Argumentation and persuasion in English are often closely related, so people often use argumentation or argumentation to contain them. However, strictly speaking, the purpose of argument is to get the truth, while the purpose of persuasion is to make the persuaded agree with the persuader's wishes.
Argumentative writing has a long history in China and European and American countries, and occupies an important position in style. As early as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period in China, argumentative writing, as a style, had been formed and made great progress. For thousands of years, argumentative writing has played an important role in politics, economy, culture and people's lives, and its scope of use is extremely wide.
1. Writing argumentative essays
An argumentative essay, no matter what problems are discussed, what opinions are expressed, what reasons are expounded, and what fallacies are refuted, is to convince readers. Argumentative writing generally consists of propositions, topics, arguments and proofs. The topic is the object of discussion and the basic problem raised and solved by the author in the argumentative essay; Argument is the author's viewpoint and proposition in argumentative writing, and it is the core of argumentative writing; Argument is the basis and material to prove the correctness of argument; Argumentation is the process and method for the author to prove an argument with arguments.
2. Reasoning-syllogism
When writing argumentative essays, syllogism is often used, which is a kind of deductive reasoning that links two judgments and draws a new conclusion (see the second section of the second chapter of this book). We know that anyone's knowledge can be divided into direct and indirect parts, and indirect knowledge accounts for a large proportion. Indirect knowledge is summed up through the practice of others, and there are always different degrees of generality. When we meet something special, we often think of general knowledge about it. When special things are linked with general knowledge, reasoning can be realized and new conclusions can be drawn.
A syllogism usually consists of three judgments. The first judgment is called "major premise", which represents general principles and principles; The second judgment is called "minor premise", which represents individual objects; The third judgment is called "conclusion", which comes from two premises. For example:
All mothers are women .. (major premise)
Mary is a mother .. (minor premise)
So Mary is a woman .. (Conclusion)
The above example represents a typical syllogism, which is often called "Aristotelian". Aristotle, an ancient Greek philosopher, has put forward this reasoning method for more than two thousand years, and it is still needed in our argumentative writing today. However, just knowing the structural form of syllogism does not guarantee that we will use it to draw correct conclusions. In order to draw a correct and convincing conclusion, we must strictly abide by the following rules:
1) Each syllogism can only have three "$ term", also called "nouns". In the above example, there are only three nouns, Mary, mother and woman. If this rule is violated, there will be four errors. For example:
All whiskies contain alcohol.
This grape soda is a soft drink.
This grape soda contains alcohol .. (Conclusion)
There are four nouns in this example: whisky, wine, grape soda and soft drink. To correct this mistake, four nouns must be changed into three nouns. For example, the following example meets the requirements of syllogism.
All whiskies contain alcohol.
This bottle of Tim is whisky.
This bottle of wine contains alcohol. (conclusion)
2) The three "terms" (also called "nouns") in syllogism must appear twice and have the same meaning. For example, Mary, mother and wom-an in the above example appear twice each. It is important to note that each noun must have the same meaning, and sometimes it seems to be the same noun, but in fact two different concepts are mistaken for the same concept. In this way, you will unconsciously make a "four-noun mistake". This kind of mistake often appears in both Chinese and English sentences. For example, a student said:
The working class is great.
My father is a working class.
Is he great? (conclusion)
"Working class" is a collective concept in the major premise and a universal concept in the minor premise. In fact, they are two different concepts, so this inference has also made a "four-noun mistake."
(3) In the medium term, it should be distributed at least once in the place. In reasoning, the relationship between the main term and the secondary term depends on the intermediate term. In the premise, the event must be GAI at least once, and the event must be related to the event. If the event is not GAI once, the relationship between events will be uncertain and inevitable conclusions cannot be drawn.
In the "standard syllogism" (standard syllogism), events, events and the arrangement rules of events are:
Violating this rule will make the mistake of "the fallacy of not defining intermediate $ TERM" For example:
Some college students are not self-motivated.
Zhang Ming is a college student.
Therefore, he is not motivated. (conclusion)
In this reasoning, does Zhang Ming belong to the category of "not striving for progress"? The premise is uncertain (because only some college students are not motivated), but now they have made a positive judgment, so the inference is wrong. Similarly, the following English example also violates the mistake that "China goods are not GAI".
Some vegetarians eat eggs.
Tom is a vegetarian.
Tom eats eggs .. (Conclusion)
This is a wrong inference, because the premise only includes some objects, so it is only possible but not inevitable for Tom to eat eggs.
4) GAI's "item" in the premise must not be GAI's item in the conclusion. The so-called "item" means that the non-GAI in the premise means that only part of the extension (object) is involved in the premise, not all the extension (object), so it is impossible to GAI in the conclusion. If GAI, which involves all objects, expands the objects that should not be expanded, it will come to a wrong conclusion.
If you violate this rule, you will make the mistake of "GAI". For example:
Good movies are what our country needs.
And some good movies are foreign movies, (minor premise)
Therefore, China needs foreign films. (conclusion)
The minor premise in the example is not GAI's, because some good movies are foreign movies, which cannot be extended to: all good movies are foreign movies. It is wrong to make a positive judgment in the conclusion and become GAI's. Similarly:
All dirty people smell bad .. (major premise)
Some truck drivers are dirty.
All truck drivers smell bad ... (conclusion)
This English example also made a logical mistake, because the minor premise is not GAI, and when the conclusion is GAI, the mistakes will follow.
In short, syllogism should be often used in argumentative writing. Only by truly mastering its spiritual essence can we correctly use syllogism.
3. The structural model of argumentative writing
Logical thinking is often used in argumentative writing (see chapter 2, section 2 quater of this book). When the author thinks logically, he should follow the formal logic rules from concrete to abstract or from abstract to concrete, and process all kinds of information accepted by the human brain to form a correct understanding. According to the law of logical thinking, there are three main types of argumentative structure:
1) inductive type: its model is "point theory = (point theory 1+ point theory 2+ point theory 3+ point theory n)+ conclusion". This is actually the specific application of induction in argumentative writing. Argumentative writing is an article that first provides specific argumentation materials and finally forms opinions. Argumentation is the material in argumentation, the basis and reason of argumentation; Argument is the central meaning of the conclusion.
2) Deductive: its model is "general theory+sub-theory (sub-theory 1+ sub-theory 2+ sub-theory 3+ sub-theory n)". Based on deductive method, this kind of argumentative paper follows the logical law from viewpoint to material and from abstract to concrete, and often appears in the form of extended syllogism. Its basic framework is general theory before sub-theory, and the central argument appears before sub-theory.
3) Combination of deduction and induction: the model is "general theory+sub-theory (sub-theory 1+ sub-theory 2+ sub-theory 3+ sub-theory n)+ conclusion". This is a structural model combining deduction and induction, and it is an ideal model for argumentative writing, because this writing method can overcome the shortcomings of monotonous and straightforward description, make the structure of the article complete, ups and downs, attract readers and enhance persuasiveness.
4. Compare demonstration methods
There are two common ways to write argumentative essays in students' compositions. First, the author puts forward his own argument in the first paragraph, then several paragraphs provide arguments, and finally the conclusion. For example, "Who do you think should pay for education, the government or the students?" For the composition topic, this writing method is generally (limited to space, only the topic sentence is given in each paragraph):
I think the government, not the students, should pay.
Paragraph 2: First of all, social progress mainly comes from
The third paragraph: second, it is the members of the whole society who benefit.
The fourth paragraph: Third, every member of society has an equal right to receive.
Therefore, in order to maintain social progress, the government, not
The second writing method is "comparative argument", that is, asking questions at the beginning, then answering questions from both positive and negative aspects, and finally the author puts forward his own views. On the same topic above, the composition is roughly as follows:
Who do you think should pay for education, the government or the students?
In almost every society, education is regarded as one of the important institutions. At the same time, this is a very expensive operation, so it is important to carefully consider who should pay for it.
Some people think that education, as a very precious commodity, should be paid by the recipients-students. This view is reasonable to some extent. Recipients can get many benefits after receiving education. For example, people with higher education have more chances to find a good job and earn more money than those without education. In this sense, recipients should pay for the benefits they get.
However, it should not be overlooked that in fact, it is the members of society who benefit the most from education, and their managers and governments should pay for this kind of education. This is because we are faced with a very special commodity, which enables those who accept it to use what they have learned to serve the society. Compared with these educated people, the product of the education system and their contribution to society, the rewards they get are less important.
At the same time, the law stipulates that all people should have equal rights to receive education. If this kind of education is paid by the recipients themselves, many poor children will be excluded from school simply because their parents have no money to pay for it. In fact, this is a discriminatory policy and illegal. Therefore, it is really the government, not the students, who should pay for the education system.
The first writing method has fewer advantages and more disadvantages. "Advantages" are mainly manifested in its easy operation, but there are also many disadvantages: mediocrity, arbitrariness and unconvincing. The second writing method has obvious advantages, and its argumentation development winds out like a mountain stream. First, ask questions to make people think deeply, then put forward their own arguments and arguments from the pros and cons, and then put forward the author's own views through positive and negative comparison to avoid subjective and arbitrary writing style and enhance the persuasiveness of the article. The contrast of the content of the article can be clearly reflected in the structural level, and the cross-contrast of the positive and negative aspects can make the viewpoint more distinct and the thinking more prominent. Articles can form intricate, tortuous and varied beauty. There is no doubt that we should imitate the second writing.