Ad Hominem ArgumentsA vital contribution to legal theory and media and civic discourse |
Contents
Classic Cases and Basic Concepts | 1 |
Abusive and Circumstantial | 2 |
The Smoking and Tree Hugger Cases | 6 |
The Bias Ad Hominem | 11 |
Poisoning the Well and Tu Quoque | 14 |
Genetic Fallacy Two Wrongs and Guilt by Association | 18 |
Historical Origins of the Ad Hominem | 21 |
The Contemporary Ex Concessis View | 28 |
Panoramic View of the Argument | 163 |
Personal Conduct and Character of Political Officeholders | 166 |
The Equivocation Defense | 171 |
Evaluating a Case | 175 |
Character Deliberation and Practical Reasoning | 177 |
What Is Character? | 178 |
Place of Character in Critical Discussion | 180 |
Deliberation As a Type of Dialogue | 183 |
Actions Circumstances and Commitment | 31 |
Person and Commitment | 34 |
Conclusion | 38 |
The Textbook Treatment | 44 |
The Early Accounts | 45 |
Growing Recognition of Nonfallacious Aspect | 50 |
Wild Variations | 55 |
Elaboration of Subtypes | 59 |
Justifying the View That It Is Fallacious | 64 |
Fundamental Disagreements | 69 |
Nonstandard Systems of Classification | 75 |
Increased Sophistication | 84 |
Persistence of the Problems | 92 |
General Problems Posed | 98 |
Commitment and Personal Attack | 104 |
Argument from Commitment | 106 |
Relation to Circumstantial Ad Hominem | 108 |
Form of Personal Attack | 112 |
Person and Participant | 115 |
Ways Out of the Dilemma | 118 |
The Direct Ad Hominem Revisited | 120 |
Context Sensitivity of the Circumstantial Ad Hominem | 125 |
The Bias Attack Explored | 129 |
Ad Hominem Attacks and Defenses | 132 |
Prospects for Further Progress | 137 |
A Longer Case Study | 141 |
Problem of Fixing Ad Hominem Criticisms | 143 |
Framing the Issues of the Dialogue | 145 |
The Main Argumentation Stage | 148 |
Closing Stages of the Argument | 153 |
Analysis of the Opening and Confrontation Stages | 155 |
Analysis of the Argumentation and Closing Stages | 160 |
Practical Reasoning | 186 |
Character and Practical Reasoning | 189 |
Making Circumstantial Charges Stick | 192 |
Character in Political Discourse | 196 |
Aristotle on Ethotic Argument | 200 |
Ad Hominem in Legal Argument | 203 |
Actions Commitments and Character | 207 |
Forms and Classification of Subtypes | 211 |
Form of the Direct Subtype | 213 |
Form of the Circumstantial Subtype | 218 |
Critical Questions for the Circumstantial Subtype | 223 |
Form of the Bias Subtype | 228 |
The Poisoning the Well Subtype | 230 |
Tu Quoque and Two Wrongs | 233 |
Guilt by Association | 237 |
The Situationally Disqualifying Subtype | 240 |
Applying the Classification System to Cases | 244 |
Summary of the Classification System | 248 |
Evaluation of Ad Hominem Arguments | 264 |
Dialectical Relevance | 268 |
Subjective and Objective Evidence | 271 |
The Credibility Function | 273 |
Relevance of a Persons Credibility | 276 |
Ad Hominem As a Reasonable Legal Argument | 278 |
Evaluating the Direct Type | 281 |
Evaluating the Circumstantial Type | 284 |
Evaluating the Bias Type | 288 |
Explaining the Fallacy | 292 |
Notes | 295 |
Bibliography | 299 |
307 | |