R1 Goddu IL 31.2 REV 
 
 © G.C. Goddu. Informal Logic, Vol. 31, No. 2 (2011), pp. 75-88. Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity? G.C. GODDU Department of Philosophy University of Richmond Richmond, VA 23173 U.S.A. ggoddu@richmond.edu Abstract: The product/process dis- tinction with regards to “argument” has a longstanding history and foun- dational role in argumentation the- ory. I shall argue that, regardless of one’s chosen ontology of arguments, arguments are not the product of some process of arguing. Hence, appeal to the distinction is distorting the very organizational foundations of argumentation theory and should be abandoned. Resumé: La distinction proces- sus/produit appliquée aux arguments joue un rôle de fondement de la théorie de l’argumentation depuis longtemps. Quelle que soit l’ontologie des arguments qu’on adopte, je soutiens que les argu- ments ne sont pas le produit d’un processus d’argumentation. Donc l’usage de cette distinction déforme le fondement organisationnel de la théorie d’argumentation, et par con- séquent, on devrait abandonner cette distinction Keywords: Argument, acts of arguing, process, product 1. Introduction In recent work, Ralph Johnson raises several problems for the adequacy of the Logic/Rhetoric/Dialectic trichotomy and for its alleged basis—the argument as product/process/procedure trichotomy. My concern here is not with Johnson’s problems— rather it is with what Johnson leaves unchallenged. While John- son ultimately has some reservations about argument as proce- dure, he leaves the product/process distinction untouched. He writes: “The distinction between product and process seems to me fairly secure. It has a longstanding history here and in other disciplines. In logic, for instance, the term ‘inference’ is under- stood as ambiguous as between the process of drawing an infer- ence and the inference that results from that process” (Johnson 2009, p. 3). Despite its longstanding history and foundational role in argumentation theory, I am not so confident about the security G.C. Goddu 
 76
 of the product/process distinction, at least as it applies to “ar- gument” or even “inference”. In what follows, I shall focus on “argument”. In section 2, I shall first articulate the conditions required for “argument” to be subject to the product/process ambiguity, and then, in sections 3 and 4, argue that, regardless of whether one thinks arguments are composed of acts or propo- sitions or sentences, not all of the conditions are met. Finally, in section 5, I shall point out some ways in which argumentation theorists have been led astray by relying on this alleged ambigu- ity. 2. The process/product distinction and argument In his chapter on ambiguity, just after giving an example of how an argument can go wrong by failing to distinguish the action sense of a word from the result sense of a word, Max Black writes: “A great many words exhibit a similar fluctuation be- tween emphasis upon a process (a doing something) and an as- sociated product (the result of an activity)”(Black 1946, p. 177). The general consensus, among argumentation theorists at least, is that “argument” is such a word. Though Black himself does not acknowledge that he thinks “argument” is such a word, his own discussion of argument evinces at least part of such an am- biguity. On the one hand, in his glossary, he defines an argu- ment as follows: “Argument. A process of reasoning in which the truth of some proposition (the conclusion) is shown, or al- leged to be shown, to depend upon the truth of others (the prem- ises)”(Black 1946, p. 379). But in the main body of his text he writes: “We have seen that the elements out of which that com- plex object which we call an argument is constructed are state- ments (or more precisely, propositions); and we have noticed that the propositions are arranged or related to one another in a certain way”(Black 1946, p. 18). On the one hand, Black defines argument as a process of reasoning, but on the other he calls an argument a complex object constructed of statements or proposi- tions. That there are words subject to the process/product ambi- guity is not a matter of dispute. Black’s own examples of “sci- ence” and “education” are perfectly legitimate. But is “argu- ment” subject to the ambiguity? To say that a word is subject to the process/product ambiguity is to say that (a) there is a sense of the word that refers to an activity; (b) there is a sense of the word that refers to an object or thing; and (c) the object or thing is in some sense the result or outcome of the activity. For exam- ple, we could use “science” to describe the activity of doing cer- Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
 77
