Practical Argumentation Part 12

Argument by generalization very rarely const.i.tutes absolute proof. In dealing with things, it may do so in rare cases; in dealing with human actions, almost never. The reason why it can establish only a strong probability lies in a weakness in the process of reasoning.

Notice that while this kind of argument apparently reasons directly from the example cited to the case in hand, there is in reality an intermediate step. This step is a general truth of which both the known fact and the fact to be proved must be instances. When it is argued that since one mastiff makes a good watch dog another mastiff will also make a good watch dog, the reasoning pa.s.ses through the general statement, "All mastiffs make good watch dogs."

Graphically the process might be represented thus:--

General Law / / / / Known Fact Fact to be Proved

This method is very much like the method of reasoning from effect to effect, except that here the intermediate step does not _cause_, but merely accounts for the facts. In the ill.u.s.tration taken from Burke, the known fact is that neither Turkey nor Spain can govern their distant provinces despotically. The general law is that no country can govern a distant dependency harshly. The fact proved is that England cannot play the despot with the American Colonies.

The weakness of this sort of reasoning is now easily seen. In the first place, there are few general laws governing human action that always hold true. In the second place, unless there is a very strong resemblance between the cases compared, unless they are alike in all essential particulars, they will not both be examples of the working of one general law.

The following quotation points out an error that might be made from too hasty reasoning by example:--

On August 23d the Southern Railway, which since 1902 had been paying 5 per cent. annual dividends on its preferred stock, voted to reduce those dividends from a 5 per cent. annual rate to one of 3. Five days later, on August 28th, the Erie Railroad, which had been paying 4 per cent ... announced that it would pay no cash dividend this time, but would issue to the amount of the usual 4 per cent. dividend, what it called dividend warrants, which were practically notes at 4 per cent.

redeemable in cash in 1907.

It was natural that this action regarding dividends should have awakened much uneasiness.... To predict a similar cutting of dividends by other railway companies would, however, be unwarranted. The case of the Southern Railway and the Erie was peculiar. Each had been cla.s.sed among the financially weak railways of the country. Both were reorganized from absolute railway wrecks, and in each the new scheme of capitalization was proposed to the markets at a time when recovery from the depression of 1893 had not made such progress as it had achieved when the greater companies, like the Union Pacific, were reorganized. The result was that, with both these railways, provisions of working capital and adjustment of liabilities to the possible needs of an active industrial future were inadequately made. [Footnote: Alexander D. Noyes, The Forum, October-December, 1907, p.198.]

An excellent ill.u.s.tration of how to refute argument by generalization is found in the following quotation. It has been said that since England finds free trade beneficial, the United States should adopt the same policy. Mr. Reed, a leading advocate of protection, points out the weakness of this argument.

According to the usual story that is told, England had been engaged with a long and vain struggle with the demon of protection, and had been year after year sinking farther into the depths, until at a moment when she was in her distress and saddest plight, her manufacturing system broke down, "protection, having destroyed home trade by reducing," as Mr. Atkinson says, "the entire population to beggary, dest.i.tution, and want." Mr. Cobden and his friends providentially appeared, and after a hard struggle established a principle for all time and for all the world, and straightway England enjoyed the sum of human happiness. Hence all good nations should do as England has done and be happy ever after.

Suppose England, instead of being a little island in the sea, had been the half of a great continent full of raw material, capable of an internal commerce which would rival the commerce of all the rest of the world.

Suppose every year new millions were flocking to her sh.o.r.es, and every one of those new millions in a few years, as soon as they tasted the delights of a broader life, would become as great a consumer as any one of her own people.

Suppose that these millions, and the 70,000,000 already gathered under the folds of her flag, were every year demanding and receiving a higher wage and therefore broadening her market as fast as her machinery could furnish production. Suppose she had produced cheap food beyond all her wants, and that her laborers spent so much money that whether wheat was sixty cents a bushel or twice that sum hardly entered the thoughts of one of them except when some democratic tariff bill was paralyzing his business.

Suppose that she was not only but a cannon shot from France, but that every country in Europe had been brought as near to her as Baltimore is to Was.h.i.+ngton--for that is what cheap ocean freights mean between us and European producers. Suppose all those countries had her machinery, her skilled workmen, her industrial system, and labor forty per cent. cheaper. Suppose under that state of facts, with all her manufactures proclaiming against it, frantic in their disapproval, England had been called upon by Cobden to make the plunge into free trade, would she have done it? Not if Cobden had been backed by the angelic host. History gives England credit for great sense. [Footnote: Thomas B. Reed, Speech in House of Representatives, Feb. 1, 1904.]

ARGUMENT FROM a.n.a.lOGY. When two instances of objects which are _unlike in themselves_, but which _perform similar functions or have similar relations_, are compared for the sake of showing that what is true in one case is true in the other, the process is called _argument from a.n.a.logy_. The following quotation is a good ill.u.s.tration of this kind of argument:--

"Mr. Pinchot compared our present consumption of wood to the case of a man in an open boat at sea, cut adrift from some s.h.i.+pwreck and with but a few days' supply of water on board. He drinks all the water the first day, simply because he is thirsty, though he knows that the water will not last long. The American people know that their wood supply will last but a few decades. Yet they shut their eyes to the facts."

Water and wood are not alike in themselves; they cannot be directly compared, but they are alike in the relations they bear to other circ.u.mstances.

When President Lincoln refused to change generals at a certain time during the Civil War, saying that it was not wise to "swap horses while crossing a stream," he reasoned from a.n.a.logy. Since the horse in taking its master across the stream and the general in conducting a campaign are totally unlike in themselves but have similar relations, the argument is from a.n.a.logy and not from generalization.

It is easy to see that such reasoning never const.i.tutes indubitable proof. If argument from generalization, where the objects compared differ from each other in only a few respects, is weak, plainly, argument from a.n.a.logy is much weaker, since the objects are alike merely in the relations they bear.

Though argument from a.n.a.logy does not const.i.tute proof, yet it is often valuable as a means of ill.u.s.tration. Truths frequently need illumination more than verification, and in such cases this sort of comparison may be very useful. Many proverbs are condensed arguments from a.n.a.logy, their strength depending upon the similarity between the known case and the case in hand. It is not hard to find the a.n.a.logy in these expressions: "Lightning never strikes twice in the same place"; "Don't count your chickens before they are hatched"; "A fool and his money are soon parted."

The student who has carefully read this chapter up to this point should have a fairly clear idea of the nature of proof; he should know that proof consists of evidence and reasoning; he should know the tests for each of these; and he should be able to distinguish between strong and weak arguments. The next step for him to take will be to apply these instructions in generating proof for any statement that he wishes to establish.

A common fault in argumentation is the failure to support important points with sufficient proof. One or two points well established will go farther toward inducing belief in a proposition than a dozen points that are but weakly substantiated. A statement should be proved not only by inductive reasoning, but, if possible, by deductive. If one uses argument from antecedent probability in establis.h.i.+ng a statement, he should not rest content with this one method of proof, but he should try also to use argument from sign, and argument from example, and, whenever he can, he should quote authority.

Notice that in the following outline three kinds of proof are used.

The amount of proof here given is by no means sufficient to establish the truth of the proposition being upheld; the outline, however, does ill.u.s.trate the proper method of building up the proof of a proposition.

The present condition of the United States Senate is deplorable.

ANTECEDENT PROBABILITY.

I. The present method of electing Senators is ample cause for such a condition, since

A. Senators are not responsible to any one, as

1. They are not responsible to the people, for

a. The people do not elect them.

2. They are not responsible to the legislature, for

a. The legislature changes inside of six years.

SIGN.

II. There is ample evidence to prove that the condition is deplorable.

A. States are often unrepresented in the Senate. (Haynes'

_Election of Senators_, page 158.)

B. Many Senators have fallen into disrepute, for

1. One out of every ten members of the Fifty-eighth Congress had been before the courts on criminal charges.

(Harper's Weekly, Vol. XLIV, page 113.)

C. Many Senators have engaged in fist fights on the floor of the Senate Chamber.

AUTHORITY.

III. Prominent men testify to its deplorable condition. (A. M. Low, North American Review, Vol. CLXXIV, page 231; D. G. Phillips, Cosmopolitan, Vol. XL, page 487.)

PERSUASION.

Though it has been stated in a previous chapter that the persuasive portions of an argument should be found for the most part in the introduction and the conclusion, still persuasion in the discussion is extremely important. It is true that the real work of the discussion is to prove the proposition; but if conviction alone be used, there is great danger, in most cases, that the arguer will weary his audience, lose their attention, and thus fail to drive home the ideas that he wishes them to adopt. Since everything depends upon how the arguer has already treated his subject, and how it has been received by the audience, specific directions for persuasion in the discussion cannot possibly be given. Suggestions in regard to this matter must be even more abstract and general than were the directions for persuasion in the introduction.

