Abstract
No informal fallacy has received more attention from logicians than circular or question-begging argument. Unlike other informal fallacies, circular argument can demonstrate deductive validity. Yet, it fails of some criterion of rational persuasion in that an arguer simply ‘begs for’ rather than proves the question-at-issue. Historical and recent attempts to characterize the flaw in this argument have achieved a proliferation of dialectical and epistemic criteria which, it is claimed, prohibit the use of this argument. These criteria attest to the failure of the proponent in argument to argue from premises that are among the commitments of an opponent or to argue from premises that are better known than the question-at-issue. It is argued that these criteria have relevance in certain contexts of inquiry but may also be suspended temporarily when adverse epistemic conditions obtain at the outset of an inquiry. Conditions of this type attend many public health deliberations. Under adverse epistemic conditions circular argument is a type of faute de mieux reasoning which allows investigators to progress an inquiry until such times as conclusion-independent evidence emerges. The results of a study of public health reasoning are discussed. They provide evidence for the claim that members of the public are adept at recognising conditions under which some circles in argument are virtuous while others are vicious.
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Cummings, L. (2015). Circular Argument. In: Reasoning and Public Health: New Ways of Coping with Uncertainty. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-15013-0_6
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