Healthcare rationing during pandemics has been widely discussed in global bioethics literature. However, existing scenarios and analyses have focused on high income countries, except for very few disease areas such as HIV treatment where some analyses related to African countries exist. We argue that the lack of scholastic discourse, and by extension, professional and democratic engagement on the subject constitute an unacceptable ethical omission. Not only have African governments failed to develop robust ethical plans for pandemics, ethicists in this region (...) have been unable to ignite public discourse on rationing. Therefore, we aim to initiate a debate on how rationing health and social goods could be done ethically in Ghana during the current and future pandemics. The paper discusses and critiques some moral considerations for rationing and their relevance in the Ghanaian context. This contribution may facilitate ethical decision-making during the current pandemic - in Ghana and other African settings where hardly any rationing guidelines exist. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to show the pervasive, though often implicit, role of arguments in negotiation dialogue. This holds even for negotiations that start from a difference of interest such as mere bargaining through offers and counteroffers. But it certainly holds for negotiations that try to settle a difference of opinion on policy issues. It will be demonstrated how a series of offers and counteroffers in a negotiation dialogue contains a reconstructible series of implicit persuasion dialogues. The paper (...) is a sequel to van Laar and Krabbe, in which we showed that for some differences of opinion it may be reasonable to shift from persuasion dialogue, aimed at a resolution of the difference on the merits, to negotiation dialogue, aimed at compromise, whereas in the present paper we show that such a shift need not amount to the abandonment of argumentation. Our main aim in this paper as well as in the previous one is to contribute to the theory of argumentation within the context of negotiation and compromise formation. (shrink)

Women’s empowerment is a concept describing the promotion of women doing things independently and in their own interests, being more conducive to their future and physical and mental development; this includes participation in different outdoor activities, including sports. This qualitative study presents data collected from 18 young female students at sports and physical education universities in Southern Punjab (SP) in Pakistan, selected using a snowball sampling technique. The current study explores their gendered and lived experiences of playing sports and engaging (...) in physical activities in patriarchal systems by emphasizing the concept of women’s empowerment in the context of feminism in sports theory. The findings suggest that the participants faced typical gender stereotypes in their families and communities, which position sports and physical activities as being not feminine. The chances for women to participate in sports and physical activities decrease as they grow up. However, the participants used a range of strategies to advance their interests and academic careers in sports and physical activities by resisting and incorporating dominant discourses of women’s participation in sports and physical activities, which also has implications in the internal and external policy domains at the local and national levels. The participants displayed great resilience and optimism, empowering them to enter the male-dominated domains, and thus we labeled them as change agents. (shrink)

Hastings Center Report, Volume 52, Issue 1, Page 32-41, January/February 2022.

Argumentation as the public exchange of reasons is widely thought to enhance deliberative interactions that generate and justify reasonable public policies. Adopting an argumentation-theoretic perspective, we survey the norms that should govern public argumentation and address some of the complexities that scholarly treatments have identified. Our focus is on norms associated with the ideals of correctness and participation as sources of a politically legitimate deliberative outcome. In principle, both ideals are mutually coherent. If the information needed for a correct deliberative (...) outcome is distributed among agents, then maximising participation increases information diversity. But both ideals can also be in tension. If participants lack competence or are prone to biases, a correct deliberative outcome requires limiting participation. The central question for public argumentation, therefore, is how to strike a balance between both ideals. Rather than advocating a preferred normative framework, our main purpose is to illustrate the complexity of this theme. (shrink)

This paper contains some considerations on the relation between philosophy of science and science, in particular biology. There is a contrast between formalistic and pragmatic approaches to the structure of scientific thought, which is illustrated by the different viewpoints on the nature of explanation. In an appendix some aspects of the logical structure of teleological explanation are discussed.

Some critical reactions hardly give clues to the arguer as to how to respond to them convincingly. Other critical reactions convey some or even all of the considerations that make the critic critical of the arguer’s position and direct the arguer to defuse or to at least contend with them. First, an explication of the notion of a critical reaction will be provided, zooming in on the degree of “directiveness” that a critical reaction displays. Second, it will be examined whether (...) there are normative requirements that enhance the directiveness of criticism. Does the opponent have in circumstances a dialectical obligation to provide clarifications, explanations, or even arguments? In this paper, it is hypothesized that the competitiveness inherent in critical discussion must be mitigated by making the opponent responsible for providing her counterconsiderations, if available, thus assisting the proponent in developing an argumentative strategy that defuses them. (shrink)

Across care settings, the practice of lying to or withholding the truth from people living with dementia is common, yet it is objected to by many. Contrary to this common discomfort, I have argued in previous work that respecting members of this group as moral equals sometimes requires deceiving them. In this paper, I test my proposed practice against complex, controversial cases, demonstrating both its theoretical strength and its practical value for those working in social care.

