In a reaction to an essay on male and female analytical skills a critical reader sent in a letter to the editor containing the following passage:
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- 1.
At first sight it seems that the standpoints and argument perhaps have something to do with each other, but after closer consideration it appears that the argument put forward (“research shows that in 85% of all sports canteens alcohol is served”) cannot be used to support the standpoint that Dutch amateur sport suffers by serving alcohol. It could support another standpoint, for example: “It is very likely that someone in a sports canteen can get an alcoholic drink”.
- 2.
The unexpressed premise of the worker amounts to something like: “Whoever has had an education, will have it a lot better than someone (like me) who had no education.” Although it is not certain what the worker means when he says “have it better” it is very obvious that he means the financial circumstances of his children. But what does Carmiggelt think of this train of thought? He lays the idealistic belief at his door that knowledge makes one happy, an interpretation that goes much further than that which in all reasonableness can be deduced from the words of the worker.
- 3.
Such differences can be shown in two ways, by saying that Z has a certain characteristic that X does not possess or the other way around. Both types of criticism are equally serious, because in the case of a comparison relation it is assumed that all (relevant) characteristics of X and Z are common.
- 4.
Propositions can, by their nature, be classified into descriptive (also known as: factual), evaluative and inciting propositions. In descriptive propositions facts or events are described (“The Dutch economy is stagnant”), in evaluative propositions an opinion is expressed about facts or events (“The Dutch economy looks bleak”) and in inciting propositions there is an indication that a certain course of action has to be taken (“The Dutch economy needs to have an extra impulse”). The choice of an argument scheme and the method which has to be applied are, amongst others, linked to the nature of the propositions that are expressed in the standpoint that has to be defended. What is described in the text, for the purpose of the legibility, as a descriptive proposition (in the standpoint) supported by a normative argument is upon further reflection a descriptive proposition (that is expressed in the standpoint), and an evaluative proposition (that is expressed in the argument). The crux of the matter is that it is not warranted to point out the undesirable consequences of this (evaluating proposition) when testing a claim (a descriptive proposition) because facts and norms may not be confused with each other (as happens in an argumentum ad consequentiam).
- 5.
Apart from that, in the opening stage the discussants can explicitly agree as to which schemes they will permit during the discussion and which they deem suitable to defend a particular type of standpoint.
- 6.
The reductio ad absurdum reasoning (also called the reductio ad impossible) is also known as proof by contradiction. This type of reasoning is often used in mathematics and in logic and boils down to being able to prove a certain theory by assuming that the opposite of the theory is true, from which subsequently via deduction a contradiction will be derived (whereby it is proved that the original starting point, the hypothesis, must have been wrong).
- 7.
Reductio ad absurdum argumentation is found by respondents, although reasonable in an absolute sense, to be more unreasonable in a relative sense than the two remaining reasonable types of argumentation (in this case pragmatic and non-pragmatic) (first Helmert contrast: pragmatic versus non-pragmatic argumentation (F(1,17)<1); second Helmert contrast between, on the one hand reductio ad absurdum and, on the other hand, the pragmatic and non-pragmatic reasonable argumentation: (F(1,17) = 4.49; p < 0.05)). It is, by the way, for the first time in this series of experiments that we see substantial differences in reasonableness between different types of reasonable argumentations.
- 8.
The fact that the reductio ad absurdum does not often occur in everyday conversations – so we assume – means that the respondents are not very familiar with this type of reasoning. Considering the specific status of this type of reasoning, it seems that the reductio ad absurdum is used particularly in scientific (in this case mathematical and logical) contexts where something is proved by showing that the opposite is not true or in scientific discussions where no evidence can be produced. By using the opposite of a standpoint as a starting point for the evidence to be produced (namely that the starting point is in fact wrong) it will be possible in these types of discussions to decide about the truthfulness or falsity of the content of that standpoint. Conversely, pragmatic argumentation occurs very frequently in everyday conversations, particularly in those contexts where a decision has to be made or a choice has to be made from various alternatives and the pros and cons have to be weighed. It is likely that the respondents are familiar with this type of reasoning and are therefore better able to judge if this type is used in a sound or unsound way. The low chances of recognizing this type of reasoning therefore explain, in our opinion, why the respondents had such difficulty in judging the reasonable and unreasonable form of this reductio ad absurdum reasoning: If the respondents are unfamiliar with the reasonable form in which something is proved by assuming – temporarily – the opposite of it to be true, how can they then ever distinguish the reasonable from the unreasonable use of it?
- 9.
The fact that reductio ad absurdum argumentation can hardly be recognized and judged as sound argumentation can well-nigh not be pure coincidence: In the experiment, discussed in the Chapter 5, where the fallacy of immunizing a standpoint was studied and where 6 reductio ad absurdum argumentations acted as “fillers,” an average score of 4.38 (0.71) was found, a value which is identical to the average score in this study apart from one fraction, 4.39.
- 10.
With hindsight it is of course a pity that we did not ask for their motivations for the judgment of reasonableness on the two relevant reasonable counterparts of the argumentum ad consequentiam: reductio ad absurdum and pragmatic argumentation. Restrictions due to a lack of time for testing and methodological considerations of various kinds (considerations concerning a stability control, masking the aim of the study, the reliability of the motivations given) made sure that not more than three types of argumentation could be studied via motivation.
- 11.
How, from a historic point of view, the slippery slope came to be on the lists of “fallacies” in the introductory logic textbooks is according to Walton (who wrote a monograph on this fallacy) “something of a mystery”. “Aristotle did not include the slippery slope argument in his original list of fallacies, and Hamblin (1970) makes no mention of it as a recognized type of fallacy (…). (It becomes) fairly common only in recent ones” (Walton, 1992, p. 5).
- 12.
Wherever possible we tried to take dialogue fragments in which the slippery slope was committed from existing sources (newspapers, columns, letters that were sent to newspapers, interviews, etc) in an effort to guarantee the validity. Once constructed and adapted to the requirements of our experimental study, the fragments were judged by three pragma-dialecticians (working independently from each other) to see if they were up to standard. The same procedure was also applied to the construction of fragments with a fallacy of false analogy.
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van Eemeren, F., Garssen, B., Meuffels, B. (2009). The Argumentation Stage: The Argument Scheme Rule. In: Fallacies and Judgments of Reasonableness. Argumentation Library, vol 16. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2614-9_7
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