Arguments from authority and expert opinion in computational argumentation systems

In this paper we describe the impact that Walton’s conception of argumentation schemes had on AI and Law research. We will discuss developments in argumentation in AI and Law before Walton’s schemes became known in that community, and the issues that were current in that work. We will then show how Walton’s schemes provided a means of addressing all of those issues, and so supplied a unifying perspective from which to view argumentation in AI and Law.

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“…Walton made extensive use of Carneades to illustrate his more recent work on argumentation schemes (e.g. [98,99], and [102]).…”

Section: Using Argumentation Schemes To Generate and Evaluate Argumentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Another specific reasoning task which has been addressed using argumentation schemes is statutory interpretation [83,102,116]. In [65] MacCormick and Summers identified eleven types of argument used when interpreting statutes.…”

Section: Argumentation Schemes For Statutory Interpretationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Argumentation schemes in AI and Law

Atkinson

Bench‐Capon

2021

AAC

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“…However, if the reported speech contains the position of an opponent in a discussion, the analyst might also have reasons to hold the author committed to having provided a faithful report thereof; this may lead to the accusation of the so-called 'straw man fallacy'-see, e.g., Aikin and Casey (2022); Lewi ński and Oswald (2013). And if the reported speech contains a position of a third party, there is even a third possible interpretation, namely, that it functions as (part of) the premise of an argument from authority-see, e.g., Goodwin (1998); Wagemans (2011); Walton and Koszowy (2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

More than Relata Refero: Representing the Various Roles of Reported Speech in Argumentative Discourse

2022

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Reported speech, or relata refero, although not always part of the argumentation tout court, can be an important element of argumentative discourse. It might, for instance, provide information on the position of another party in the discussion or function as part of the premise of an argument from authority. Whereas existing methods of representing argumentative discourse focus on arguments and their interrelations, this paper develops a method that enables the analyst to also include informative elements in the representation, focusing on reported speech. It does so by incorporating the notion of ‘voice’ into the representation framework of Adpositional Argumentation (AdArg). In particular, the paper explains how to formalize the constituents of this notion and illustrates its use in representing (1) an author’s report of the position of another party (including the supporting argumentation); (2) an author’s own position (including the supporting argumentation); and (3) source-based arguments such as the argument from authority, with an indication of the distance of the source from the author.

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