The three research questions of this study have been: what exactly is active ambiguity?; how should we assess active ambiguities in an argumentative discussion?; what does an adequate dialectical account of active ambiguity look like? These three questions have been answered by giving a definition of active ambiguity, and by elaborating on the properties of active ambiguity. Based on the survey of possible consequences of active ambiguities, and based on the basic division of labour in a persuasion dialogue, we arrived (...) at a set of requirements that a normative, procedural account of active ambiguity should satisfy. The model for ambiguity dialectic both provides a detailed account of evaluating active ambiguities, as well as a dialectical account of dealing with alleged active ambiguity. The distinction between constitutive and regulative rules for discussion has made it possible to provide a discussion model in which discussants can raise the issue of active ambiguity, and in which they can argue about the correctness of such points of order. This immanent dialectical approach has lead to a fourfold classification of fallacies: by using an actively ambiguous expression a party either violates a regulative, or a constitutive rule for persuasion dialogue, and if this party violates a rule, he or she either commits a fallacy of ambiguity, and possibly also the more complex fallacy of equivocation. This model for ambiguity dialectic has been shown to be useful for the analysis and evaluation of complex debates and discussions. The present study can be extended in various ways:  A model for critical discussion can be enriched so that it accommodates other regulative rules, such as the rule that requires arguments to be valid. By doing so, other points of order and other fallacy criticisms can be studied from the perspective of a critical metadiscussion.  The results concerning active ambiguity can be applied to other modes of reasoning, such as visual argumentation.  The results can be applied to ambiguity at the level of larger stretches of argumentative discourse. That could lead to a fruitful contribution to the theory of argument structures.  There still is a need for dialectical models that concern the use of usage declaratives different from providing a disambiguation, such as the use of definitions, clarifications of unfamiliar expressions, amplifications, etc., and the question would have to be answered how the rules with respect to active ambiguity would relate to those models.  The model can be enriched by inserting a specific ‘linguistic utterance meaning testing machine’. That would be a major step towards implementing the model in a computer program.  The use of descriptive profiles of dialogue could be improved further. In order to analyse the way parties respond to dialectically complex contributions, we are in need of a dialectical theory that provides the parties with specific rights and obligations for putting forward complex contributions and for responding to complex contributions. (shrink)

Assembling a series of voices from across the field, this book demonstrates how posthuman theory can be employed to better understand and tackle some of the challenges faced by contemporary international law. With the vast environmental devastation being caused by climate change, the increasing use of artificial intelligence by international legal actors, and the need for international law to face up to its colonial past, international law needs to change. But in regulating and preserving a stable global order in which (...) states act as its main subjects, the traditional sources of international law - international legal statutes, customary international law, historical precedents and general principles of law - create a framework that slows down its capacity to act on contemporary challenges, and to imagine futures yet to come. In response, this collection maintains that posthuman theory can be used to better address the challenges faced by contemporary international law. Covering a wide array of contemporary topics - including environmental law, the law of the sea, colonialism, human rights, conflict, and the impact of science and technology - it is the first book to bring new and emerging research on posthuman theory and international law together into one volume. This book's posthuman engagement with central international legal debates, prefaced by the leading scholar in the field of posthuman theory, provides a perfect resource for students and scholars in international law, as well as critical and socio-legal theorists, and others with interests in posthuman thought, technology, colonialism and ecology. (shrink)

Research misconduct remains an important problem in health research despite decades of local, national, regional, and international efforts to eliminate it. The ultimate goal of every health research project, irrespective of setting, is to produce trustworthy findings to address local as well as global health issues. To be able to lead or participate meaningfully in international research collaborations, individual and institutional capacities for research integrity are paramount. Accordingly, this paper concerns itself not only with individuals’ research skills but also with (...) institutional and national policies and governance. Such policies and governance provide an ethical scaffold for the production of knowledge and structure incentives. This paper’s operational definition of research therefore draws from Institute of Medicine’s articulation of health research as an inquiry that aims to produce knowledge about the structure, processes, or effects of personal health services; and from an existing health systems framework. The paper reviews the research regulatory environment and the ethics apparatus in Ghana, and describes a project jointly undertaken by Ghanaian researchers in collaboration with New York University to assess the perceived adequacy of current institutional practices, opportunities, and incentives for promoting RI. (shrink)

