Category Archives: Models

Examples we can productively study

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We Need to Remember What an Argument Looks Like

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Having lived through another multi-year deluge of dubious ideas badly argued, its good to pause and remember what rational discussion should look like. I’m not talking about “arguing” here, but about the unit of discourse known as an “argument.” There are established and widely accepted rules that apply.  

In the courts, news interviews, and even simpler discussions with acquaintances, any assertion about “the way things are” deserves a good defense. In a debate we would expect assertions to be supported by evidence.  In a less formal conversation it is not unreasonable to also assume that at least some compelling evidence will be offered, especially if a conversational partner expresses doubt. A judge would expect evidence that is more than just hearsay, also rejecting truth claims from those not in a position to make them. If a more informal exchange happens over a holiday gathering, you owe it to everyone in the room to do more than make an unsubstantiated claim and call it a day.

An argument considered in isolation can take many forms. But its basic structure is simple and contains at least two parts: (1) An assertion or claim and (2) supporting evidence or good reasons. In schematic terms it is laid out like this:

That’s it. In its most basic form it is an assertion of fact supported with statements of proof to back it up: perhaps expert testimony, representative examples, solid research, statistical summaries, and so on.  The asserted claim is not enough, unless it is so obvious that no one would disagree. But we are focusing here on consequential assertions that others have doubted or denied. Somehow, we must relearn a basic tenet of civil affairs that a claim by itself is insufficient.

For example, consider the claim that “the 2020 presidential election was free of fraud.” If I stop there in the presence of a MAGA true-believer, I’m uttering a statement that—in formal terms—lacks “force.” To be sure, we are only too happy to display our opinions like flags. They signal our attitudes and beliefs. But they have no power to bind others to seriously consider them.

How can I meaningfully assert that the election was fair and accurate? Where is my evidence?  I ought to be able to supply it, and not—as the President does with its counter-argument—by offer a rewording of the claim to make it seem like a reason. So, if I am making a claim, I ought to be able to put “because” after it and find that the reasons that follow will make sense: will sound right.  Our example might unfold in the following sequence.

“The Election was free of fraud.”
                                    Because. . .
I. The Attorney General in the Trump Administration said so.
II. The administration’s cyber-security head said so.
III. No state government found evidence of significant instances of fraud.
IV. Virtually all respected journalists covering the election found no significant evidence of a corrupted vote.
V. A vast array of American courts couldn’t even find enough evidence to proceed to a trial.

To be sure, each of these assertions may need their own specifics or testimony. An example for the first claim could include Attorney General William Barr’s own words: “to date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election.” As testimony, Barr’s words are especially credible because he is (1) in a position to know, and (2) he is a “reluctant” source, meaning that Barr’s natural bias would be to support the views of the president who appointed him.

Arguments work best with truth claims. What can you do with your Uncle Fred’s assertion that he “believes” many dead Democrats “voted?” You can ask him for evidence. But Fred may use the intellectual slight-of-hand of converting what he “believes” into what he “knows.” That’s dishonest, but telling him so probably will not keep him up at nights. People uttering belief statements are best left to their magical thinking. You cannot usually do much about fantasies that individuals need to believe.

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Life in the Hands of an Able Writer

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An only child who had to oversee the passage of his parents, Christopher Buckley wrote about this lonely role with grace.

Many of us who struggle with the task of finding ways to give heat to ideas can usually point to favorites: cases where a writer has put the perfect image together to make his or her point.  These passages are moments of rhetorical grace, sometimes represented by economy of style or an evocative image.  Writers read partly to experience these moments. They add more fuel for the long slog of putting words on the page.

Christopher Buckley with his Parents

One personal favorite is from an unlikely source and subject. Christopher Buckley’s 2009 memoir of the last year of his celebrity parents is funny and wise on the demands of coping with the inevitable.  In Losing Mum and Pup we see the conservative gadfly William F. Buckley Jr. and his socialite wife struggle to the end.  An only child who had to oversee their passage through what his father often described as “this vale of tears,” Christopher also bore the role of keeper of the flame of their outsized legacies.

That the book could be characterized as a pleasure to read is a credit to his dry wit and effective storytelling. Humor and melancholy merge seamlessly.  Among other things, his dad’s ability to cope with the death of his mother produces the kinds of serio-comic episodes that any caregiver with a sense of humor would recognize.

This is not just a memoir about wheelchairs and vacant faces. The younger Buckley has the good sense to understand the end of his parents lives mostly in terms of the consequential work done in their most productive years: Pat, in the upper stratosphere of New York museums and philanthropies, Bill in publishing and conservative politics. The senior Buckley had some awful views, but he was also a polymath with a wide collection of interests and talents.

Here’s a favorite passage seemingly about his father’s love of sailing, but also much more.  It contains a wonderful image.

Pup was an avid sailor. He had learned to sail as a child in upstate Connecticut, on a not very large lake. Now we live on the Connecticut shore of Long Island Sound and kept a thirty-eight-foot wooden sloop. It was named Panic, a name my mother found all too apt. . .  I now get that Pup’s greatness was of a piece with the way he conducted himself at sea. Great men always have too much canvas up. Great men take great risks. It’s the timorous soul—souls like myself—who err on the side of caution; who take in sail when they see a storm approaching and look for a snug harbor. Not my old man. Or as Mum used to put it, “Bill why are you trying to kill us?” Great men are also impatient. This particular aspect showed up most vividly in my father’s manner of docking his boats. Most people, when guiding, say a ten or twenty ton vessel toward a dock, approach slowly. Not my old man. His technique was to go straight at it, full speed. Why waste time? This made for memorable episodes.1

“Great men have too much canvas up.”  It’s an apt image that seems completely faithful to the person who published the National Review.  It was the perfect verbal image. Anyone who had observed  Buckley on his Firing Line broadcasts or his work as a conservative essayist could also see the literal extended to the behavioral.  Fearless sailing was typical of who the father was, even when he was heading in the wrong direction.

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1 Christopher Buckley, Losing Mum and Pup, Emblem Books, 2010., pp. 121-22.