take the form of--Schopenhauer was quite misogynistic (true), and therefore everything he says is tainted by this and apparently false. Or Mr. Greene writes of manipulation, therefore he is a man who manipulates in everything he does, and so his writing is manipulative as opposed to truthful. He wants to deceive and create followers, as opposed to revealing something elemental about human nature. You see, attack the character of the man, and from that all kinds of beautiful syllogisms will follow.

 

We shall continue this in Part Two.

 

Art of Argument Confusion, part two -

 

I had hoped that the current election cycle would supply me with endless examples to illustrate the following ideas taken from Schopenhauer. But the Republicans cannot hang themselves quickly enough and so their discourse seems more pointed inward than outward, and the Democrats are just standing aside and laughing. Please provide your own examples, if you can. (I have noticed that the lawyers out there find this stuff way too rudimentary, considering that it is all standard practice in their world. I ask you to be indulgent. We are less used to these things.)

 

I continue with Schopenhauer's examples:

 

Metaphors and names: When a good argument is not on your side, or the ideas are stacked against you, you use names for things that are loaded with emotions and built-in biases to divert the argument. Of course the Republicans have gotten much mileage with a word like Liberal. But this can be much more subtle. Your opponent speaks of innovation or reform. You refer to it as revolution and drastic change. You are loading the emotional dice and shifting the thought process to their motives: for personal power perhaps, which is what a revolution could imply?

The Ann Coulter non causae ut causae : How could Schopenhauer have been so prescient? I quote from his book: "When your opponent has answered several of your questions without the answers turning out favourable to the conclusion at which you are aiming, advance the desired conclusion--although it does not in the least follow--as though it had been proved, and proclaim it in a tone of triumph. If your opponent is shy or ******, and you yourself possess a great deal of impudence and long blond hair and a good voice, the trick may easily succeed."

 

False inconsistencies : I get this one used on me all the time. It consists of your opponent seeming to find inconsistencies in what you are saying, either by dredging things up from the past (things you wrote long ago), or from people who seemingly belong to your group (let's say Machiavelli in my case), or even in your present argument. It is easy to create the illusion of inconsistency in anyone's argument if you are clever enough. And in defending yourself against this charge you look weak and defensive.

 

Contradiction and contention : In a one-on-one debate, on TV, or even here on the Internet, this tactic consists of vehemently contradicting your opponents. The goal is to rile them, and draw them into exaggerating their original statements, going further than they had wanted to. Now they leave themselves open to some juicy counter-attacks. This can be an active form of deception, a kind of stirring waters to catch fish, or it can actually be a positive ploy. People will often be guarded in a debate, reluctant to show what they really mean. They talk with a subtext. You are getting them to reveal this subtext.

 

Fog and confusion through the false syllogism : Your opponent makes a proposition. You draw from that a false inference, one that subtly or not so subtly distorts the proposition. This new false proposition on his part can be used for even more absurd inferences, on and on. It is a variety of the distraction tactics discussed in part one. The goal is often to create a lot of fog around the issue, particularly if your own ideas are not so solid. I think we can safely refer, as an example, to what the Republicans have done to the Democrat arguments that we need a phased withdrawal from Iraq. This leads to cut and run, and finally to warmly embracing bin Laden himself.

 

The appeal to authority rather than reason ploy: Your argument is teetering, you don't have rationality on your side? Pull in an outside authority to bolster your shaky ideas. This must be carefully chosen. You want one that plays well to your audience, that has the right aura to him or her--Colin Powell, Mahatma Gandhi, Jesus, Vince Lombardi, whatever works. As Seneca says, "Every man prefers belief to the exercise of judgment," so bring in those authorities with a solid belief team behind them. Use a lot of Latin to designate things. (actum agere.) Actually that doesn't work so well anymore. Now it is better to use French, or something from popular culture, or incomprehensible jargon, or Derrida and postmodern claptrap, anything that gives an aura of profundity or hipness. Don't be afraid of twisting the quotes or references to suit your purposes.

 

The egghead-slander ploy: I prefer to end with the words of the master himself. "If you know that you have no reply to the arguments which your opponent advances, you may, by a fine stroke of irony, declare yourself to be an incompetent judge: 'What you now say passes my poor powers of comprehension; it may be all very true, but I can't understand it, and I refrain from any expression of opinion on it.' In this way you insinuate to the bystanders, with whom you are in good repute, that what your opponent says is nonsense."

 

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