What if in discussion the critic refuses to recognize an emotionally expressed argument of her interlocutor as an argument, accusing him of having presented no argument at all. In this paper, we shall deal with this reproach, which taken literally amounts to a charge of having committed a fallacy of non-argumentation. As such it is a very strong, if not the ultimate, criticism, which even carries the risk of abandonment of the discussion and can, therefore, not be made without burdening (...) oneself with correspondingly strong obligations. We want to specify the fallacies of non-argumentation and their dialectic, i.e., the proper way to criticize them, the appropriate ways for the arguer to react to such criticism, and the appropriate ways for the critic to follow up on these reactions. Among the types of fallacy of non-argumentation, the emphasis will be on the appeal to popular sentiments . Our aim is to reach, for cases of non-argumentation, a survey of dialectical possibilities. By making the disputants themselves responsible for the place of emotion in their dialogues, we hope to contribute to a further development of the theory of dialectical obligations. (shrink)

The transition from university to working life appears a critical period impacting human service workers’ long-term health. More research is needed on how psychological factors affect the risk. We aimed to investigate how subgroups, based on self-efficacy, psychological flexibility, and basic psychological needs satisfaction ratings, differed on self-rated health, wellbeing, and intention to leave. A postal survey was sent to 1,077 recently graduated psychologists in Sweden, response rate 57.5%, and final sample 532. A hierarchical cluster analysis resulted in a satisfactory (...) eight-cluster solution. We identified two at-risk subgroups, displaying the lowest scores on health and wellbeing, and one potential low-risk subgroup with the highest ratings on said variables. The “Low risk?” group rated high on all three psychological constructs, a positive transition to working life, a work environment where resources balanced relatively high emotional demands, good health, and wellbeing. Almost the complete opposite ratings characterized the potential risk groups. “Quitting?” scored significantly higher than “Getting sick?” on self-efficacy and psychological flexibility as well as actively seeking new employment and reporting daily thoughts on leaving the profession. We suggest that a combination of low self-efficacy and psychological flexibility could increase the risk of individuals staying despite suboptimal working conditions. With combined higher self-efficacy and psychological flexibility, individuals in similar circumstances appear more inclined to quit. We conclude that the ways recently graduated psychologists rate their self-efficacy, psychological flexibility, and basic needs satisfaction appear to be reflected in their self-rated health and wellbeing. (shrink)

This article discusses the key existential stakes of implementing biometrics in human lifeworlds. In this pursuit, we offer a problematization and reinvention of central values often taken for granted within the “ethical turn” of AI development and discourse, such as autonomy, agency, privacy and integrity, as we revisit basic questions about what it means to be human and embodied. Within a framework of existential media studies, we introduce an existential ethics of care—through a conversation between existentialism, virtue ethics, a feminist (...) ethics of care and post-humanist ethics—aiming to deepen and nuance our understanding of the human behind “human-centered” AI directives. The key argument is that biometrics implicates humans through unprecedented forms of objectification, through which the existential body—the relational, intimate and frail human being—is at risk. We interrogate these risks as they become visible at three sites where embodied humans are challenged by biometrics, and thus where the existential body is challenged by the biometric body. This occurs through reductionism (biometric passports nailing bodies to identities, removing human judgment and compromising agency at the AI border), enforced transparency (smart home assistants surveying human intimacies and invading intimate spaces in the bedroom) and the breaching of bodily integrity (chipping bodies to capture sensory data, challenging the very concept of bodily integrity through self-invasive biohacking). Our existential ethics of care is importantly not a solutionist list of principles or suggestions, but a manifesto for a way of thinking about the ethical challenges of living with biometrics in today’s world, by raising the right questions. We argue that a revitalized discussion of the basic existential stakes within human lived experience is needed and should serve as the foundation on which comprehensive frameworks can be built to address the complexities and prospects for ethical machines, responsible biometrics and AI. (shrink)

The epistemologists Biro and Siegel have raised two objections against the pragma-dialectical approach to argumentation. According to the first objection the pragma-dialectical theory is not genuinely normative. According to the second objection the rejection of justificationism by pragma-dialecticians is unwarranted: they reject justificationism prematurely and they are not consistent in accepting some arguments (‘justifications’) as sound. The first objection is based on what we regard as the misconception that the goal of resolving differences of opinion cannot provide a normative approach. (...) In response to the second objection we argue that in pragma-dialectics, the notion of argument, and related notions, are defined in a non-justificatory manner. (shrink)

Many commentators call for a more ethical approach to planning for influenza pandemics. In the developed world, some pandemic preparedness plans have already been examined from an ethical viewpoint. This paper assesses the attention given to ethics issues by the Ghana National Integrated Strategic Plan for Pandemic Influenza.

