In his proposal for a democracy by consensus, Wiredu argued that deliberation is an activity that depends solely on the logical persuasiveness of ideas. Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze and I had objected to this view of deliberation. Bernard Matolino has responded separately to Eze and me by sticking to Wiredu’s position that deliberation is a purely rational activity. In this article, I support my earlier claim that persuasion (and hence deliberation) is not an entirely logical activity, and our concern as human beings is to recognize the influence of non-rational factors, for the purpose of minimizing the role of these non-rational factors. My general aim here is to explore the implications of a counterfactual situation in which we assume that deliberation is a purely rational activity, and these implications are unpalatable even to proponents of deliberation as a purely rational activity. My conclusion is that it is only by recognizing the role of non-rational factors in deliberation that we are driven to institute mechanisms to ensure that logic dominates over non-rational factors as much as practicable in either persuading or in being persuaded. Assuming that deliberation is a purely rational activity, on the other hand, forestalls any measures and allows non-rational influences to fester undeterred.

中文翻译：

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争论是纯粹理性的一些暗示

Wiredu在他的以协商一致方式实现民主的提议中认为，审议是一种完全取决于思想的逻辑说服力的活动。我和伊曼纽尔·楚科迪·埃兹（Emmanuel Chukwudi Eze）反对这种审议的观点。伯纳德·马托利诺（Bernard Matolino）坚守Wiredu的立场，即审议是纯粹理性的活动，分别对Eze和我作出回应。在本文中，我支持我先前的主张，即说服（并因此进行思考）不是完全合乎逻辑的活动，而我们作为人类的关注点是要认识到非理性因素的影响，目的是使这些非理性因素的作用最小化。 -理性因素。我在这里的总体目标是探讨反事实情况的含义，在这种情况下，我们认为审议是纯粹的理性活动，这些暗示，甚至对于作为纯粹的理性活动进行审议的支持者而言，都是难以接受的。我的结论是，只有通过认识到非理性因素在审议中的作用，我们才能建立机制，以确保逻辑在说服或说服中尽可能多地主导非理性因素。另一方面，假定审议是纯粹理性的活动，则可以阻止任何措施，并允许非理性的影响恶化。