Open AccessCon Amore: Henry Johnstone, Jr.'s Philosophy of Argumentation
Author(s) -
James Crosswhite
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
informal logic
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.368
H-Index - 15
eISSN - 2293-734X
pISSN - 0824-2577
DOI - 10.22329/il.v21i1.2233
Subject(s) - argumentation theory , rhetoric , argument (complex analysis) , epistemology , philosophy , virtue , sociology , linguistics , chemistry , biochemistry
Henry Johnstone's philosophical development was guided by a persistent need to reform the concept of validity -either by reinterpreting it or by finding a substitute for it. This project lead Johnstone into interesting confrontations with the concept of rhetoric and especiaUy with the work of Chaim Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca. The project culminated in a failed attempt to develop a formal ethics of rhetoric and argumentation, but this attempt was itself not consistent with some of Johnstone's other characterizations ofan ethics of argument ation. A virtue ethics would be truer to the Johnstonian philosophical project than a formal ethics of argument.Resume