Elizabeth Barnes has recently developed an account of disability that is sensitive to the role of self-evaluation. To have a physical disability is, according to Barnes, to have a body that is merely different from the norm. Yet, as Barnes notes, some disabilities will genuinely frustrate some life plans. It may be the case, therefore, that a disability is instrumentally bad for a person and that acquiring one may be a genuine loss. Equally, however, a person may genuinely value a (...) disability such that it is instrumentally good for them and that they experience the acquiring of it as a gain. Notably, Barnes explicitly restricts this analysis to physical disabilities, leaving open the status of mental disabilities. Nevertheless, Barnes does not rule out the extension of her model to this category, and she expresses a desire to see future work on other disabilities built upon it. This article takes up this challenge, making the case that to possess a mental disability is merely to possess a minority mind. (shrink)

The dispute between the transgender-rights movement and “gender-critical” activists represents a stark division in British public discourse. Although the issues of contention are numerous and require their own philosophical treatment, a core metaphysical concern underlies them. Gender-critical activists, such as Kathleen Stock, tend to argue that recognizing trans women as women requires erasing the category of biological sex. This implies that all trans women are male, and thus recognizing them as women rips female biology from the root of the category (...) “woman.” In this article, I argue that this view is mistaken. As exogenously produced sex characteristics should count toward a person's sex classification, all trans women are female. (shrink)

Not least among the many enigmas attending the origins and development of the first vernacular lyric in the European Middle Ages is the existence of at least twenty women poets who lived in southern France from about the mid-twelfth to the mid-thirteenth century and who participated in the highly conventionalized poetic system created by the troubadours, those humble poetlovers who sang to their beloved as domna, the superior lady. In periods when the tides of feminism are high these women's voices (...) have insistently claimed our attention, as we try to understand their songs and puzzle over their very existence. Their poetic inventions require us in particular to pay close attention to the subtle, even elusive, concept of voice—its relation to the identity of the poet and the poem's speaker, the elements that characterize its expression, the multiplicity of images created by different voices, and so on. If we are willing to listen and analyze carefully, the trobairitz have much to teach us about the way women poets enter into and find their place in a traditional poetic system created by male poets. Their songs demonstrate with intricate complexity the way poetic fictions play with cultural, literary, and social definitions of man and woman, masculine and feminine; their poems offer valuable warnings about the pitfalls involved in generalizing women into woman. (shrink)

Carers often interfere with the choices of people living with dementia. On neorepublican and (most) relational egalitarian views, interference can be justified if it tracks a person's interests: if it does not lead to a relationship of domination. However, the kind of environment-shaping interventions carers often pursue would be considered infantilising or objectionably paternalistic in other cases. In this paper, I defend this indirect approach and argue that it offers the best prospects of dementia care without domination.

Despite negative effects on their health and social lives, many informal carers of people living with dementia claim to be acting in accordance with a moral obligation. Indeed, feelings of failure and shame are commonly reported by those who later give up their caring responsibilities, suggesting a widespread belief that professional dementia care, whether delivered in the person's own home or in an institutional setting, ought always to be a last resort. In this paper, however, I suggest that this common (...) intuition gets things the wrong way around. Adopting a relational egalitarian framework, I argue that the most serious injustices engendered by present‐day dementia care services are contingent on broader societal structures—they can thus be ameliorated relatively easily (if resource intensively) by changing those structures. Informal dementia care, on the other hand, carries similar risks of injustice and is much more resistant to structural reform. While there may be moral obligations to provide informal dementia care in present‐day societies, then, they arise because of the deficiencies of professional care, not the virtues of its informal counterpart. Though we may be far from achieving just care arrangements in most of our societies, we must never lose sight of the fact that, when we engage in morally permitted informal dementia care, we are exercising our last resort. (shrink)