 tain sorts of investigations or we could use “science” to de- scribe the results or outcomes of those investigations. But while “argument” satisfies conditions (a) and (b), it is not at all clear that it satisfies condition (c) as so many seem to suppose.1 That “argument” satisfies conditions (a) and (b) is also not a matter of contention. Just compare—“It is better to engage in argument than in intimidation” and “Peter Unger’s argument for skepticism consists of three propositions.” But merely satisfying conditions (a) and (b) is not enough to warrant talking about ar- guments as process and arguments as product. Satisfying condi- tions (a) and (b) merely warrants talking about the activity of arguing2 on the one hand and arguments as objects on the other. Indeed, no one ought to dispute that there are acts of arguing, as opposed to acts of explaining or prophesying or poetry reading, on the one hand, and groups of propositions, sentences, state- ments or utterances, on the other. But for the product/process ambiguity to obtain, the object must in some sense be the prod- uct of the activity—does this hold for “argument”? Many theorists write as if it does. Here are but a few examples: O’ Keefe and other rhetoricians think that argument in the sec- ond sense is given too much importance, especially by logicians and philosophers, and that more emphasis should be placed on the process of arguing, rather than on something produced in that process. (Levi 2000, p. 59 ) The term ‘argument’ can be used to refer either to the process or to the product of that process. (Johnson 2000, p. 12) Logic helps us to understand and evaluate arguments as prod- ucts people create when they argue. (Wenzel 1990, p. 9) An argument is produced by the activity of arguing and arguing is something people do. (Fogelin 1985, p. 2) 























































 1
Perhaps “argumentation” as some people use it does satisfy the three condi- tions. But then, if I am correct in what follows, that just shows that “argu- ment” and “argumentation” are not always interchangeable. Regardless, for any who view “argumentation” as interchangeable with “argument”, then the following discussion applies to “argumentation” as well.
 2
Though most of my examples will involve individuals making arguments, there is nothing in my formulation that restricts activities to the acts of single individuals. Groups debating or having an argument are also instances of the activity of arguing. But since group arguing is at least in part comprised of individuals making arguments to others in the group, if the distinction fails in the individual case it will fail in the group case.
 G.C. Goddu 
 78
 Not all theorists are willing to be constrained by the prod- uct/process locutions. For example, Alvin Goldman writes: The term ‘argument’ will be used here for the product, or per- haps content, of argumentation, usually, for a set of sentences, or a set of propositions that might be expressed by means of such sentences. One member of such a set is a conclusion and the other members (possibly null) are premises. The elements of an argument might be printed, uttered, or merely thought. ‘Ar- gumentation’, by contrast, will refer to the process or activity of producing or deploying such a complex object. A process of ar- gumentation can be purely mental, in which case it is ‘infer- ence’, or it can be overt and public. (Goldman 2003, p. 52) Note that while Goldman does incorporate the possibility that argumentation is the process or activity of producing arguments, he also allows for the possibility that arguments might be the content of argumentation or what is deployed in argumentation. Despite Goldman’s willingness to allow for the possibility that arguments might be related to acts of arguing in some other manner than product of the process, the norm in argumentation theory is to treat arguments-as-objects as the product of the process of argument-as-activity. I shall, however, argue in the next sections, that even Goldman’s weaker position concedes too much, for arguments are just not the products of the process of arguing. 3. Products as propositions? Suppose you hold that arguments-as-objects are sets of proposi- tions. Should you accept that these sets of propositions are the product of acts of arguing? No. Propositions are abstract objects, either eternal or atemporal, and not the subject of production. Hence, whatever is the product of acts of arguing, if there is such a product, it is not the set of propositions that is an argu- ment. But perhaps someone might object that while the proposi- tions are not created, perhaps the sets or particular groupings of them are—in other words the argument, i.e., the group of propo- sitions does not exist as an argument until someone groups them that way and that way of grouping happens as a result of the ac- tivity of arguing. Short reply: If the group that is the argument just is a set, say the ordered set of a set of propositions and another proposi- tion, then, since the set is itself an abstract object and exists in- Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
