May the force be with you

✍ Scribed by Michael J. Wreen

• Book ID: 104633388
• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1988
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 913 KB
• Volume: 2
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0920-427X
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00128985

✦ Synopsis

This paper is a critical assessment of argumentum ad baculum, or appeal to force. Its principal contention is that, contrary to common opinion, there is no general fallacy of ad baculum. Most real-life ad baculums are, in fact, fairly strong. A basic logical form for reconstructed ad baculums is proposed, and a number of heterodoxical conclusions are also advanced and argued for. They include that ad baculum is not necessarily a prudential argument, that ad baculum need not involve force, violence, or threats, and that one can argue ad baculum to oneself. The starting point of the paper, however, is a critical evaluation of three ad baculums from the exercise sets of Irving Copi's well-known Introduction to Logic.