The Irrelevance of Relevance

Botting, David

doi:10.22329/il.v33i1.3493

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…7. In a similar vein, Botting (2013) has recently argued that a satisfactory formal analysis of relevance is impossible, on pain of infinite regress -precisely because whatever reasons one might individuate to support a judgement of relevance, they will have in turn to demonstrate their own relevance for that purpose. In his own words:…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trust, relevance, and arguments

Paglieri¹,

Castelfranchi²

2014

Argument & Computation

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This paper outlines an integrated approach to trust and relevance with respect to arguments: in particular, it is suggested that trust in relevance has a central role in argumentation. We first distinguish two types of argumentative relevance: internal relevance, i.e. the extent to which a premise has a bearing on its purported conclusion, and external relevance, i.e. a measure of how much a whole argument is pertinent to the matter under discussion, in the broader dialogical context where it is proposed. Then, we argue that judgements of internal relevance heavily rely on trust, and that such trust, although occasionally misplaced (e.g. in some so-called fallacies of relevance), is nonetheless based on several reasons, and thus often justified, by either epistemic or pragmatic considerations. We conclude by sketching potential methods to formally model trust in argumentative relevance, and briefly discussing the technological implications of this line of research.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trust, relevance, and arguments

Paglieri¹,

Castelfranchi²

2014

Argument & Computation

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“…Formal conditions can never be sufficient if relevance is a question of epistemic judgments. This insight can also be used-in contrast to the argument that Botting (2013) develops-to reject an idea developed by John Woods: that the epistemic notion of relevance is "analyzable in terms of contextual implication" (1992, p. 190). For Botting (2013), contextual implication means that premise "P is relevant to Q in context C if P and C together non-trivially imply Q but neither P nor C on their own non-trivially implies Q" (p. 19).…”

Section: Are the Premises Relevant To The Conclusion?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This insight can also be used-in contrast to the argument that Botting (2013) develops-to reject an idea developed by John Woods: that the epistemic notion of relevance is "analyzable in terms of contextual implication" (1992, p. 190). For Botting (2013), contextual implication means that premise "P is relevant to Q in context C if P and C together non-trivially imply Q but neither P nor C on their own non-trivially implies Q" (p. 19). By focusing on implication, the discussion of relevance is transformed from an epistemological or cognitive problem to a formal or logical one.…”

Section: Are the Premises Relevant To The Conclusion?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Bad Arguments and Objectively Bad Arguments

Hoffmann

Catrambone

2023

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Many have argued that it is impossible to determine criteria to identify good arguments. In this contribution, we argue that it is at least possible to identify features of objectively bad arguments. Going beyond Blair and Johnson’s ARS criteria, which state that reasons must be acceptable, relevant, and sufficient, we develop a list of eight criteria with instructions for how to apply them to assess arguments. We conclude by presenting data from two empirical studies that show how frequently students violate these criteria in lab conditions and “in the wild.”

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“…In any case, it would not be because we judge the higher-order conditional to be relevant that we judge the lower-order conditional to be relevant. The relevance-claim represents the content of a judgment and does not need to be derived from anything or rely on anything further [for more detailed discussion see Botting (2013)]. There is no regress in justification or evaluation with respect to relevance-claims.…”

Section: Continuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Necessary Existence of Inference-Claims

Botting¹

2021

RIA

Self Cite

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In (2018) Gilbert Plumer argues against the existence of inference-claims on the grounds that they lead to the kind of vicious infinite regress illustrated in Carroll’s famous Achilles and the Tortoise paper (Carroll 1895). In Plumer’s view, it is not simply that neither arguments nor arguers do make inference-claims, but that they can’t do so, on pain of this regress. In further unpublished work Plumer has generalized from this result: it is a mistake to include reference to standards of argument assessment within the content of the argument. Inference-claims (i.e., sufficiency-claims) do not exist, and neither do relevance-claims or acceptability-claims, and all for much the same reason. I will argue that his arguments fail to show that inference-claims do not exist, because the regresses they lead to either are not vicious, not infinite, or can be avoided. Then I hope to show, on the grounds of what I call the ‘completeness’ of the argument, that inference-claims not only do exist but that they must exist. This is not to say that inference-claims are necessarily asserted in an act of arguing, but asserting them would not lead to the kind of harmful consequences Plumer supposes, any more than their mere existence would.

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The Irrelevance of Relevance

Cited by 7 publications

References 4 publications

Trust, relevance, and arguments

Trust, relevance, and arguments

Bad Arguments and Objectively Bad Arguments

The Necessary Existence of Inference-Claims

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