At the intersection of literature and history, three “antique romances” initiated a new genre in the mid-twelfth century by transposing into French the great stories of Greek and Latin epic: the fratricidal war of Oedipus's sons in the Roman de Thèbes, the founding of Rome in the Eneas, and the Roman de Troie's Trojan War based on Dares and Dictys. Rejecting Homer's version for these “eyewitness” accounts, Benoît de Sainte-Maure translated the full history of the Trojan War from its beginning (...) in the tale of Jason and the Argonauts to the annihilation of Troy and the victors’ unhappy homecomings. The myth of Trojan descent claimed by many European rulers, including the British and Normans, gives Benoît's translation more than entertainment value for his first public, the Plantagenêt court of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Indeed, while repeatedly assuring his readers that this great estoire, story and history, will provide pleasurable enjoyment, Benoît also signals a more serious intent by invoking Solomon and the seven liberal arts: we would be like beasts if not for learning from the past that allows us to distinguish between wisdom and folly. The author/narrator's school training is on full display as he highlights the importance of remembering and the dangers of forgetting. Obliged to share his knowledge, Benoît will put into romanz matter that is at once old and new, lost and refound, so that lay readers without access to his Latin sources can “remember” their past as he shapes it in romance. The success of his enterprise can be gauged by the number of extant manuscripts as well as the romance's subsequent influence on multiple versions of Trojan history, from the Histoire ancienne jusqu’à César to Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde. But can we pinpoint more specifically what and how Benoît's public might remember? (shrink)

Negotiation is not only used to settle differences of interest but also to settle differences of opinion. Discussants who are unable to resolve their difference about the objective worth of a policy or action proposal may be willing to abandon their attempts to convince the other and search instead for a compromise that would, for each of them, though only a second choice yet be preferable to a lasting conflict. Our questions are: First, when is it sensible to enter into (...) negotiations and when would this be unwarranted or even fallacious? Second, what is the nature of a compromise? What does it mean to settle instead of resolve a difference of opinion, and what might be the dialectical consequences of mistaking a compromise for a substantial resolution? Our main aim is to contribute to the theory of argumentation within the context of negotiation and compromise formation and to show how arguing disputants can shift to negotiation in a dialectically virtuous way. (shrink)

Matilda Mroz argues that cinema provides an ideal opportunity to engage with ideas of temporal flow and change. Temporality, however, remains an underexplored area of film analysis, which frequently discusses images as though they were still rather than moving. This book traces the operation of duration in cinema, and argues that temporality should be a central concern of film scholarship. In close readings of Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’Avventura, Andrei Tarkovsky’s Mirror, and the ten short films that make up Krzysztof Kielowski’s (...) Decalogue series, Mroz highlights how film analysis must consider both particular moments in cinema which are critically significant, and the way in which such moments interrelate in temporal flux. She explores the concepts of duration and rhythm, resonance and uncertainty, affect, sense and texture, to bring a fresh perspective to film analysis and criticism. Essential reading for students and scholars in Film Studies, this engaging study will also be a valuable resource for critical theorists. (shrink)

Women’s participation in physical activities has been discouraged for a variety of reasons, especially in Muslim countries. This study aims to highlight Pakistani women’s religious beliefs about sports. It focuses on whether their religion contradicts their participation in sporting activities, and it does so by using an adapted version of the Santa Clara Strength of Religious Faith Questionnaire in the theoretical context of feminism in sports. The snowball sampling method was used to select women from the Sindh province of Pakistan, (...) who completed a questionnaire incorporating the SCSRFQ that was specially designed for the current study. The results were unexpected, revealing that religious beliefs have no negative impact on Pakistani women’s participation in sports. Few participants believe that religion is an obstacle to their participation in sports. The results of the study challenge the traditional view by most of the previous studies that Islam is against women’s sports. It also challenges cultural limitations, such as some unwritten rules in Pakistani culture according to which women cannot participate in sports. These efforts should lead to enhanced female sports participation in the Pakistani context. (shrink)

In his theory of criticism, D. N. Walton presupposes that an opponent either critically questions an argument, without supplementing this questioning with any reasoning of her own, or that she puts forward a critical question and supplements it with a counterargument, that is, with reasoning in defense of an opposite position of her own. In this paper, I show that there is a kind of in-between critical option for the opponent that needs to be taken into account in any classification (...) of types of criticism, and that should not be overlooked in a system of dialogue norms, nor in a procedure for developing a strategically expedient critique. In this third option, an opponent questions and overtly doubts a statement of the proponent and supplements her doubts with a counterconsideration that explains and motivates her position of critical doubt, yet without supporting any opposite thesis, thereby assisting, as it were, the proponent in his attempt to develop a responsive argumentation, tailor-made to convince this particular opponent. First, I elaborate on the notion of an explanatory counterconsideration. Second, I discuss Walton’s distinction between premises that can be challenged by mere questioning and premises that must be challenged by incurring the obligation to offer counter-argumentation. I contend that the latter type of premises, that I would label “normality premises,” can be attacked without incurring a genuine burden of proof. Instead, it can be attacked by means of incurring a burden of criticism that amounts to the obligation to offer an explanatory counterconsideration, rather than a convincing ex concessis argument. Of course, providing the opponent with the right to discharge her burden of criticism with explanatory counterconsiderations brings a clear strategic ad- vantage to her. It is much less demanding to motivate one’s doubts regarding proposition P, than to convince the proponent of not-P. If we want to encourage opponents to act critically, and proponents to develop responsive arguments, the importance of the notions of an explanatory counterconsideration and of a motivated doubt should be emphasized in the theory of criticism. (shrink)