 79
 dependently of anyone thinking of it or creating it, the group is not produced by the act of arguing. Longer reply: Suppose one holds that the entity that is the argument is not the set of propositions, but rather the group of propositions that results via the activity of some agent. One might wonder whether this group just is the set of propositions even if it is the activity of the agent that has made us become aware of the set (and even though one may not think of the en- tity one is now aware of as a set or an ordered set). But assume for the moment there is a distinct entity that is the result of this grouping activity. So according to the current proposal, an ar- gument is a group of propositions that gets grouped as part of the activity of arguing. Assume, for the moment, that arguments are groups of proposi- tions. Is the act of arguing t he only means of performing the grouping activity that produces arguments? No. Suppose Sally asks Roy to give her an example of an argument comprised solely of existential generalizations. Roy slyly responds with, “Some arguments are composed solely of existential generaliza- tions, so some arguments are composed solely of existential generalizations.” While an act of example giving has occurred, an act of arguing has not. (Roy need not be trying to convince Sally of anything. Sally may have no doubts that such arguments exist and merely be testing Roy or expecting Roy to generate an ingenious example). At the same time, Roy has satisfied Sally’s request for an example of an argument. The grouping of propo- sitions that makes an argument come into existence has occurred even though an act of arguing has not. Hence, acts of arguing are, at the very least, not the only means of grouping proposi- tions to produce arguments. Are groupings of propositions even mostly the result of acts of arguing? No. Imagine that I am verbally expressing the arguments of this paper to an audience. When I argue that “ar- gument” is not a process/product word, I may be making my audience aware of various arguments via my speech acts, which would certainly constitute acts of arguing—but I am certainly not making myself aware of these arguments. I was aware of these arguments well before I presented them or wrote them down. Also, while many acts of reflection, imagination, follow- ing through implications, etc. occurred, as well as considerable reasoning about everything from word choice, sentence order, possible objections and possible consequences, in the production of these arguments, no obvious acts of arguing, even with my- self, occurred. But if my arguments exist prior to my using them here to argue and if the groupings happened by some means oth- er than arguing with myself, which I am pretty sure they did, G.C. Goddu 
 80
 then my arguments, as groupings of propositions, are not the products of acts of arguing. My arguments are not special in this regard. Most argu- ments are already known, even if not fully or with sufficient clarity, to those who use them to argue. In other words, assum- ing that arguments are groupings of propositions, the arguer has already grouped the propositions into an argument prior to en- gaging in the act of arguing. But if arguments in general exist prior to their use and if the grouping in general happens by some means other than self-arguing, then arguments are not, in most cases, the products of acts of arguing. Are arguments as propositions ever the result of acts of arguing? Perhaps there are cases of spontaneous arguing in which the arguer has no idea what his or her own argument is until he or she is done arguing. I cannot immediately rule out the possibility of such cases. Nor, however, can I produce any clear examples of such spontaneous arguments. Until such examples are forthcoming, we should remain skeptical that there are any such cases and so remain skeptical that arguments as groups of propositions are the product of acts of arguing. Also, even if there are some examples of these sorts of cases, surely these sorts of cases are not the norm. Nor, given a general concern with improving the quality of one’s arguments or increasing the forethought one puts into one’s arguments, do we want these sort of cases to be the norm. But if these sorts of cases are not the norm, if they exist at all, then argumentation theory should not have a fundamental organizing principle that presupposes these sorts of cases. Note that these objections work even if one has a view of propositions or abstract objects such that they are the sorts of entities that can be created by human activity. Even if proposi- tions, or sets of propositions, are created by us, in the vast ma- jority of cases (and perhaps all cases), the propositions or sets of propositions are created prior to being used to argue. But then arguments, as sets or groups of propositions are not, in the vast majority (and perhaps all) cases, the products of acts of arguing. 4. Products as sentences? Speech acts? Suppose one takes arguments to be composed of sentences rather than propositions. Presumably there are two choices— sentence types or sentence tokens. Neither option, I strongly suspect, will do as an adequate theory of arguments-as-objects, but arguing that claim is a different paper. Regardless, even supposing that one of these options will work as a theory of ar- Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
