num_pages: 112
description: Argument and Argumentation. Schopenhauer's rule-book for argumentation. This is the ultimate philosophical book to learn how to put forward your argumentation by using reason and evidence in support of your conclusions. "Dialectic is the art of intellectual fencing; and it is only when we so regard it that we can erect it into a branch of knowledge." "Truth is in the depths. At the beginning of a contest each man believes, as a rule, that right is on his side; in the course of it, both become doubtful, and the truth is not determined or confirmed until the close. Dialectic, then, need have nothing to do with truth, as little as the fencing master considers who is in the right when a dispute leads to a duel. Thrust and parry is the whole business. Dialectic is the art of intellectual fencing; and it is only when we so regard it that we can erect it into a branch of knowledge. For if we take purely objective truth as our aim, we are reduced to mere Logic; if we take the maintenance of false propositions, it is mere Sophistic; and in either case it would have to be assumed that we were aware of what was true and what was false; and it is seldom that we have any clear idea of the truth beforehand. The true conception of Dialectic is, then, that which we have formed: it is the art of intellectual fencing used for the purpose of getting the best of it in a dispute."
title: The Art of Controversy: Arthur Schopenhauer
publisher: Createspace