I found the relevance in an argument very interesting. In the book "Critical Thinking" by Richard L. Epstein, he discusses about the relevance in an argument. Relevance is when a person is able to connect with the matter of the argument. As stated in Epstein's book, a premise is irrelevant when a part of the argument can be deleted and the argument has no or little effect, meaning taking away does not weaken the argument. Irrelevant saying in an argument only creates a bad argument because it can make the premises irrelevant to the conclusion. Epstein explains that when a person tries to make a argument relevant bu adding more premises to link to the conclusion, the premises are not obvious to the other person. I think this reading was very helpful because when people argue, many tend to lean towards a different direction and add in irrelevant statements. Section d. relevance was very useful and I think it can useful for others as well.
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ReplyDeleteI was going to choose this topic to talk about for one of my blog posts as well, however, I decided to choose another topic. I am really glad that someone chose to talk about this topic because I found it very interesting. One of my personal pet peeves is when someone who you are having a conversation with brings up a point that is completely irrelevant to the topic that we were previously discussing. Sometimes I wish that those people can have access to this textbook so that they can learn from their mistakes and become better communicators. Thanks for your post!