David Hitchcock

The eightfold way of deliberation dialogue

Deliberation dialogues occur when two or more participants seek to jointly agree on an action or a course of action in some situation. We present the first formal framework for such dialogues, grounding it in a theory of deliberative reasoning from the philosophy of argumentation. We further fully articulate the locutions and rules of a formal dialogue game for this model, so as to specify a protocol for deliberation dialogues. The resulting protocol is suitable for dialogues between computational entities, such as autonomous software agents. To assess our protocol, we consider it against various records of human deliberations, against normative principles for the conduct of human dialogues, and with respect to the outcomes produced by dialogues undertaken according to the protocol.

Toulmin’s Warrants

In The Uses of Argument (1958) proposed a new, dialectically grounded structure for the layout of arguments, replacing the old terminology of “premiss” and “conclusion” with a new set of terms: claim, data (later “grounds”), warrant, modal qualifier, rebuttal, backing. Toulmin’s scheme has been widely adopted in the discipline of speech communication, especially in the United States. In this paper I focus on one component of the scheme, the concept of a warrant. I argue that those who have adopted Toulmin’s scheme have often distorted the concept of warrant in a way which destroys what is distinctive and worthwhile about it. And I respond to criticisms of the concept by (1984), (1996) and (1991). Their criticisms show the need for some revision of Toulmin’s position, but his basic concept of warrant, I shall argue, should be retained as a central concept for the evaluation of arguments.

Does the Traditional Treatment of Enthymemes Rest on a Mistake

In many actual arguments, the conclusion seems intuitively to follow from the premisses, even though we cannot show that it follows logically. The traditional approach to evaluating such arguments is to suppose that they have an unstated premiss whose explicit addition will produce an argument where the conclusion does follow logically. But there are good reasons for doubting that people so frequently leave the premisses of their arguments unstated. The inclination to suppose that they do stems from the belief that the only way in which an argument’s conclusion can follow definitely from its premisses is to follow logically. I argue that this belief is mistaken. I propose a revision of the current generic conception of logical consequence, and its variant specifications, to avoid the paradoxes of strict implication. The revised conception can then be naturally extended to include also what we might call ‘enthymematic consequence’. This concept is a kind of consequence, whose properties merit investigation.

Instrumental rationality

Comprehensive reasoning from end to means requires an initiating intention to bring about some goal, along with five premisses: a specified means would immediately contribute to realization of the goal, the goal is achievable, the means is permissible, no alternative means is preferable, and the side effects do not outweigh the benefits of achieving the goal. Its conclusion is a decision to bring about the means. The scheme can be reiterated until an implementable means is reached. In a particular context, resource limitations may warrant truncation of the reasoning. ACM Category: I.2.11 Multiagent systems. General terms: Theory.

Decision Support for Practical Reasoning A Theoretical and Computational Perspective

This book represents the first coherent published work in bringing together various branches of artificial intelligence with argumentation and rhetoric, and, as such, aims to play a key role in the establishment of a new field of scholarly research. The volume not only offers in-depth assessments of existing research, but also represents a substantial advance in the state of the art, and lays out a roadmap for future work in this newly emerging cross-disciplinary field. Audience: This book is of interest to academics, researchers, PhD and graduate students in philosophy of argument, logic, informal logic, critical thinking, rhetoric, artificial intelligence, multi-agent systems, computational linguistics, natural language processing, law, cognitive science and the interdisciplinary areas between these fields.Practical reasoning is reasoning about what is to be done. A decision on what to do may involve weighing the options open to an individual, taking into account dependencies on the actions of others, or complex collaborative decisionmaking. The role of argument in practical reasoning is explored in this chapter, both from a philosophical and computational perspective. In doing so, we discuss the use of computational systems in assisting people engaged in decision making, and, in particular, we investigate practical reasoning as joint deliberation between the human and decision support system. Such a system, it is argued, facilitates research into the use of argumentation techniques in computational models of practical reasoning, and the use of computational models to evaluate theories of practical reasoning.

Some Principles of Rational Mutual Inquiry

In mutual inquiry two or more people seek rational agreement on an answer to an open question. Rules for a dialogue system for mutual inquiry should conform to at least the following 18 principles: externalization, dialectification, mutuality, turn-taking, orderliness, staging, logical pluralism, rule-consistency, semantic openness, realism, retractability, role reversal, experiential appeal, openness, tentativeness, tracking, termination rules, allocation of burden of proof.

The Practice of Argumentative Discussion

I propose some changes to the conceptions of argument and of argumentative discussion in Ralph Johnson’s Manifest Rationality (2000). An argument is a discourse whose author seeks to persuade an audience to accept a thesis by producing reasons in support of it and discharging his dialectical obligations. An argumentative discussion (what Johnson calls ‘argumentation’) is a sociocultural activity of constructing, presenting, interpreting, criticizing, and revising arguments for the purpose of reaching a shared rationally supported position on some issue. Johnson’s theory of argumentative discussion, with occasional modifications, is derived from this definition as a sequence of 17 theorems. Argumentative discussion is a valuable cultural practice; it is the most secure route to correct views and wise policies.

Evidence and its uses in health care and research: The role of critical thinking

Summary Obtaining and critically appraising evidence is clearly not enough to make better decisions in clinical care. The evidence should be linked to the clinician’s expertise, the patient’s individual circumstances (including values and preferences), and clinical context and settings. We propose critical thinking and decision-making as the tools for making that link. Critical thinking is also called for in medical research and medical writing, especially where pre-canned methodologies are not enough. It is also involved in our exchanges of ideas at floor rounds, grand rounds and case discussions; our communications with patients and lay stakeholders in health care; and our writing of research papers, grant applications and grant reviews. Critical thinking is a learned process which benefits from teaching and guided practice like any discipline in health sciences. Training in critical thinking should be a part or a pre-requisite of the medical curriculum.

Decision Support for Practical Reasoning

Practical reasoning is reasoning about what is to be done. A decision on what to do may involve weighing the options open to an individual, taking into account dependencies on the actions of others, or complex collaborative decision-making. The role of argument in practical reasoning is explored in this chapter, both from a philosophical and computational perspective. In doing so, we discuss the use of computational systems in assisting people engaged in decision making, and, in particular, we investigate practical reasoning as joint deliberation between the human and decision support system. Such a system, it is argued, facilitates research into the use of argumentation techniques in computational models of practical reasoning, and the use of computational models to evaluate theories of practical reasoning.

Validity in Conductive Arguments

An appeal to features of some case in support of attribution of some status to that case is non-conclusively valid if and only if it is not conclusively valid but any case with those features either has the status or has some overriding negatively relevant feature not implied by lacking the status.