Child assent is recommended in addition to parental consent when enrolling children in clinical research; however, appreciation and relevance ascribed to these concepts vary in different contexts, and information on attitudes towards storage of biological samples for future research is limited, especially in developing countries. We assessed caregivers’ understanding and appreciation of consent and assent procedures, and their attitudes towards use of stored blood samples for future research prior to enrolling a child in clinical research. A total of 17 in-depth (...) interviews were conducted with primary caregivers of children at enrolment or on the immediate follow-up date. All caregivers recalled significant amount information from the study information sheet and were able to appropriately link such information to the consent process. While all participants confirmed information received prior to blood sampling as adequate, a few noted that the purpose was not sufficiently well communicated. Caregivers felt children were cognitively vulnerable, and prone to decisions that were not necessarily in their best interest. Nearly all caregivers felt it was their right and responsibility to overrule objections from their ward’s regarding enrolment into specific study or receipt of a therapeutic procedure. There were no objections or concerns regarding use of stored biological samples for future research purposes. There is thus, a need to improve understanding of caregivers on the information provided during the informed consent process. Context-specific studies on the age of assent in specific populations are needed. (shrink)

Some critical reactions hardly give clues to the arguer as to how to respond to them convincingly. Other critical reactions convey some or even all of the considerations that make the critic critical of the arguer’s position and direct the arguer to defuse or to at least contend with them. First, an explication of the notion of a critical reaction will be provided, zooming in on the degree of “directiveness” that a critical reaction displays. Second, it will be examined whether (...) there are normative requirements that enhance the directiveness of criticism. Does the opponent have in circumstances a dialectical obligation to provide clarifications, explanations, or even arguments? In this paper, it is hypothesized that the competitiveness inherent in critical discussion must be mitigated by making the opponent responsible for providing her counterconsiderations, if available, thus assisting the proponent in developing an argumentative strategy that defuses them. (shrink)

Some critical reactions hardly give clues to the arguer as to how to respond to them convinc-ingly. Other critical reactions convey some or even all of the considerations that make the critic critical of the arguer’s position and direct the arguer to defuse or to at least contend with them. First, an explication of the notion of a critical reaction will be provided, zooming in on the degree of ‘directiveness’ that a critical reaction displays. Second, it will be examined whether (...) and to what extent there is a normative requirement to strive after criticism that is more than minimally directive. In this paper, it is hypothesized that the com-petitiveness inherent in critical discussion must be mitigated by making the opponent responsible for providing her counterconsiderations, if available, thus assisting the proponent in developing an argumenta-tive strategy that defuses them. (shrink)

Contemporary theory of argumentation offers many insights about the ways in which, in the context of a public controversy, arguers should ideally present their arguments and criticize those of their opponents. We also know that in practice not all works out according to the ideal patterns: numerous kinds of derailments are an object of study for argumentation theorists. But how about the use of unfairstrategiesvis-à-vis one’s opponents? What if it is not a matter of occasional derailments but of one party’s (...) systematic refusal to take other parties seriously? What if one party continually forgoes any form of critical testing and instead resorts to threats or blackmail? Can this be countered by the tools of reason? Or should one pay one’s opponent back in the same coin? To gain some grasp of these issues, we describe a number of strategies used in the public controversy about induced earthquakes in Groningen. We check whether these strategies arefair,i.e.balanced, transparent,andtolerant.We also investigate the effects of the choice for a particular kind of strategy. It appears that, in circumstances, choosing a fair strategy may be detrimental for resolving the controversy and choosing an unfair one beneficial. Following up ideas from social psychology and political science, we formulate some guidelines for the choice of strategies. At the end, we stress the importance — especially for those whose opinions carry little weight — of having a society in which the knowledge and skills needed for assessing the fairness of strategies are widespread. (shrink)

