2 Aristotle 1 · On Arguing. Handed down at the Lyceum, from his Sophistical Refutations and his Ethics
This book does not set out the forms of inference, nor where starting points come from. Those belong in a school, not in a life. What is kept is the three things a person needs among other people: how to see whether you are after the truth or after the win, how to hear a bad argument, and how far a thing needs proving before you stop.
1.1Two men sit talking. It looks like one thing. There are two.
1.2One is trying to get it clear. One is trying to win.
1.3Both will quote, both will speak quickly, both will seem to have reason on their side.
1.4To tell them apart, do not judge how well they speak. Watch one small thing:
1.5The man trying to get it clear, on hearing a counter-example, pauses.
1.6The man trying to win, on hearing a counter-example, goes straight to what is wrong with the counter-example.
1.7Now a second thing:
1.8The man trying to get it clear will put his opponent’s case more strongly, and then answer it.
1.9The man trying to win will put his opponent’s case more weakly, and then knock it down.
1.10And a third, which is the surest:
1.11Look at the premises he uses, and whether he believes them himself.
1.12The man trying to get it clear uses only sentences he grants. What he does not grant, he does not pick up.
1.13The man trying to win will pick up sentences he does not believe himself, provided they sound like what everyone accepts.
1.14A man who will not concede whatever you set before him is not reasoning. He is twisting words, and holding a wall.
1.15I do not say that the men who want to win are bad men. Everyone wants to win sometimes. I do.
1.16I say: know which of the two you are doing at this moment.
1.17You may do either. Only do not win with one hand while telling yourself you are seeking the truth.