Notice Board

The Department of Philosophy Colloquium Series presents:

Reasons and Arguments: The role of context in the logical evaluation of argumentation

Speaker: José Alhambra (IE University)
Friday, April 10 | 3:30 - 5 p.m.
University Hall B716

Abstract: Generalism is the claim that the practice of arguing depends on a suitable supply of general rules that specify what kinds of conclusions can be drawn from what kinds of data. The most common way to substantiate this position is by appealing to the conditions of evaluation of arguments: the practice of arguing depends on general rules because they are required to distinguish between good and bad arguments. In my presentation, I will show that this argument can be countered in at least two ways: (1) by pointing out that the logical evaluation of an argument is fundamentally contextual and (2) by showing that there are alternatives to the use of general rules. To support (1), I will explore two ideas from metaethics: holism and the weighing of reasons. The first is the claim that whether something is a reason for something else depends on circumstances that are not part of that reason (Dancy 2004). The second is the view that the weight of a reason depends on the reasons available for doing or believing something else, as well as on other contextual considerations (Bader 2016). As for the second claim, I will argue that the reason posed by an argument can be justified on a case-to-case basis, e.g., by analogy (Woods and Hudak 1989). If this were so, not only would general rules not be sufficient to assess an argument, but they would not be necessary either. I will call this position 'particularism in the theory of argument.'