Profiles of Dialogue, Types of Criticism, and Fallacies

Erik Krabbe
Faculty of Philosophy, University of Groningen, The Netherlands.

The study of dialogical procedures (dialectic) is an important - some think: the crucial - component of argumentation studies, whether these are undertaken in a formal or in a more informal setting. Profiles of dialogue constitute an informal instrument that serves as a heuristic device to obtain more adequate formalizations of dialogical procedures reflecting normative standards for good argument. Moreover, profiles of dialogue can be exploited for the practical purpose of evaluating empirically given dialogues and arguments.

The aim of the present study is to clarify the notion of a profile of dialogue by giving some examples and to illustrate how such profiles can be used. Starting from a situation of conflict, where one party's point of view is challenged by another party, it is attempted to construct a survey of types of reasonable moves and countermoves that can serve as ingredients for a critical discussion leading to a resolution of the conflict. The standard reaction to a challenge of one's point of view is to present an argument in defense of one's point of view. The standard reaction to an argument is criticism of the argument. Here four main types of criticism are distinguished: tenability criticism, connection criticism, active criticism (including the presentation of a counterargument), and fallacy criticism. The lecture will concentrate on the last type of criticism and try to show how profiles of dialogues suggest procedural rules that permit the dicussants to regulate their own procedural disagrements in a number of classical fallacy cases.