110 research outputs found
The breeding of researchers
Fifth entry in F. Paglieri Postdoc journal for Nature (2010-2011
Trust, argumentation and technology
Introduction to a special issue on "Trust, argumentation and technology
Don’t worry, be gappy! On the unproblematic gappiness of alleged fallacies
The history of fallacy theory is long, distinguished and, admittedly, checkered. I offer a bird eye view on it, with the aim of contrasting the standard conception of fallacies as attractive and universal errors that are hard to eradicate (section 1) with the contemporary preoccupation with “non-fallacious fallacies”, that is, arguments that fit the bill of one of the traditional fallacies but are actually respectable enough to be used in appropriate contexts (section 2). Godden and Zenker have recently argued that reinterpreting alleged fallacies as non-fallacious arguments requires supplementing the textual material with something else, e.g. probability distributions, pragmatic considerations, dialogical context. Thus fallacies remain gappy on all accounts, and this is the hallmark of their failure. However, I argue that such gappiness is typically unproblematic, and thus no more flawed than enthymematic argumentation in general (section 3). This, in turn, calls into question the usefulness of the very notion of fallacy
No More Charity, Please! Enthymematic Parsimony and the Pitfall of Benevolence
Why are enthymemes so frequent? Are we dumb arguers, smart rhetoricians, or parsimonious reasoners? This paper investigates systematic use of enthymemes, criticizing the application of the principle of charity to their interpretation. In contrast, I propose to analyze enthymematic argumentation in terms of parsimony, i.e. as a manifestation of the rational tendency to economize over scant resources. Consequences of this view on the current debate on enthymemes and on their rational reconstruction are discussed
Fight or flight?
First entry in F. Paglieri Postdoc journal for Nature (2010-2011
Ruinous arguments: Escalation of disagreement and the dangers of arguing
People argue to reconcile differences of opinion, but reconciliation may fail to happen. In these cases, most theorists assume arguers are left with the same disagreement from which they started. This is too optimistic, since disagreement might instead escalate, and this may happen because of the argumentative practice, not in spite of it. These dangers depend on epistemological, pragmatic, and cultural factors, and show why arguers should be (and are) careful in picking their dialogical fights
The ecology of social interactions in online and offline environments
The rise in online social networking has brought about a revolution in social
relations. However, its effects on offline interactions and its implications
for collective well-being are still not clear and are under-investigated. We
study the ecology of online and offline interaction in an evolutionary game
framework where individuals can adopt different strategies of socialization.
Our main result is that the spreading of self-protective behaviors to cope with
hostile social environments can lead the economy to non-socially optimal
stationary states
The junior senior supervisor
Second entry (column) in F. Paglieri Postdoc journal for Nature (2010-2011
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