Abstract
Recourse to meta-argument is an important feature of successful argument exchanges; it is where norms are made explicit or clarified, corrections are offered, and inferences are evaluated, among much else. Sadly, it is often an avenue for abuse, as the very virtues of meta-argument are turned against it. The question as to how to manage such abuses is a vexing one. Erik Krabbe proposed that one be levied a fine in cases of inappropriate meta-argumentative bids (2003). In a recent publication (2022) Beth Innocenti expands on this notion of a penalty, arguing that some meta-arguments should be halted with “shouting, cussing, sarcasm, name-calling.” In this essay, we review Innocenti’s case that these confrontations and haltings improve the argumentative circumstances. We provide three reasons that this promise is not well-founded. First, that such confrontations have a significant audience problem, in that they are more likely to be interpreted as destroying the argumentative context than improving it. Second, that Innocenti’s procedural justification, that those who lose meta-discussions should pay a penalty, is not satisfied if the meta-discussion is halted. And third, there is a boundary problem for the cases, since it seems there is no principled reason to restrict halting meta-arguments just to these cases (especially if there is no meta-discussion on the matter to make the bounds explicit). Though expressions of anger can be appropriate in argument, we argue, it cannot take the place of argument.
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Notes
See Aikin and Casey (Forthcoming b) for an account of the meta- and para-argumentative role of humor in making and commenting on arguments. Justice Elena Kagan (of the US Supreme Court) used this particular image of stuffing rabbits into a hat in her majority decision in Borden (2021).
See Monique Judge (2018) for a discussion.
See Herman and Oswald (2022) for a case that argumentative criticism (in their case, the straw-manning of one’s interlocutor) comes to be a criticism also of their intellectual character.
See Aikin and Talisse (2008) for the implicated epistemic background to tone of voice in disagreements.
For articulations of the rule of defense as a requirement of reasoned dialogue, and defenses of it against objectors, see: Johnson (2000, 2003), van Eemeren and Grootendorst (2004), Rescorla (2009), Aikin (2021), and Alsip Vollbrecht (n.d.). Taylor argues, further, that the work of de-colonizing philosophy and broader intellectual culture depends on “deepened resources for self-critique” (2015), so requires all living up to the rule of defense.
One mark of the insincerity may be that the use of the NAQ (or other meta-argumentative bid) would be that it persistently is offered, even when answers have been given explicitly in other contexts. In this case, again, the issue is not with the bid but with the insincerity (and disruptive purpose) with which it is posed.
Walton (2011: 379) distinguishes between paralogisms (blunders) and sophisms (purposeful attempts at deception). The meta-argumentative vice of NAQs can be taken to be both in that the vicious use hides behind either the accusation of a blunder and (or) the, for example, naïve understanding of generics. Godden (2022:46) argues that only the vicious use merits sanction.
See Aikin and Casey (Forthcoming a) for a review of fallacious inferences drawn from this breakdown.
In this, we think that the analysis of moral and intellectual grandstanding is useful—one uses moral and intellectual talk as a means to publicly humiliate and intimidate others and to make oneself feel better and appear more virtuous in others’ eyes. It is, then, an abuse of moral and intellectual talk. See Tosi and Warmke (2020) for an account with regard to moral talk, and see Alsip Vollbrecht (n.d.) for an account with regard to moral and intellectual talk.
See Njovane (2015) for an account of how norms of politeness “reinforce black oppression” (126) if they are designed to curb critique.
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Aikin, S., Casey, J. On Halting Meta-argument with Para-Argument. Argumentation 37, 323–340 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10503-023-09602-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10503-023-09602-z