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Argument schemes are abstractions substantiating the inferential connection between premise(s) and conclusion in argumentative communication. Identifying such conventional patterns of reasoning is essential to the interpretation and evaluation of argumentation. Whether studying argumentation from a theory-driven or data-driven perspective, insight into the actual use of argumentation in communicative practice is essential. Large and reliably annotated corpora of argumentative discourse to quantitatively provide such insight are few and far between. This is all the more true for argument scheme corpora, which tend to suffer from a combination of limited size, poor validation, and the use of ad hoc restricted typologies. In the current paper, we describe the annotation of schemes on the basis of two distinct classifications: Walton's taxonomy of argument schemes, and Wagemans' Periodic Table of Arguments. We describe the annotation procedure for each, and the quantitative characteristics of the resulting annotated text corpora. In doing so, we extend the annotation of the preexisting US2016 corpus of televised election debates, resulting in, to the best of our knowledge, the two largest consistently annotated corpora of schemes in argumentative dialogue publicly available. Based on evaluation in terms of inter-annotator agreement, we propose further improvements to the guidelines for annotating schemes: the argument scheme key, and the Argument Type Identification Procedure.

The existing classifications of arguments are unsatisfying in a number of ways. This paper proposes an alternative in the form of a Periodic Table of Arguments. The newly developed table can be used as a systematic and comprehensive point of reference for the analysis, evaluation and production of argumentative discourse as well as for various kinds of empirical and computational research in the field of argumentation theory.

Abstract This paper provides a theoretical rationale for distinguishing four basic argument forms. On the basis of a survey of classical and contemporary definitions of argument, a set of assumptions is formulated regarding the linguistic and pragmatic aspects of arguments. It is demonstrated how these assumptions yield four different argument forms: (1) first-order predicate arguments, (2) first-order subject arguments, (3) second-order subject arguments, and (4) second-order predicate arguments. These argument forms are then further described and illustrated by means of concrete examples, and it is explained how they are visually represented in the Periodic Table of Arguments.