But, of course, a disputant may be asking to prove the premises of any syllogism; in which case other syllogisms may be advanced for that purpose.
This is an example of the paralogism of 'proving too much'; when a disputant is so eager to refute an opponent as to lay down, or imply, principles from which an easy inference destroys his own position.
An authoritative disputantwas not unfrequently put down, and presumption of every kind checked by the same query.
Bob is the most formidable disputant of the whole company; for, without troubling himself to search for reasons, he tires his antagonist with repeated affirmations.
You are a distinguished hero, you are a disputant of the Kshatriya caste; why do you remain silent?
Then he announced to king Sinhaksha, by the mouth of the doorkeeper, that he was a disputant come from Kasmira.
The best cure for commercial distress would be, as one disputant asserted, to burn all the goods in our warehouses.
But, to say nothing of cases which may be put by an ingenious disputant in which this may not quite apply, we have to consider reasons which may be extra-economical.
His pride as a logician and skilful disputant abated in the latter and better portion of his life he had more deference to the judgment of others, and more distrust of his own.
It was allowed to thedisputant of old to yield up the controversy, with little resistance, to the master of forty legions.
A reverend disputant of the same costiveness in public elocution with myself.
A very shrewd disputant in those points is dexterous in puzzling others.
Arian controversy, and the ability he showed as a disputantprobably had much to do with his promotion to the bishopric of Caesarea.
He was anxious that the disputation should be in Latin, that the arguments should be reduced to writing, and that each disputant should sign his paper.
But against the Romanist the same disputant avows Spiritualist principles, declaring that since "the Church" appears to him to be erroneous, he dares not to accept it as infallible.
For the disputant who maintains this dogma, tells us in the very next breath that Person has not in this connexion its common signification; so that he is elaborately enforcing upon us we know not what.
The same disputant may add that the Court in which, they sit is unreal, and their bodily persons only shadows.
His face hardened, and in his nasal voice he dealt a swift epigram at Mr. Wishart, which for the moment left the young disputant floundering.
A disputant familiar with his analysis would foresee at once that if he could get the Respondent to admit that all actions undertaken for private ends are vicious, the victory was his, while nothing short of this would serve.
A disputant who had trapped a respondent into admitting that it is possible for Socrates not to fly, might have pushed the concession farther in some such way as this: "Is it possible for Socrates not to walk?
If a disputant admits the cases produced to be all and can produce none to the contrary, he is bound to admit the conclusion.
It was the custom for the Disputant to expound his argument in this form:-- If so and so is the case, such and such follows.
The modern disputant who demands a plain answer Yes or No, is sometimes guilty of this trick.
For example, it being admitted that culture is good, a disputant goes on to argue as if the admission applied to some sort of culture in special, scientific, aesthetic, philosophical or moral.
The catechist with me gave so lucid and categorical a reply that the Muhammadan disputant and chairman changed their tone, and said that, as the time was getting late, it would be better to postpone my question till another time.
By this method of bringing back the argument to its true starting-point, even the disputant himself would be affected and the truth become manifest to his mind.
The former seemed as ardent as was the latter disputant in his abhorrence of the Southern traitors; but he constructed a very fair argument for the consistency of England.
It is not pleasant to be giving to every shallow or flippant disputant the advantage over me of knowing my most private thoughts, I might even say the intercourse between myself and my Maker.
It consists in passing from the subject of dispute, as from a lost game, to the disputant himself, and in some way attacking his person.
