Argumentation Schemes

Abstract

This book provides a systematic analysis of many common argumentation schemes and a compendium of 96 schemes. The study of these schemes, or forms of argument that capture stereotypical patterns of human reasoning, is at the core of argumentation research. Surveying all aspects of argumentation schemes from the ground up, the book takes the reader from the elementary exposition in the first chapter to the latest state of the art in the research efforts to formalize and classify the schemes, outlined in the last chapter. It provides a systematic and comprehensive account, with notation suitable for computational applications that increasingly make use of argumentation schemes.

Argumentation Schemes for the Collaborative Debate of Requirement Risks in Software Projects

“…In contrast with our work, a kind of cause-and-effect examination is not explicitly presented there as it is in our set of schemes. The schemes used in [13] rely on the generalized argumentation templates presented in [9]. Our work also exploits the reuse of such generalized scheme formulations, adapting a selected scheme from such catalogue to the specification of argumentation templates for the analysis of requirement risks.…”

“…Described in an informal logic notation, the catalogue of such schemes [9] contains generalized templates for arguments from cause to effect, arguments from expert opinion, arguments from sign, etc. In fact, such kinds of templates could be exploited in the construction of tools to support collaborative debates.…”

“…[16]). As defined in the "argumentation scheme from cause to effect" [9], argument templates can express relationships between causal factors and certain situations, where such situations are taken as effects from these causes. The generalized description of this scheme is: Major premise: Generally, if A occurs, then B will (might) occur.…”

“…As described in [8], argumentation processes can be used as a form of acquisition and construction of knowledge, which is a task based on presentation and computation of arguments and counter-arguments as well as the deliberations on particular issues. As described in [9], "argumentation schemes" allow the construction of such a dialogue-based system, where these schemes allow software engineers to describe argument structures commonly used in daily discourse. Such a scheme model presents a template for an argument type in an application problem, where this template can be used by stakeholders to elaborate and analyze argument instances to be advanced in their debates.…”

Logic, Reasoning, Argumentation: Insights from the Wild

“…Few logicians would presumably disagree that logic has since its beginnings primarily offered a generality-aspiring treatment of the syntax of inference, rather than treating the substance of particular premise-conclusion-transitions that many argumentation theorist focus on. Midway in between is the argumentation scheme-approach [see, e.g., Walton et al, 2008], where argument-templates likewise aspire to generality, but do so at the level of natural language. Though the boundaries remain blurry, genuine approaches to natural language argumentation have mostly remained non-formal.…”