Pushing the bounds of rationality: Argumentation and extended cognition

One of the central tasks of a theory of argumentation is to supply a theory of appraisal: a set of standards and norms according to which argumentation, and the reasoning involved in it, is properly evaluated. In their most general form, these can be understood as rational norms, where the core idea of rationality is that we rightly respond to reasons by according the credence we attach to our doxastic and conversational commitments with the probative strength of the reasons we have for them. Certain kinds of rational failings are so because they are manifestly illogical – for example, maintaining overtly contradictory commitments, violating deductive closure by refusing to accept the logical consequences of one’s present commitments, or failing to track basing relations by not updating one’s commitments in view of new, defeating information. Yet, according to the internal and empirical critiques, logic and probability theory fail to supply a fit set of norms for human reasoning and argument. Particularly, theories of bounded rationality have put pressure on argumentation theory to lower the normative standards of rationality for reasoners and arguers on the grounds that we are bounded, finite, and fallible agents incapable of meeting idealized standards. This paper explores the idea that argumentation, as a set of practices, together with the procedures and technologies of argumentation theory, is able to extend cognition such that we are better able to meet these idealized logical standards, thereby extending our responsibilities to adhere to idealized rational norms

The Argument Reasoning Comprehension Task: Identification and Reconstruction of Implicit Warrants

Reasoning is a crucial part of natural language argumentation. To comprehend an argument, one must analyze its warrant, which explains why its claim follows from its premises. As arguments are highly contextualized, warrants are usually presupposed and left implicit. Thus, the comprehension does not only require language understanding and logic skills, but also depends on common sense. In this paper we develop a methodology for reconstructing warrants systematically. We operationalize it in a scalable crowdsourcing process, resulting in a freely licensed dataset with warrants for 2k authentic arguments from news comments. On this basis, we present a new challenging task, the argument reasoning comprehension task. Given an argument with a claim and a premise, the goal is to choose the correct implicit warrant from two options. Both warrants are plausible and lexically close, but lead to contradicting claims. A solution to this task will define a substantial step towards automatic warrant reconstruction. However, experiments with several neural attention and language models reveal that current approaches do not suffice.Comment: Accepted as NAACL 2018 Long Paper; see details on the front pag

Persuasive argumentation as a cultural practice

In this article author traces relation between argumentation and cultural practice. The first part focuses on definition of argumentation in informal logic tradition. In particular, it discusses argument in terms of verbal and social activity involving the use of everyday language. Author claims that there is no argumentation beyond language. The second part explains persuasive argumentation as a form of cultural practice. The persuasive arguments found in “social practice” can be understood as a social activity, analysable within the context of a given cultural system. Author refers to an approach taking the argumentative expression as a certain type of communicative practice, directed towards respecting, recognising or accepting specific actions. The inclusion of persuasive argumentation in the “circuit of cultural activities” to be studied makes it possible to compare this type of argumentation with other social practices, and to posit a clear historical dimension in the study of argumentation. It also makes it possible to view persuasive argumentation as one of many cultural activities aimed at changing or perpetuating behaviours, attitudes, thinking, etc. The third part of the paper concerns the problem of humanistic interpretation of persuasive argumentation. Author attempts to develop this intuition, at the same time demonstrating the problems that arise from this approach. In conclusion, author tries to analyze argumentation in terms of culture theory and humanistic interpretation

Virtue and argument: Taking character into account

In this paper we consider the prospects for an account of good argument that takes the character of the arguer into consideration. We conclude that although there is much to be gained by identifying the virtues of the good arguer and by considering the ways in which these virtues can be developed in ourselves and in others, virtue argumentation theory does not offer a plausible alternative definition of good argument

On the Difference between Assumption-Based Argumentation and Abstract Argumentation

Acknowledgements The first author has been supported by the National Research Fund, Luxembourg (LAAMI project) and by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC, UK), grant ref. EP/J012084/1 (SAsSy project). The second and third authors have been supported by CNPq (Universal 2012 - Proc. no. 473110/2012-1), CAPES (PROCAD 2009) and CNPq/CAPES (Casadinho/PROCAD 2011).Peer reviewedPostprin

Fuzzy argumentation for trust

In an open Multi-Agent System, the goals of agents acting on behalf of their owners often conflict with each other. Therefore, a personal agent protecting the interest of a single user cannot always rely on them. Consequently, such a personal agent needs to be able to reason about trusting (information or services provided by) other agents. Existing algorithms that perform such reasoning mainly focus on the immediate utility of a trusting decision, but do not provide an explanation of their actions to the user. This may hinder the acceptance of agent-based technologies in sensitive applications where users need to rely on their personal agents. Against this background, we propose a new approach to trust based on argumentation that aims to expose the rationale behind such trusting decisions. Our solution features a separation of opponent modeling and decision making. It uses possibilistic logic to model behavior of opponents, and we propose an extension of the argumentation framework by Amgoud and Prade to use the fuzzy rules within these models for well-supported decisions