Some Points on Plato, Aristotle, and Rhetoric
[These represent my reflections, responses, and opinions.]
Plato and Dialectic
– a method for moving through disciplined discourse toward an acknowledged, if not
ever fully embraceable truth.
-- a way of using careful examination of assumptions/propositions in relationship to
authoritative moral principles, in order to expose and refute falsehood, propose and reveal
a direction toward truth (a behavioral commitment, a way of acting), and the process,
through guided dialogue, to teach/persuade a person to make recognize the need for that
commitment and to make it.
-- the interactive exchange between a patient philosopher/teacher and an engaged but still
uninformed and unformed student—it leads, gradually, through the self-conscious
guidance of the teacher, to the student’s awareness of, appreciation for, acceptance of,
and commitment to a movement to truth.
-- the dialectic demonstrates ways of understanding the meaning of that which can be
claimed but cannot be directly sensed, the transcendent meaning behind the experience of
truth’s shadows in the material world.
-- the expression and demonstration of loving intimacy of spirit (not body) between the
loving teacher and the beloved student, and the embrace of love as a path to truth by the
student through the recognition and acceptance of love’s transcendent and transformative
power.
-- Plato prefers the direct oral discourse of dialectic, between two individuals or among a
small group, because he repeatedly demonstrates that love is essential to truth, and
devotion to truth is essential to love, and that both must emerge from the psychological
intimacy of that interpersonal dialogue represented in the writings.
-- we might theorize that Plato rejects “rhetoric” that is public speaking, not “rhetoric”
that is interpersonal discourse, because the public speaking is about manipulation and
control of a group or crowd, not about the shared awakening to the love of truth between
a teacher and student.
-- Plato’s sense of what would be a “true rhetoric” is an intimate discourse of teaching
through which both teacher and student come closer to active love of truth.
-- Plato’s rejection of “public rhetoric” seems more a matter that it is neither necessarily
loving nor necessarily truth seeking, merely seeking resolution of issues and consensus
on action.
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-- dialectic is the rhetoric of love, where love is the ongoing commitment to seek the truth
and to share with others the seeking of that truth—it is the loving verbal dance of truthseeking.
Aristotle – Logic, Dialectic, and Rhetoric
– draws on the Platonic/Socratic tradition, but extends it as a more formal
Method.
-- Aristotle’s philosophical oeuvre represents a wide range of subjects, both
fundamental/general and specific and topical.
-- at the heart of his philosophical system is the Organon (can be called the “instrument”
or perhaps the “method”) – an elaborate, analytical, hierarchical system for determining
what we can know and how we know it —taken as a whole, the Organon is a systematic
logic that allows for the development and expression of true statements.
-- the Organon comprises the following: Categories, On Interpretation, Prior Analytics,
Posterior Analytics, Topics, and Sophistical Refutations—the first three of these represent
the foundational principles and procedures of deductive logic, establishing the categories
of reasoning, the terms of reasoning, and the procedures of reasoning (almost like a
linguistics study—how terms can be placed into groups, and how the groups can be used
to propose statements about the relationship between and among groups, between and
among terms, and between and among terms and groups (to some extent, we have so
embedded this kind of logical processing in our language, our institutions, and our overall
culture that it seems almost a given, an outgrowth of nature itself, but it is all the result of
intellectual endeavor by Aristotle, his students and followers, and generations of
philosophers who worked as disciples of the Aristotelian philosophy).
-- at the heart of the whole Organon, especially at the heart of the first half, is the
syllogism—the basic method for making statements about the true relationships between
and among things and categories of things
-- the Posterior Analytics deals with induction, though it also depends on deduction as
well – drawing on the rather nebulous and perhaps transcendent concept of “nous” (a
kind of a priori knowledge, or a kind of natural potential of the mind to perceive first
principles), one can establish a basis for observation, analysis, and deduction that, in
concert, demonstrate what can be established as real and true.
-- in the Posterior Analytics, demonstration is revealed as a deduction that produces
knowledge (in a sense, a kind of applied logic that is deployed in response to experience
and observation, resulting in authoritative statements about reality—i.e., knowledge, and
in this case, an early form of authoritative “scientific” knowledge.
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-- the Posterior Analytics and the procedures of demonstration are what, for Aristotle,
constitute a “scientific method,” and the technique of the “demonstration” is the means
by which scientific knowledge is established—how we know what is.
-- at the heart of Aristotle’s sense of “science” is a knowledge of causes—the cause why
something is, that this cause is definitive, and that it cannot be otherwise.
-- Aristotle deals with four aspects of causality—the Material Cause, the Formal Cause,
the Efficient Cause, and the Final Cause—
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The Material Cause is that out of which something comes (its material nature and
substance).
The Formal Cause is the shape the thing takes.
The Efficient Cause is that which is the primary source of something’s condition
(e.g., what shapes the material into the form).
The Final Cause is the “telos” or the reason or end for which something exists.
-- additionally, Aristotle is concerned that the analysis of causality yield a sense of what
are “necessary” and “sufficient” causes of something—
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The “necessary” cause – if A is necessary for B, then the mere presence of B,
indicates the presence of A (but the presence of A does not, of itself, indicate the
presence of B).
The “sufficient cause – if A is a sufficient cause of B, then the mere presence of A
does indicate the presence of B (but the presence of B does not, of itself, indicate
the presence of A because B can be brought about by another cause, say C).
-- Dialectic in Aristotle relates both to the methods of discovering premises or
propositions from which a conclusion follows and also to the methods for discovering
premises which will be accepted by an audience – in the service of logic and science,
dialectic is more often than not a method of challenging and refuting premises—dialectic
also works in areas of greater certainty or authority than rhetoric, but less certainty or
authority than demonstration—in a way, it is a middle ground between demonstration and
rhetoric.
-- Rhetoric, for Aristotle, is parallel to dialectic, using similar methodologies and
procedures, but in the service of areas that are not so much authoritatively proved as
agreed upon through consensus – rhetoric is also a matter of understanding what premises
can lead to what conclusions, but in a context influenced by both the character of the
speaker and by the states of mind of the listeners, and so it is much more in the realm of
the probabilistic than in the realm of the demonstrable.
[ Note: The notes on Aristotle are derived from my own reading and study, in part, and
also from a variety of prior courses from times gone by. To review, I found a useful
online source on Aristotle’s logic -- http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-logic/]
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