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Date:         Sun, 15 Nov 1992 21:46:59 -0800
From:         James Crosswhite <JCROSS@OREGON.BITNET>
Subject:      Re:Multimedia/In Defense of Reason

In my last post I wrote that a reason is an influence
without force or violence, that writing is language without
the force of sound, that written reasoning is the whispering
of language. Gary Beason said he didn't buy it, not if I
meant that reasoning is intrinsically fair and equal.

You're right to pass on this, Gary--if we mean every
instance of reasoning that actually goes on. However,
there's something in the idea of reason--or rather, there is
an ideal of reason according to which reasoning *is*
intrinsically fair and equal, and insofar as any instance is
not, it is subject to rational criticism. That is, to the
degree that someone is being forced to assent to some claim,
the assent is not motivated by reason, but by force--and we
have an instance not of reasoning but of forced assent.

You also mention that deduction and induction are violent
because they are monological. I don't use those categories
much, but from my angle it's impossible for argumentation to
be really monological. (We're in pretty deep here--it's
going to take me a while to surface. The uninterested can
check out now.)

All argumentation must be multi-voiced. Imagine a claim. Why
does it need justification? If there's no one to challenge
it, it just stands. One needs a reason to support a claim
only because there is a challenge to it--another "voice"
raises a question or makes a counter-claim or asks for
clarification. If it didn't, one wouldn't have an argument.
The reason in support of the claim is the answer to this
often (especially in writing) implicit question. Toulmin
actually brings out the questioner's voice in his ordinary
argumentation model, understanding the "data" and "warrant"
and "backing" as answers to questions. In his scheme, all
arguments are dialogues.

As for violence, I think of argumentation as on a continuum
with other ways of resolving conflicts. War and slugging it
out are on one end of the continuum: uncontained force,
violence. As one moves toward argumentation, one passes
through other kinds of force, more "contained" or more
"mediated." At some point the violence gets contained in
actual language, in threats, shouting, etc. When one gets to
writing, the force is contained in a medium that is just
about as ethereal as possible--i.e. uses a minimal amount of
force, highly contained, to work through the conflict. To
let the power of writing work at all takes the consent of
readers, who must work to let the reasoning have any effect
on them at all. If one tries to move any further on the
continuum, one pretty much loses the ability to resolve
conflicts by doing something about them.

This continuum connects reason with freedom, in the sense of
a relative absence of constraint. I see written
argumentation as an incredibly weak form of influence, one
that requires tremendous cooperation and imagination and
desire to reach mutual understandings.

My point is that most images act on us in a much more
forceful and violent way--the force is not as "contained,"
the influence is pretty directly on our senses. For example,
when we see the image of an ox, we might ask someone, "Do
you see the ox?" But when we read a description of an ox, we
ask only, "Did you read about that ox?" An image gives us
the ox with relatively little work on our part; we have to
work (i.e. act more than be acted on) to get the written ox.
Freedom and reason and fairness lie on the side of our
acting rather than our being acted on.

At least, this is the angle I find most helpful, the angle
that redeems for me the connections people have experienced
between freedom and reason.

BTW, I'm waiting to hear mer's response to Robert Royar's
response to Irv Peckham. I'm guessing mer will say that the
inside/outside metaphor isn't very helpful when it comes to
thinking of mind/world or any similar couples.

jim crosswhite  jcross@oregon.uoregon.edu
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU