Vagueness in Argumentation, Rhetoric and Sophistry

Week 7 Overview

• Debates often stem from unclear word meanings, leading to disputes.
• Semantic ambiguity, where the meaning of words is unclear, can lead to equivocation.
• Syntactic ambiguity arises from unclear wording or grammatical structure.
• Vagueness differs from ambiguity; it involves a lack of clarity or preciseness along a spectrum.
• Examples illustrating vagueness include determining when someone becomes old, wealthy, or bald, necessitating arbitrary line-drawing.
• Language is inherently rhetorical, encompassing negative, neutral, and positive senses.
• Negative rhetoric involves misuse to manipulate, differing significantly from convincing.
• Arguments exist both for and against rhetoric, with some viewing language as mere sophistry.
• Fallacies will be examined to discern how to avoid them.
• The focus will be on problems of vagueness, rhetoric, and sophistry.
• Focus on highlighted sections of Plato’s Gorgias.

Lecture: The Perils of Vagueness in Argumentation

• Language or verbal disputes, as well as factual disputes, can cause disagreements.
• Language disputes stem from ambiguity or vagueness.
• Instances of ambiguity include semantic ambiguity, where word meaning is unclear, and syntactic ambiguity, resulting from grammar or word order.
• Vagueness can be beneficial, offering wiggle room, though excessive vagueness can be problematic.
• Using lawyer-esque language in normal speech can irritate people.
• A joke illustrates ambiguity when the referent is unclear, "Every minute in the world, a woman has a baby. She must be found and stopped”.
• Ambiguity can be present in the question, "Who makes more money? Admin assistants, secretaries, doctors?".
• The fallacy of composition occurs when one assumes that what's true of parts of a whole is true of the whole.
• An example of the fallacy of composition is assuming that because all parts of a machine are lightweight, the entire machine is lightweight.
• Another example involves randomness at the quantum level, with the fallacy being that because there's freedom at the micro-level, there is freedom at the macro-level.
• A Grand Unified Theory or Theory of Everything (TOE) unifies events at micro and macro levels.
• The fallacy of division is the opposite of the fallacy of composition.
• An example of the fallacy of division is assuming that because we each have a mother, the class as a whole has a mother.
• Problematic stereotypes exemplify the fallacy of hasty generalization.
• In Citizens United, corporations were defined to have the same rights as people, leading to the question of whether corporations are people because they are defined as groups of people.
• The statement that the US is the wealthiest country implies that its citizens must all be some of the wealthiest in the world.
• Language serves as a representational system connecting us to the world.
• The text uses ambiguity, seems to conflate vagueness and ambiguity in the way.
• Ambiguity involves multiple possible interpretations and fuzzy word choices, while vagueness involves two or more meanings not clearly discernible from context.
• Vagueness can be advantageous in advertisements, terminal diagnoses, or legal wording as “weasler” words to get you out of something.
• Relative terms are inherently vague, such as "good," which is relative to something.
• Terms like "middle-aged," "young," and "bald" exist on a spectrum, necessitating arbitrary line-drawing.
• Consider the thought experiment of a 24-year-old fighter jet pilot returning from Afghanistan and being unable to rent a Chevy Cobalt, highlighting an arbitrary line drawn.
• Ask why there are reasons for the line to be drawn, such as brain development.
• Specificity is paramount, as precision makes arguments easier to refute.
• The goal is to be as accurate and precise as possible to attain truth.
• Believing someone is tall is easier to argue than believing someone is 6 foot 2.
• Precision occurs when only one fact verifies something.
• Accuracy occurs when something is both precise and true.
• Only religious exemptions were allowed for the draft in the 1970s, raising questions regarding the criteria.
• Religious exemptions for vaccines raise questions about criteria, such as church attendance and the definition of religion.
• It is important to avoid vagueness.
• Vagueness applies only to language, not to persons or things.
• Bertrand Russel protested WWI and WWII, but argued that no definition of red isn’t precise.
• Logical operators are vague because they draw on the ambiguity of everyday English.
• Even proper names are vague, as people may share the same name.
• The Mercator projection is imprecise and Eurocentric, while the Peters Projection is less Eurocentric and portrays Africa accurately.
• The most precise map would be at a 1:1 scale with real life, but this is impossible.
• It's still worth getting as close as we can, even though perfection isn’t reachable.
• Authagraph is the best
• According to Bertrand Russel, distinguishing between a normal glass of water and one containing typhoid requires a microscope.
• Wittgenstein believed that meaning is based on word use in a language game.
• Meaning isn't perfectly fixed by those who created the language.
• We haven’t gotten around to defining the specificity.
• Knowledge is vague.
• Russel suggests that we shouldn't give up if knowledge is possible, but rather approximate certainty with maximum precision.
• A thought experiment: adding sand grain by grain- when can you say you have a pile of sand?
• When does someone become rich? Related to the abortion debate…
• The line-drawing fallacy argues that if there is no precise line, then a pile of sand can never exist.
• Randomly drawing a line without reason is equally problematic.
• This relates to excessive force in George Floyd.
• False dilemma is also important.

Socrates’ Critique of Sophistic Rhetoric

• In Gorgias, Socrates engages in dialogue with Gorgias and his students Polus and Callicles.
• Socrates questions whether rhetoric is a legitimate art.
• If a person understands what is good, they will act accordingly.
• Socrates asks Gorgias whether he can turn someone into a rhetorician capable of convincing crowds, even persuading non-experts about health.
• Rhetoric is about persuading people of facts, rather than the facts themselves, as in medicine.
• Socrates questions how rhetoric can be taught, and if rhetoric students need to know all the facts beforehand or understand justice.
• The just man does just things, so a rhetorician must act justly and never wishes to act wrongly.
• If a rhetorician acts unjustly, the teacher should not be blamed, but rather the individual doing wrong.
• Rhetoric was about justice.
• The rhetorician can’t use rhetoric immorally or want to do wrong.
• Polus interrupts to ask Socrates to define flattery, which Socrates labels as a form of flattery, akin to disguising something horrible with a palatable appearance.

