Two is a Small Number: False Dichotomies Revisited

Our acceptance of falsely dichotomous statements is often intellectually distorting. It restricts imagination, limits opportunities, and lends support to pseudo-logical arguments. In conflict situations, the presumption that there are only two sides is often a harmful distortion. Why do so many false dichotomies seem plausible? Are all dichotomies false? What are the alternatives, if any, to such fundamental dichotomies as ‘true/false’, ‘yes/no’, ‘proponent/opponent,’ and ‘accept/reject’

What is acknowledgement and why is it important?

In the context of redressing wrongs of the past, the importance of acknowledgement is often urged. It figures significantly, for instance, in the final report of South Africa\u27s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and in the 1996 Canadian Royal Commiss ion Report on Aboriginal Peoples. In both documents a central theme is that acknowledging wrongs of the past is a key first step towards healing and reconciliation. Several recent statements about public apology also urge that moral apologies are signif icant because of the ways in which they acknowledge wrongdoing and responsibility. However, there seem to be few explanations of what, exactly, acknowledgement amounts to and why one would expect it to be an important stage in the healing of victims or in the reconciliation between victim and perpetrator groups. I suggest that ackno wledgement is a kind of spelling out, or articulation, of something that we already know or are in a position to know. When we acknowledge something we avow or accept it as something attached to ourselves. I distinguish between granted acknowledgement, received acknowledgement, and self-acknowledgement. Often acknowledgement is partial and compromised, a situation which may be confusing and harmful to those who have been wronged. I propose explanations as to why the acknowledgement that they are worth y human beings who were wronged and deserved better tends to be profoundly important to groups such as Blacks in South Africa and native peoples in Canada. I also address difficulties which we face when we are pressed to acknowledge injustice and wrongdo ing which we would rather not accept as part of our social history

Reflections on the authority of personal experience

The authority of first person claims may be understood from an epistemic perspective or as a matter of social practice. Building on accounts of Hume, Nagel, and several more recent authors, it is argued that this authority should be understood as limited. To extend it beyond notions of what it is like to experience something, we shift from what should be a narrow subjective edge to a territory of objective claims, thereby reasoning incorrectly. A relevant application is the supposed authority of victims

Truth and Storytelling: Some Hidden Arguments

This paper explores the relationship between narrative and argument in the context of ‘telling our stories’, a common aspect of processes of political reconciliation. Truth commissions and informal workshops often emphasize the telling of stories as a means of providing a sense of the experiences of persons affected by political conflict. Such stories, or narratives, may provide a powerful tool in reconciliation processes, given that they provide a basis for acknowledgement, understanding and empathy. However the power of narrative in such contexts does not eliminate the need for the exploration and evaluation of arguments for contested claims, and there is likely to be a tension between empathetic and critical elements in this regard

Emotion, Relevance and Consolation Arguments

There is a kind of argument offered to console people who are sorry or depressed, to the effect that they should not feel so badly because others are even worse off. In such arguments, B tries to console A for A’s suffering on the grounds that some other person or persons, C, have suffered equally bad things or even worse. Here, A and B may be the same person: people sometimes seek to console themselves. The point is to diminish A’s grief on the grounds that he or she is not alone in feeling it. If a person is grieving from having lost a job, well, there are others who have had the similar experiences or worse; they may have lost several jobs or never had a decent job in the first place. If she has been diagnosed with an illness requiring unpleasant lifestyle restrictions well, many other people are ill and many have worse diseases – terminal illnesses characterized by severe physical pain, for instance. I have often played the role of A in this scenario and that of B, and who knows, perhaps I have, without knowing it, played the role of C as well. Many in the audience could probably report the same thing, since Consolation Arguments of this type are rather common. A recent item circulated on the Internet and forwarded to me by David Hitchcock included the following, among others

Arguing Forever? Or: Two Tiers of Argument Appraisal

In this paper I explore Ralph Johnson\u27s proposal that in addition to premises and conclusion every argument should have a dialectical tier in which the arguer addresses objections to the argument, and considers alternative positions. After exploring several reasons for thinking that Johnson\u27s proposal is a good one, I then raise a number of objections against it and move ahead to respond to those objections, which I do by distinguishing making out a case for a conclusion from offering an argument for it, and distinguishing supplementary arguments (responding to objections and considering alternative positions) from one\u27s main argument. I contend that it is not realistic to see arguers as having an obligation to respond to all objections and to address all alternative positions; we must somehow discriminate those which need and merit a reply from those which do not