An approach to argument macrostructure -- The dialectical nature of argument -- Toulmin's problematic notion of warrant -- The linked-convergent distinction, a first approximation -- Argument structure and disciplinary perspective : the linked-convergent versus multiple-co-ordinatively compound distinctions -- The linked-convergent distinction, refining the criterion -- Argument structure and enthymemes -- From analysis to evaluation.

The aim of this paper is to explore the status of argumentative discourse. We argue that argumentation can contribute to instances of different discourse genres, regardless of whether it is functional to their purposes. By analyzing examples from the daily press in the light of an approach to discourse analysis inspired by pragmatics, we show that also texts that are not expected to be argumentative have underlying argumentative structures and that a text’s being argumentative is a matter of degree: the (...) understanding of underlying argumentative structures contributes to a varying extent to the understanding of what a text as a whole means and of its point in the speech situation. This role of argumentative structures in text understanding suggests considering argumentation as a cognitively-based dimension of discourse, connected to human rationality. (shrink)

Argumentation schemes are forms of reasoning that are fallible but correctable within a self-correcting framework. Their use provides a basis for taking rational action or for reasonably accepting a conclusion as a tentative hypothesis, but they are not deductively valid. We argue that teleological reasoning can provide the basis for justifying the use of argument schemes both in monological and dialogical reasoning. We consider how such a teleological justification, besides being inspired by the aim of directing a bounded cognizer to (...) true belief and correct choices, needs to take into account the attitudes of dialogue partners as well as normative models of dialogue and communicative activity types, in particular social and cultural settings. (shrink)

Wellman identified three types of conductive arguments, the third of which contains both pro and counter-considerations in the same piece of reasoning. This paper provides a pragma-dialectical analysis of this type of argumentation, with special focus on argumentation reconstruction. It argues that the account of pro/con argumentation in the framework of argument-as-product has problems solvable by a pragma-dialectical approach. The paper asserts that pro/con argumentation should be analyzed as a dialectical strategy of a protagonist, where acknowledgement of counter-considerations shows that (...) the antagonist’s reasons have been taken into consideration, although the pro-considerations override them. Thus, the pro-considerations of pro/con argumentation should be interpreted as the protagonist’s overriding defeaters of the antagonist’s counter-arguments, the protagonist incorporating the latter as counter-considerations. The paper further argues that the pragma-dialectical framework needs an additional conceptual tool to properly reconstruct complex forms of pro/con argumentation. Finally, the pragma-dialectical approach to reconstruct pro/con argumentation has several advantages, especially to a more logical-structural approach to complex pro/con argumentation. (shrink)

This paper presents what we call with Plantin an argumentative cell as an unit which is inspired by Toulmin’s layout of arguments, in order to analyse two major effects of pseudo-objectivity in argumentation. Four problems of Toulmin's layout will be tackled: Data are only described as facts, the definition of Backing is blurred, but it may be linked with sources of information and extended to Data, the dialectical component of the Rebuttal needs to be extended to concessions, and dealing with (...) complex argumentation within such a model is quite difficult. Treating these problems will highlight the rhetorical possibility of a "bias of objectivity": numerous arguments that use starting points which may appear to be objective or shared in order to impose a standpoint to the addressee. This bias can be seen in at least two rhetorical strategies: the first one is using facts as arguments without signs of evidentiality in grounds for the argument. The second one is delivering opinions as apparently collectively shared. (shrink)

In previous work I argued against (i) the likelihood of finding a theoretically sound foundation for the linked/convergent distinction and (ii) the utility of the distinction even if a sound theoretical basis could be found. Here I subject Douglas Walton’s comprehensive discussion of the linked/convergent distinction found in Argument Structure: A Pragmatic Theory to careful scrutiny and argue that at best Walton’s theory remains incomplete and that attempts to fill out the details will run afoul of at least one of (...) the problems adduced above—i.e., result in either a theoretically unsound distinction or a theoretically sound, but unnecessary distinction. (shrink)