The Usefulness of Rhetoric

• The true and just are inherently stronger than their opposites.
• One should be able to argue on both sides of questions for a comprehensive understanding and to refute opponents.
• Only rhetoric and dialectic argue in opposite directions.
• Unjust use of words causes great harm, but it does great good when used justly.
• The function of rhetoric is not persuasion, but to see methods to persuade.
• Sophistry isn't about ability, but about deliberate choice.
• A rhetor is called upon based on knowledge, while a sophist is called upon based on choice, and refers not to deliberate choice but to ability.

Definition of Rhetoric, Pisteis, the means of persuasion

• Rhetoric belongs to the genus of "dynamis," encompassing ability, capacity, and faculty.
• Actuality produced by rhetoric is seeing how persuasion can be effective.
• "Poetics" encompasses arts other than poetry, such as dance, painting, and sculpture.
• Rhetoric deals with specific circumstances to observe or grasp the utility of.
• Pisteis can be non-artistic or embodied in art, artistic.
• Persuasion increases the perceived credibility of the speaker during the speech.
• Character is the most authoritative form of persuasion.
• Persuasion occurs through ethos, logos, and pathos.
• Rhetoric is partly dialectic and resembles it.
• Induction (paradigm) or syllogism (enthymeme) can form a rhetorical argument.
• These can be formed from previous arguments or arguments needing to be formed.
• A chain of syllogisms is harder to follow.
• Enthymemes derive from probabilities and signs and sometimes have implied information.
• Rhetoric forms the above forms and doesn’t touch on facts

What is Sophistry - What is Rhetoric

• Rage can have uses but is not something you can plant
• Emotion can be used in oratory (Clarence Darrow example)
• Oratory = public speaking (neutral term)
• Speakers don't always have the truth on their side
• Tricks/strategies vs. logical fallacies (red herring not applicable here as there's no argument)
• Socrates was ultimately punished to death for corrupting the youth, teaching them how to argue in a tricky way
• Persuasive speech: clear, logical, emotional, ethical
• Aristotle's concepts: logos (logic), pathos (emotion), ethos (character)
• Persuasion involves more than just logic
• Ethics (character) in Greek vs. morality in Latin
• Rhetoric has positive (persuasion) and negative (bad element) aspects
• Dunning-Kreuger effect- amateurs thinking they’re experts
• Rhetoric arose in democracies where public speaking was essential- no lawyers in Ancient Greece, in direct democracy you’d have to be able to defend yourself
• Sophisticated (but potentially deceptive) argumentation
• Accusation against Socrates of making the weaker argument stronger
• Useful for presenting truth and justice, which are naturally stronger but need effective delivery
• "The truth will out" is not guaranteed
• Relevance to modern issues like censorship and misinformation
• Persuasion requires understanding the audience; knowledge alone isn't always effective
• Rhetoric often relies on common beliefs
• Limitations of logic and argument in persuasion
• Three parts of rhetoric (Aristotle): ethos, logos, pathos
• Importance of knowing the audience and appealing to emotions ethically
• Facebook algorithms- encourage divisive speech/the misuse of anger, easier to just make people angry to gain clicks online
• Rhetoric aims to persuade (question of art and propaganda)
• Propaganda usually negative
• Frank Luntz example (using language to shape public opinion)- taking market research and pop culture into politics
• Needs to be tapped into pop culture, needs to give the public what they want to hear.
• Testing language- polls and tests what language will do best with the general public, usually emotionally moving
• Sort of twisting the narrative on environmental policy
• Focus on what the public wants to hear; testing language for emotional impact
• Framing of issues through language (e.g., "death tax")
• Estate tax vs. death tax
• Some audiences cannot be taught, requiring persuasion
• Introduction to W.E.B. Du Bois and positive propaganda
• Rhetoricians are experts in language/words (logos), not necessarily in the subject matter itself
• Appearance of being an expert without being one
• Gorgias' success in persuading the ignorant, even against medical experts
• Notice that he doesn’t convince experts, just the ignorant masses
• Less negative view than Plato/Socrates
• Rhetoric is a tool (like fire – can be good or bad depending on use)

11- The Perils of Ambiguity and Cliche in Argument and Related Fallacies

• Verbal vs. factual disagreement
• Types of ambiguity: semantic and syntactic ambiguity
• Each type has their own error in reasoning
• Semantic- fallacy of equivocation
• Syntactic- amphibole
• Language can also be confused just based on vagueness
• Types of disputes: linguistic, verbal, disagreement over the use of language
• Errors in reasoning come about due to confused language and lack of clarity in what we mean.
• Disputes can have both syntactic and semantic ambiguity, and there can also be vagueness- all in the same dispute.
• Cliches- coughing up overworn phrases that are no longer as interesting or wise, a borrowed phrase or “thought crutch”
• The decline of a language must have political/economic causes.
• Avoid saying “it’s clear” or “it’s obvious”, a proof surrogate that stands in the place of an actual argument, effect has becoming a cause, sort of an infinite feedback loop, like alcoholism.
• How can you tell if someone is trying to persuade or create rhetoric?
• Slanter- a type of euphemism, a positive or negative spin
• Euphemisms offer a positive/good slant on something, sugarcoating
• Political language consists mainly of euphemisms now.
• Can have euphemisms and dysphemisms, can we avoid it completely? I mean there’s no purely neutral language
• Oftentimes, people will use bigger words just to seem smarter, when normal words will do
• Amphibody is more rare
• Equivocation is more common: