The Politics of Aristotle

by Aristotle

  A strong appearance of having been refuted is often produced by the most highly sophistical of all the unfair tricks of questioners, when without deducing [10] anything, instead of putting their final proposition as a question, they state it as a conclusion, as though they had deduced it—‘Therefore so-and-so is not true’.

  It is also a sophistical trick, when a paradox has been laid down, to require, when the accepted view has been originally proposed that the answerer shall answer what he thinks about it, and to put one’s question on matters of that kind in the form [15] ‘Do you think that . . . ?’ For then, if the question is taken as one of the premisses of one’s argument, either a refutation or a paradox is bound to result: if he grants the view, a refutation; if he refuses to grant it or even to admit it is accepted, an implausibility; if he refuses to grant it, but admits that it is accepted, something very like a refutation results.

  Moreover, just as in rhetorical arguments, so also in those aimed at refutation, [20] you should examine the discrepancies of the answerer’s position either with his own statements, or with those of persons whom he admits to say and do aright, and also with those of people who are supposed to bear that kind of character, or who are like them, or with those of the majority or of all men. Also just as answerers, too, often, when they are in process of being refuted draw a distinction, if their refutation is just about to take place, so questioners also should resort to this from time to time to [25] counter objectors, pointing out, supposing that against one sense of the words the objection holds, but not against the other, that they have taken it in the latter sense, as e.g. Cleophon does in the Mandrobulus25 They should also break off their argument and cut short their other lines of attack, while in answering, if a man perceives this being done beforehand, he should put in his objection and have his say first. One should also lead attacks sometimes against positions other than the one [30] stated, excluding it if one cannot find lines of attack against the view laid down, as Lycophron did when set to deliver a eulogy upon the lyre. To counter those who demand ‘Against what are you directing your effort?,’ since one is thought bound to state the reason, while, on the other hand, some ways of stating it make the defence too easy, you should state as your aim only the general result that always [35] happens in refutations, namely the contradiction of his thesis—viz. that your effort is to deny what he has affirmed, or to affirm what he denied: don’t say that you are trying to show that the knowledge of contraries is, or is not, the same.26 One must not ask one’s conclusion in the form of a proposition. Some things should not even be put as questions at all but used as though granted.

  16 · We have now dealt with the sources of questions, and the methods of [175a1] questioning in contentious disputations; next we have to speak of answering, and of how solutions should be made, and of what requires them, and of what use is served by arguments of this kind.

  The use of them, then, is, for philosophy, two-fold. For in the first place, since [5] for the most part they depend upon the expression, they put us in a better condition for seeing in how many ways any term is used, and what kind of resemblances and what kind of differences occur between things and between their names. In the second place they are useful for one’s own personal researches; for the man who is [10] easily committed to a fallacy by someone else, and does not perceive it, is likely to incur this fate himself also on many occasions. Thirdly and lastly, they further contribute to one’s reputation, viz. the reputation of being well trained in everything, and not inexperienced in anything; for that a party to arguments should find fault with them and yet cannot definitely point out their weakness, creates a [15] suspicion, making it seem as though it were not the truth of the matter but inexperience that put him out of temper.

  Answerers may clearly see how to meet arguments of this kind, if our previous account was right of the sources whence fallacies came, and if we adequately distinguished the forms of dishonesty in putting questions. But it is not the same [20] thing to take an argument in one’s hand and then to see and solve its faults, as it is to be able to meet it quickly while being subjected to questions; for what we know, we often do not know in a different context. Moreover, just as in other things speed or slowness is enhanced by training, so it is with arguments too, so that supposing we [25] are unpractised, even though a point is clear to us, we are often too late for the right moment. Sometimes too it happens as with diagrams; for there we can sometimes analyse the figure, but not construct it again: so too in refutations, though we know [30] on what the connexion of the argument depends, we still are at a loss to split the argument apart.

  17 · First then, just as we say that we ought sometimes to choose to deduce something in a reputable fashion rather than in truth, so also we have sometimes to solve arguments rather in a reputable fashion than according to the truth. For it is a general rule in fighting contentious persons, to treat them not as refuting, but as [35] merely appearing to refute; for we say that they don’t really deduce anything, so that our object in correcting them must be to dispel the appearance of it. For if refutation is a non-homonymous contradiction arrived at from certain premisses, there will be no need to draw distinctions against ambiguity and homonymy; for they do not effect a deduction. The only motive for drawing further distinctions is that the conclusion reached looks like a refutation. What, then, we have to beware of, is not being refuted, but seeming to be, because of course the asking of [175b1] ambiguities and of questions that turn upon homonymy, and all the other tricks of that kind, both conceal a genuine refutation and make it uncertain who is refuted and who is not. For since one has the right at the end, when the conclusion is drawn, to say that he has not denied what one has stated except homonymously, no matter [5] how precisely he may have addressed his argument to the very same point as oneself, it is not clear whether one has been refuted; for it is not clear whether at the moment one is speaking the truth. If, on the other hand, one had drawn a distinction, and questioned him on the homonymy or the ambiguity, the refutation would not have been a matter of uncertainty. Also what contentious arguers (less so nowadays than formerly) aim at would have been achieved, namely that the person [10] questioned should answer either ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; whereas nowadays the improper forms in which questioners put their questions compel the party questioned to add something to his answer in correction of the faultiness of the proposition as put; for certainly, if the questioner distinguishes his meaning adequately, the answerer is bound to reply either ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

  [15] If anyone is going to suppose that an argument which turns upon homonymy is a refutation, it will be impossible for an answerer to escape being refuted in a sense; for in the case of visible objects one is bound of necessity to deny the term he has asserted, and to assert what he has denied. For the remedy which some people have for this is quite unavailing. They say, not that Coriscus is both musical and [20] unmusical, but that this Coriscus is musical and this Coriscus unmusical. But this will not do, for to say that this Coriscus is unmusical, or musical, and to say this Coriscus is so, is to use the same expression; and this he is both affirming and denying at once. ‘But perhaps they do not mean the same’. Well, nor did the name in the former case: so where is the difference? If, however, he is to use in the one case [25] the simple title Coriscus, while in the other he is to add the prefix one or this, he commits an absurdity; for the latter is no more applicable to the one than to the other; for to whichever he adds it, it makes no difference.

  All the same, since if a man does not distinguish the senses of an ambiguity, it is not clear whether he has been refuted or has not been refuted, and since in arguments the right to distinguish them is granted, it is evident that to grant the [30] question without drawing any distinction and without qualification is a mistake, so that the argument—even if not the man himself—looks as though it has been refuted. It often happens, however, that, though they see the ambiguity, people hesitate to draw such distinctions, because of the dense crowd of p
ersons who propose questions of the kind, in order that they may not be thought to be [35] ill-tempered at every turn; then again, though they would never have supposed that that was the point on which the argument turned, they often find themselves faced by a paradox. Accordingly, since the right of drawing the distinction is granted, one should not hesitate, as has been said before.27

  If people never made two questions into one question, the fallacy that turns upon homonymy and ambiguity would not have come about, but either genuine refutation or none. For what is the difference between asking whether Callias and Themistocles are musical, and what one might have asked if the pair of them, [176a1] though different, had had its own single name? For if the term applied means more than one thing, he has asked more than one question. If then it is not right to demand to be given without qualification a single answer to two questions, it is evident that it is not proper to give an unqualified answer to any homonymous [5] question, not even if the predicate is true of all the subjects, as some claim that one should. For this is exactly as though he had asked ‘Are Coriscus and Callias at home or not at home?’, supposing them to be both in or both out; for in both cases there is a number of propositions; for though the simple answer is true, that does not make the question one. For it is possible for it to be true to say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ without [10] qualification to countless different questions; but still one should not answer them with a single answer; for that is the death of argument. Rather, it is as though different things had actually had the same name applied to them. If then, one should not give a single answer to two questions, it is evident that we should not say ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ in the case of homonyms; for the remark is simply a remark, not an [15] answer at all, although among disputants such remarks are demanded, because they do not see what the consequence is.

  As we said, then, inasmuch as some things seem to be refutations though they are not, in the same way also some things will seem to be solutions, though they are [20] not. Now these, we say, must sometimes be advanced rather than the true solutions in contentious reasonings and in meeting ambiguity. The proper answer in saying what one thinks is to say ‘Granted’; for in that way the likelihood of being refuted on a side issue is minimized. If, on the other hand, one is compelled to say something [25] paradoxical, one should then be most careful to add that it seems so; for in that way one avoids the impression of being either refuted or paradoxical. Since it is clear what is meant by postulating the point at issue, and people think that they must at all costs overthrow the premisses that lie near the conclusion, and that some must not be conceded because he is postulating the point at issue, so whenever any one [30] claims from us a point such as is bound to follow as a consequence from our thesis, but is false or paradoxical, we must plead the same; for the necessary consequences are generally held to be a part of the thesis itself. Moreover, whenever the universal has been secured not under a definite name, but by a comparison of instances, one should say that the questioner assumes it not in the sense in which it was granted nor [35] in which he proposed it; for this too is a point upon which a refutation often depends.

  If one is debarred from these defences one must pass to the argument that the conclusion has not been properly proved, approaching it in the light of the given classification.28

  In the case, then, of names that are used literally one is bound to answer either without qualification or by drawing a distinction: it is the tacit understandings implied in our statements, e.g. in answer to questions that are not put clearly but [176b1] truncatedly, upon which refutation depends. For example, ‘Is what belongs to Athenians the property of Athenians?’ Yes. ‘And so it is likewise in other cases. But man belongs to the animal kingdom, doesn’t he?’ Yes. ‘Then man is the property of the animal kingdom’. For we say that man belongs to the animal kingdom because [5] he is an animal, just as we say that Lysander belongs to the Spartans, because he is a Spartan. It is evident, then, that where what is put forward is not clear, one must grant it without qualification.

  Whenever of two things it seems that if the one is true the other is true of necessity, whereas, if the other is true, the first is not true of necessity, one should, if asked which of them is true, grant the smaller one; for the larger the number of [10] premisses, the harder it is to deduce a conclusion from them. If, again, he tries to secure that one thing has a contrary while another has not, then if what he says is true, you should say that each has a contrary, only for the one there is no established name.

  Since, again, in regard to some of the views they express, most people would say that anyone who did not admit them was telling a falsehood, while they would [15] not say this in regard to some, e.g. to any matters whereon opinion is divided (for most people have no distinct view whether the soul of animals is destructible or immortal), accordingly wherever it is uncertain in which of two senses the premiss proposed is usually meant—whether as maxims are (for people call both true [20] opinions and general assertions maxims), or like ‘the diagonal of a square is incommensurate with its side’; and moreover29 whenever opinions are divided as to the truth, we then have subjects of which it is very easy to change the terminology undetected. For because of the uncertainty in which of the two senses the premiss contains the truth, one will not be thought to be playing any trick, while because of the division of opinion, one will not be thought to be telling a falsehood; for the [25] change will make the position irrefutable.

  Moreover, whenever one foresees any question coming, one should put in one’s objection and have one’s say beforehand; for by doing so one is likely to embarrass the questioner most effectually.

  18 · Inasmuch as a proper solution is an exposure of a false deduction, showing on what kind of question the falsity depends, and since false deduction has [30] a double use—for it is used either if a false conclusion has been deduced, or if there is only an apparent deduction and no real one—there must be both the kind of solution just described, and also the correction of a merely apparent deduction, so as to show upon which of the questions the appearance depends. Thus it comes about [35] that one solves arguments that are properly deduced by demolishing them, whereas one solves merely apparent arguments by drawing distinctions. Again, inasmuch as of arguments that are properly deduced some have a true and others a false conclusion, those that are false in respect of their conclusion it is possible to solve in two ways; for it is possible both by demolishing one of the premisses asked, and by [177a1] proving that the conclusion is not the real state of the case; those, on the other hand, that are false in respect of their propositions can be solved only by a demolition of one of them; for the conclusion is true. So that those who wish to solve an argument should in the first place look and see if it is deduced or is not deduced; and next, whether the conclusion is true or false, in order that we may effect the solution [5] either by drawing some distinction or by demolishing something, and demolishing it either in this way or in that, as was laid down before. There is a very great deal of difference between solving an argument when being subjected to questions and when not; for to foresee traps is difficult, whereas to see them at one’s leisure is easier.

  19 · Of the refutations, then, that depend upon homonymy and ambiguity [10] some contain some question with more than one meaning, while others contain a conclusion bearing a number of uses: e.g. in the argument that speaking of the silent is possible, the conclusion has a double meaning, while in the argument that he who knows does not understand what he knows one of the questions contains an ambiguity. Also that which has a double use is true in one context but not in another; it means something that is and something that is not. [15]

  Whenever, then, the many senses lie in the conclusion no refutation takes place unless he secures as well the contradiction of the conclusion he means to prove; e.g. in the argument that seeing of the blind is possible; for without the contradiction there was no refutation. Whenever, on the other hand, the many senses lie in the questions, there is no necessity t
o begin by denying the double premiss; for this was not the goal of the argument but only its support. At the start, then, one should reply [20] with regard to an ambiguity, whether of a word or of a phrase, in this manner, that in one sense it is so, and in another not so, as e.g. that speaking of the silent is in one sense possible but in another not possible; also that in one sense one should do what must be done, but not in another (for what must be bears a number of uses). If, however, the ambiguity escapes one, one should correct it at the end by making an addition to the question: ‘Is speaking of the silent possible’? ‘No, but to speak of this [25] man while he is silent is possible’. Also, in cases which contain the ambiguity in their premisses, one should reply in like manner: ‘Do people then not understand what they know?’ ‘Yes, but not those who know it in the manner described’; for it is not the same thing to say that those who know cannot understand what they know, and to say that those who know something in this particular manner cannot do so. In [30] general, too, even if he deduces without qualification, one should contend that what he has negated is not the fact which one has asserted but only its name; and that therefore there is no refutation.