10 THE REASONS IN THE DISPUTE

The choice of arguments, as it has already been mentioned more than once, is determined by the tasks that we set before starting a dispute. In order to check the truth of a thought, we choose the strongest bases from our point of view in its favor. Wanting to convince someone, we choose the arguments that should seem the most convincing to him. If we want to defeat the enemy, we choose the arguments that most of all can put him in difficulty. In the dispute to persuade the listeners, we adapt the choice of arguments not so much to the enemy as to the listeners, etc. The inability to take into account the dispute's objectives when choosing arguments is a mistake, illiteracy in the dispute. Meanwhile, many make this blunder. They absolutely do not reckon with the development of the enemy, his specialty, his psychology, his knowledge, and are sincerely surprised and indignant that the argument, so obvious and strong for themselves, is not noticed, rejected or even ridiculed by the enemy. You can not blame youth for this. But in people of mature age, this is one of the signs of “narrow horizon” or “complete ignorance of life”; the inclinations to evaluate everything and everywhere on your yardstick and naive confidence that he is obligatory.

Disputes for persuasion (honest disputes) require not only a choice of arguments, appropriate to the opponent or listeners, but also a corresponding presentation of evidence. For example, reasonably interesting instructions on how to argue in front of a dark peasant audience, made by a man who had a lot of experience in this regard. Journalist and translator Kondurushkin SS (1873-1919) writes:

“A quick change of thoughts, all the more complicated, in a speech to such listeners is completely unacceptable. People who are not used to thinking can watch only a slow change of thoughts. This is just as a person who is not accustomed to walking cannot run fast. Thoughts must be set out individually. All secondary, all sorts of details, all sorts of shades should be rejected if possible, so as not to darken the main thing. - The complex communication of thoughts is intolerable. From the outside, one should speak not quickly, but “rarely,” so that people can understand and catch words. Every thought should, as far as possible, be reduced to its material and, better yet, worldly close original source. Life comparisons (even if rough) are positively necessary. Thinking real-figuratively is a property of every underdeveloped mind. ”

It must be remembered, however, that the rule of the correspondence of speech to the understanding of those for whom it is intended is generally rather poorly executed. Examples of discrepancies between the expression of thoughts and the understanding of the audience for which they are intended can be drawn daily from newspapers, magazines, and speeches, both former and modern. For clarity, we present a message from a pre-revolutionary Petrograd newspaper: “One officer sent us a kind of complaint from the army in the field. He tells that a non-commissioned officer somehow comes to him, brings a metropolitan newspaper with him and almost with tears in his eyes asks to explain the meaning of the article entitled “Property tax”. “I so wanted to know what kind of tax it was, but I cannot read it,” declares NCO, “All the words are some!” The officer began to read. The old colonel, who was sitting right there, also took part in the enterprise, and both struggled for a long time, clarifying the newspaper language and explaining the meaning of the article to the unter. According to the officer, the article contained the following words: “Fisk” (repeated twice), “Stimulus. Concept. Circulating capital. Consolidated capital "(twice)," Spec. Rentier. Fee. Basis. The principle of discrimination. Bundled capital. Unfunded capital. Corrected. Structure. Minimum. Fiscal apparatus. As the officer reports, the old colonel could not stand it, spat and went into the trench. Unther listened patiently for a long time, but it was evident how plentiful sweat was dripping from his forehead. ”

It is absolutely impossible to give any general rules for finding arguments. It all depends on our knowledge in this area, on the speed of thinking, ingenuity, etc. But if the thesis is such that one has to argue about it often, it is useful, and sometimes it is necessary to collect and remember all the arguments in its favor and arguments against him, with objections to the latter and the protection of the first. So usually they do in important cases. The success of this technique depends on the mind, insight and interest of the participant in the dispute. An intelligent person studies, first of all, the issue itself in detail and widely, and in this way learns the moves used in the dispute on this issue. Stupid people or those who argue "by office" or for the sake of a piece of bread, "train" for disputes. This category includes, for example, sectarian missionaries and similar agitators. "Wired" debater deep knowledge of the issue is no different. He only memorizes all the necessary arguments and repeats them where necessary automatically, like a talking parrot.

Each of our arguments, which turned out to be quite strong, must be made possible to “work out perfectly.” Some have excessive haste, haste. He will say a strong argument, do not interpret him properly as an opponent or listeners, does not use all his advantageous sides to the end, but already throws a fight with an opponent specifically because of this argument and grabs the other one. This is a blunder, and sometimes it is annoying to see a person lose his argument because of him. Naturally, an ordinary adversary seeks to slip away from a strong argument and joyfully clutches at a refutation of a new argument, often a less strong one. Another drawback is to “smear” the argument, dwell on it longer than necessary, or express it so verbose that sometimes the listeners and the enemy have no strength to endure. There are people who can say nothing short and clear. Disputes with them are heavy and tedious, and they rarely argue well. Under normal conditions, a good debater tries to express his main reasons briefly, aptly and vividly, so that they are immediately understood and cut into the memory. Thus, a strong argument is less exposed to the possibility of distortion and distortion during a dispute.