When is an argument to be called one-sided? When is putting forward such an argument fallacious? How can we develop a model for critical discussion, such that a fallaciously one-sided argument corresponds to a violation of a discussion rule? These issues are dealt with within ‘the limits of the dialogue model of argument’ by specifying a type of persuasion dialogue in which an arguer can offer complex arguments to anticipate particular responses by a critic.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Room for Maneuver When Raising Critical DoubtJan Albert Van Laar1When interlocutors start talking at cross-purposes it becomes less likely that they will be able to resolve their initial difference of opinion (Van Eemeren and Grootendorst 1992, 125). How much room should we give a party for rephrasing or revising her adversary’s standpoint in a manner that suits her individual purposes in the dialogue? Certainly, as textbooks in argumentation and (...) critical thinking make clear, we should steer clear of erecting and attacking straw men (Ennis 1996, 172; Govier 1985, 109–12; Groarke, Tindale, and Fisher 1997, 123). Still, a critic in a discussion or debate should be given some room to maneuver in order to rephrase the arguer’s position in her own words or to get at the underlying position of the arguer. In this article, I will be dealing with this issue from the pragma-dialectical perspective of strategic maneuvering between the shared dialectical objective of resolving a difference of opinion and the individual rhetorical objective of persuading the other side. According to existing accounts of the straw man fallacy (Talisse and Aikin 2006; Van Eemeren and Grootendorst 1992; Walton 1996), the criterion for fallaciousness resides in whether or not the critic misrepresents or distorts the arguer’s actual position. In this article I intend to provide more detailed guidelines for critics: a critic distorts or [End Page 195] misrepresents a position when she changes the formulation or nature of the arguer’s standpoint, even though this contribution by her cannot be reconstructed as containing a proposal for a change that might be acceptable to the arguer.In section 2 I will elaborate on the notion of confrontational maneuvering, that is, of strategic maneuvering between the dialectical and rhetorical goals that arise from the confrontation stage of a critical discussion. In section 3 I will characterize the form of maneuvering where an antagonist reformulates or modifies the protagonist’s standpoint in an opportune way. In section 4 I will examine the conditions under which applications of maneuvering of this kind can be sound and legitimate from a dialectical perspective and relate these conditions to the straw man fallacy. In section 5 the results of the preceding sections will be applied to a case.2. Confrontational ManeuveringIn argumentative discourse, participants typically try to achieve two kinds of objectives. First, they try to be dialectically reasonable, and second, they are out for some kind of personal triumph. The act, by the critic, of reformulating or revising the arguer’s standpoint will be dealt with from this dual perspective of strategic maneuvering (Van Eemeren and Houtlosser 2000, 2003). In order to analyze and evaluate the maneuver under discussion, I will elaborate in this section, first, on the notion of critical discussion in order to clarify the meaning of dialectical reasonableness and fallaciousness; second, on the importance of reconstruction for understanding argumentative discourse; third, on the notion of a confrontation stage; and fourth, on the distinction between direct and indirect maneuvering. These notions will be applied as follows: critics have some room for maneuvering when raising critical doubt, even when they change the arguer’s position or formulation, because there are contexts of utterance within confrontations where such a contribution does allow for a reconstruction in such a way that the result is not a direct and fallacious confrontational maneuver but, rather, an indirect and dialectically reasonable one.According to the pragma-dialectical methodology developed by Van Eemeren and Grootendorst (1984, 1992, 2004), an argumentative discourse must be reconstructed and evaluated from the perspective of a critical discussion. A critical discussion is a normative procedure that starts from a difference of opinion and that is solely aimed at resolving this dispute on the merits of the case (as perceived by the participants). When following [End Page 196] this procedure, discussants start by putting their difference of opinion into words in the confrontation stage; they proceed by deciding on the procedural and material starting points in the opening stage and by exchanging arguments and criticisms in the argumentation stage; and then they bring their discussion to a close by deciding in the concluding stage on whether the initial... (shrink)

This paper aims at a normative account of non-deductive argumentation schemes in the spirit of Hamblin’s dialectical philosophy. First, three principles are presented that characterize Hamblin’s dialectical stance. Second, argumentation schemes, which have hardly been examined in Hamblin’s book Fallacies, shall be dealt with by applying these principles, taking an argumentation scheme from authority as the leading example. Third, a formal dialectical system, along the lines indicated by Hamblin, shall be developed that includes norms for using argumentation schemes and norms (...) for responding to arguments that are presented as instantiating acceptable argumentation schemes. (shrink)

This paper examines arguments that take counter- considerations into account, and it does so from a dialogical point of view. According to my account, a counterconsideration is part of a critical reaction from a real or imagined opponent, and an arguer may take it into account in his argument in at least six fully responsive ways. Conductive arguments will be characterized as one of these types. In this manner, the paper aims to show how conducive, and related kinds of argument (...) can be understood dialogically. (shrink)

When can exerting pressure in a public controversy promote reasonable outcomes, and when is it rather a hindrance? We show how negotiation and persuasion dialogue can be intertwined. Then, we examine in what ways one can in a public controversy exert pressure on others through sanctions or rewards. Finally, we discuss from the viewpoints of persuasion and negotiation whether and, if so, how pressure hinders the achievement of a reasonable outcome.