To begin with, persuasion in the discussion should usually be of a supplementary nature. Unless the arguer has won the attention and, to some extent at least, the good will of his audience before he commences upon his proof, he may as well confess failure and proceed no farther. If, however, the persuasiveness of his introduction has accomplished the purpose for which it exists, he may introduce his proof without hesitation, taking care all the time to interweave enough persuasion to maintain the favorable impression that he has already made.

In general, the directions for doing this are the same as those for securing persuasion in the introduction. In both divisions _modesty_, _fairness_, and _sincerity_, are the characteristics that make for success. The same conditions that demand these qualities in one place require their use throughout the whole argument. Then, too, it is often effective to make occasionally an appeal to some strong emotion. As a rule, the att.i.tude of the modern audience is essentially one of indifference, of so great indifference that special effort must be made first to gain, then to hold, their attention. The direct emotional appeal, when the subject, the occasion, and the audience are such that there is no danger of its being ludicrous, will usually accomplish this result. If such a method, however, is manifestly out of place, other means must be sought for producing a similar effect.

One of the very commonest devices for gaining attention is to relate a short anecdote. Everybody enjoys a good story, and if it is chosen with proper regard for its ill.u.s.trative value, the argument is sure to be strengthened. On the whole, humorous stories are best. They often relieve the tedium of an otherwise dry speech, and not only serve as persuasion, but drive home a point with greater emphasis than could the most elaborate course of reasoning. This method is so familiar to every one that detailed explanation is unnecessary. Owing to the limited amount of time at their command, student debaters can, as a rule, use only the very shortest stories, and these should be chosen for their ill.u.s.trative rather than for their persuasive value; in written arguments greater lat.i.tude is possible.

Another method that often finds favor in both written and spoken arguments is the introduction of a paragraph showing the importance of the topic under consideration. Oftentimes the arguer can show that this particular phase of the subject is of wider significance than at first appears. Perhaps he can draw a picture that will turn a seemingly uninteresting and commonplace subject into one that is teeming with romance and wonderment. For example, consider the following extract from Burke's speech on _Conciliation with the American Colonies_:--

This is the relative proportion of the importance of the colonies at these two periods: and all reasoning concerning our mode of treating them must have this proportion as its basis; or it is a reasoning weak, rotten and sophistical.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot prevail on myself to hurry over this great consideration. It is good for us to be here. We stand where we have an immense view of what is, and what is pa.s.sed. Clouds, indeed, and darkness rest upon the future. Let us, however, before we descend from this n.o.ble eminence, reflect that this growth of our national prosperity has happened within the short period of the life of man. It has happened within sixty-eight years. There are those alive whose memory might touch the two extremities. For instance, my Lord Bathurst might remember all the stages of the progress. He was in 1704 of an age at least to be made to comprehend such things. He was then old enough _acta parentum jam legere, et quae sit poterit cognoscere virtus_. Suppose, sir, that the angel of this auspicious youth, foreseeing the many virtues which made him one of the most amiable, as he is one of the most fortunate, men of his age, had opened to him in vision, that when in the fourth generation the third prince of the House of Brunswick had sat twelve years on the throne of that nation which (by the happy issue of moderate and healing counsels) was to be made Great Britain, he should see his son, Lord Chancellor of England, turn back the current of hereditary dignity to its fountain and raise him to an higher rank of peerage, whilst he enriched the family with a new one; --if, amidst these bright and happy scenes of domestic honor and prosperity, that angel should have drawn up the curtain and unfolded the rising glories of his country, and, whilst he was gazing with admiration on the then commercial grandeur of England, the genius should point out to him a little speck, scarcely visible in the ma.s.s of the national interests, a small seminal principle rather than a formed body, and should tell him,--"Young man, there is America, which at this day serves for little more than to amuse you with stories of savage men and uncouth manners; yet shall, before you taste of death, show itself equal to the whole of that commerce which now attracts the envy of the world. Whatever England has been growing to by a progressive increase of improvement, brought in by varieties of people, by succession of civilizing conquests and civilizing settlements in a series of seventeen hundred years, you shall see as much added to her by America in the course of a single life!" If this state of his country had been foretold to him, would it not require all the sanguine credulity of youth and all the fervid glow of enthusiasm to make him believe it?