Finally, some mistakenly think that the more arguments they make, the better. This is not always the case.

In ordinary disputes, especially in disputes before the audience, it is better not to give weak arguments at all. The argument against which many objections can be found is weak, and those that are difficult to refute. Now we take into account the psychology of the enemy. After all, he naturally moves toward the least resistance and tries to attack the weak points of our argument. For him, such an argument is sometimes a find, and he will not fail to pounce on him, especially if "his deeds are bad." You have to either give up the argument that leaves an unfavorable impression in the eyes of the listeners, or get involved in a long dubious dispute due to a weak argument. Meanwhile, other strong arguments that we have expressed, thanks to this verbal battle, can go completely into the shadows and will not make the proper impression. Even worse, if at the same time we fail to defend well a weak argument: the dispute may get such a view that it is “lost” by us, that we are “defeated” in general. Especially if the opponent is an experienced sophist, and we are not skillful enough in a dispute. All this must be borne in mind. Therefore, it is usually more useful to present only the strongest arguments, and about the weak - to mention only in passing, in passing, to show that we do not attach much importance to them. This gives the right not to get involved in an argument over them.

OPPOSITION ARRANGEMENTS

As for the arguments of the enemy, the first duty, and in any case, one of the most important qualities of a good debater is to be able to listen, accurately understand and appreciate. Most debaters sin against it. But by itself it is clear that who does not know how to listen to the enemy and understand him clearly and fully, he can never either embrace the dispute, or own the dispute. The ability to listen (and the ability to read) is a difficult skill, but nonetheless a good debater is inconceivable without it. This is the first and one of the inevitable conditions for the ability to argue, it is the foundation of the art of argument. Without it, no ability and knowledge, no sharpness of mind will give a real master of the dispute. Without it, the argument often turns into some illiterate, disgusting, even from an aesthetic point of view, confusion.

If there are several arguments, then we should try to single them out separately, even from a whole sea of ​​words, in which they are often divorced, to clothe in brief phrases and find out how they figured out the thesis, not stint on awareness. Sometimes it is only necessary to find out the opponent's argument, and the opponent himself refuses this argument, sensing his weakness, “crushes” the argument, and so on. Often, having found out the argument, we immediately see that he does not prove anything, that is, the thesis is not it follows, or that the argument is undoubtedly erroneous, which could not have been noticed without asking.

It should be remembered at the same time that we will refute the proof of the thesis by the adversary only when we break down all his arguments, and not one or two of them. This is often forgotten in a dispute.

When an adversary makes any argument against our opinion, against our thesis, for his defense, it is necessary to make sure of two things: a) that this argument is true, correct, and b) that it really contradicts our opinion and is incompatible with the latter. Only under these two conditions does the falsity of our thought flow from it. Meanwhile, we usually tend to consider only the first condition (whether the argument is true) and look for errors only at this point. Therefore, we often attack the wrong track, get involved in an argument about the truth of an argument, when it is completely true or when it is very difficult to prove its fallacy. Meanwhile, if we paid attention to the second condition of the suitability of objections, then the unsuitability of this argument, that is, its compatibility with our thought, would have turned out very easily. This should always be borne in mind. Put, for example, we claim that "this person is not far away." “But he is a very large artist,” objected to the enemy. Now we have a choice: where to look for the error of an objection? From what point of view to defend your thought? You can defend by attacking the truth of the objection: “No, he is not a major artist at all. The value is average, minor. A mound, not a mountain. ” Or you can defend, denying the incompatibility of our thoughts with the objection given: “But can't a major artist be a close-minded person? The mind is one thing, the artistic talent is another, ”and so on. We must never forget these two ways of defense.

Considering the incompatibility of the opponent's argument with our thought, we sometimes discover not only that it is compatible with the latter, but more than that: it serves as a profitable argument in favor of our thought. For example, suppose we say that we should pray for such a deceased person, and they object to us: “But we are Christians, but he is a Jew.” Hearing this, we can decide that the argument “we are Christians” is not only compatible with our thesis, but even confirms it. "It is precisely because we are Christians that means that we hold onto the religion of love, we must pray for it." Or, let's say, I suggest choosing an arbitrator of a certain gentleman. They object to me: "but he is not familiar with any of the opponents." I pick up this argument: “That’s why he will be especially in place: there is less likelihood that he will be biased towards any of them.” This use of the opponent's argument for the proof of our thesis corresponds to another, reverse case, which is also often encountered during defense, but often overlooked by defense: the argument is incompatible not so much with our thesis, as with the opponent's thesis (antithesis) or with some statement of it. He sometimes destroys the thesis of the enemy. Such arguments of the attack are called “suicidal” and give the defense a case for a very effective strike. There is sometimes no point in discussing whether the argument is true or not, whether it is compatible with our thesis or not. He destroys the adversary's thesis — and it is sufficient to clearly show this so that the adversary finds himself in a difficult position: either abandon the argument, or abandon the thesis.