This talk presents a new defense of the often maligned—and frequently misunderstood—thesis that argument is essentially adversarial. The central claim is that arguments fundamentally involve inferences. In engaging with others, arguers aim to guide their interlocutors toward drawing specific inferences. While no one can be forced or coerced into accepting an inference against their better judgment, it is nevertheless possible to induce them to do so. This distinctive feature of inference makes argument unlike other paradigmatic adversarial activities in important ways, while still aligning with them in others. The talk explores this tension and what it reveals about the nature of argumentation.

Zoom Link
https://msu.zoom.us/j/94209869479
Meeting ID: 942 0986 9479
Passcode: 986224

John Casey is professor of philosophy at Northeastern Illinois University (NEIU) in Chicago, where teaches logic, critical thinking, and history of philosophy, among other subjects. Though trained as a medievalist, his current research focuses on informal logic and argumentation theory. Lately, his research has concerned argumentative adversariality, fallacy theory, and the problem of meta-argument. With frequent collaborator Scott Aikin (Vanderbilt) he has recently published Straw Man Arguments: A Study in Fallacy Theory (Bloomsbury) and co-edited (with Scott Aikin and Katharina Stevens) The Routledge Handbook of Argumentation Theory.