How does the analysis and evaluation of argumentation depend on the dialogue type in which the argumentation has been put forward? This paper focuses on argumentative bluff in eristic discussion. Argumentation cannot be presented without conveying the pretence that it is dialectically reasonable, as well as, at least to some degree, rhetorically effective. Within eristic discussion it can be profitable to engage in bluff with respect to such claims. However, it will be argued that such bluffing is dialectically inadmissible, even (...) within an eristic discussion. (shrink)

This article takes as its starting point the moral requirement to include persons with serious cognitive impairments in democratic decision‐making. That said, including such persons poses particular practical challenges to effective democratic participation. Nussbaum has set out the most extensive proposals for inclusion based on a model of guardianship, but we find they fall short due to not suitably respecting and facilitating the subjective decision‐making of impaired persons. Instead, we argue for a model of co‐constitution, whereby aides work within a (...) supported decision‐making paradigm to arrive at political choices in collaboration with impaired persons. To flesh out this model, we propose collaboration be based on three ideal types of interaction – expert, Socratic, and deliberative – designed to accommodate differing degrees and types of cognitive impairments. We further argue that the aide should have a relationship of detached professionalism with the impaired person and therefore should not be the person’s carer. Finally, we conclude that this separation be combined with transparent and regular invigilation of the aide’s decision‐making process to best safeguard the process from abuse or error. (shrink)

A critic may attack an arguer personally by pointing out that the arguer’s position is pragmatically inconsistent: the arguer does not practice what he preaches. A number of authors hold that such attacks can be part of a good argumentative discussion. However, there is a difficulty in accepting this kind of contribution as potentially legitimate, for the reason that there is nothing wrong for a protagonist to have an inconsistent position, in the sense of committing himself to mutually inconsistent propositions. (...) If so, any such charge seems to be irrelevant. The questions to be answered in this essay are: what, if any, is the dialectical rationale for this type of criticism, and in what situations, if any, is this kind of charge dialectically legitimate? It will be shown that these attacks can be dialectically legitimate, in special circumstances, and that they can be seen as strategic␣manoeuvres where a party attempts to reconcile his dialectical and his rhetorical objectives. (shrink)

It furthers the dialectic when the opponent is clear about what motivates and underlies her critical stance, even if she does not adopt an opposite standpoint, but merely doubts the proponent’s opinion. Thus, there is some kind of burden of criticism. In some situations, there should an obligation for the opponent to offer explanatory counterconsiderations, if requested, whereas in others, there is no real dialectical obligation, but a mere responsibility for the opponent to cooperate by providing her motivations for being (...) critical. In this paper, it will be shown how a set of dialogue rules may encourage an opponent, in this latter type of situation, to provide her counterconsiderations, and to do so at an appropriate level of specificity. Special attention will be paid to the desired level of specificity. For example, the critic may challenge a thesis by saying “Why? Says who?,” without conveying whether she could be convinced by an argument from expert opinion, or from position to know, or from popular opinion. What are fair dialogue rules for dealing with less than fully specific criticism? (shrink)

Negotiation is not only used to settle differences of interest but also to settle differences of opinion. Discussants who are unable to resolve their difference about the objective worth of a policy or action proposal may be willing to abandon their attempts to convince the other and search instead for a compromise that would, for each of them, though only a second choice yet be preferable to a lasting conflict. Our questions are: First, when is it sensible to enter into (...) negotiations and when would this be unwarranted or even fallacious? Second, what is the nature of a compromise? What does it mean to settle instead of resolve a difference of opinion, and what might be the dialectical consequences of mistaking a compromise for a substantial resolution? Our main aim is to contribute to the theory of argumentation within the context of negotiation and compromise formation and to show how arguing disputants can shift to negotiation in a dialectically virtuous way. (shrink)

The distinction between constitutive and regulative rules is applied to rules for critical discussion that have to do with the use of ambiguous expressions. This leads to a distinction between rule violating fallacies, by which one abandons a critical discussion, and norm violating fallacies, which are in a way admissible within a critical discussion. According to the formal model for critical discussion, proposed in this paper, fallacies of the norm violating type arc not prohibited. Instead, it provides discussants with devices (...) to discuss fallacies and fallacy criticisms. (shrink)