 81
 guments-as-objects, neither option supports the view that such objects are the product of the process of arguing. Sentence types, quite straightforwardly, are abstract objects that are not the subject of production, but rather instantiation. Sentence to- kens, on the other hand, either exist prior to the acts of arguing or are a component of the act of arguing rather than the product of the act of arguing. Consider for example the sentence tokens that exist on this very page. Those sentence tokens came into existence long be- fore being spoken aloud or read here. If my act of arguing oc- curs when the sentences are spoken aloud to an audience or read here, then the sentence tokens exist prior to the act of arguing. Hence, the sentence tokens are not the product of the act of ar- guing. But perhaps my act of arguing occurred when I first wrote the sentences down. Or perhaps the auditory argument is composed of not the tokens on this page, but the auditory sen- tence tokens that come into existence when I present this argu- ment verbally. In either case the sentence tokens are not prior to the act of arguing. Nor are they the product of it either. The au- ditory sentence tokens are part of the very speech acts that are the act of arguing that occurs when presenting this argument orally. But if they are part of the act of arguing, then they are not the product of the act of arguing. Similarly, if my act of writing the sentence tokens down is my act of arguing, then the sentence tokens are not the product of the act of arguing, rather the pro- duction of the sentence tokens constitutes the act of arguing. This latter point also reveals the problem if we suppose that arguments are composed of utterances, or statements, or speech acts. While, unlike propositions or sentences, the utter- ances, or statements, or speech acts cannot exist prior to the act of arguing, it still makes no sense to say that the utterances, or statements, or speech acts are the product of the acts of arguing. The statements, or utterances, or speech acts currently being made just are the acts of stating or uttering that constitute the current act of arguing. If I were not to make those statements, or utterances, or speech acts in the proper context or order there would be no act of arguing. Hence, taking arguments to be com- posed of statements, or utterances, or speech acts does not sup- port the claim that arguments are the products of the process of arguing.3 The only option left is that the act of arguing somehow occurs prior to the writing or uttering of the sentence tokens. But 























































 3
Of course “statement” or “utterance” also turn out to be ambiguous, since they could refer not to the act of uttering or stating, but to the sentence (or proposition) uttered or stated, in which case the arguments deployed in the first two cases come into play again.
 G.C. Goddu 
 82
 then the act of arguing must be a mental act of the arguer. I have already suggested that while many acts of reflection and imagnation may have occurred prior to the writing of my argu- ments (which on the current hypothesis are composed of sen- tence tokens), it is not at all clear that any acts of arguing with myself occurred in the production of these sentence tokens. Nor do I think that other arguers are engaging in self-argument in order to produce the arguments they make for their audiences. But suppose I am mistaken about my mental life (and the mental life of other arguers). Suppose there are acts of arguing with myself that produce these sentence tokens. It is not, however, these mental acts of arguing with myself that the many argu- mentation theorists are referring to by the “argument-as- process”. When numerous argumentation theorists enjoin us to focus more on the “process of arguing” rather than on the “product of arguing”, surely they are enjoining us to focus on the overt acts of arguing that happen in our everyday lives, (such as the politician arguing before Congress (or Parliament) that a bill should or should not be adopted, or the letter to the editor arguing that the publication got something wrong, etc.), rather than sets of propositions abstracted from any context. It is the overt observable acts, in their context of occurrence, that are supposed to be the focus of our study—not the inaccessible mental acts of the arguer.4 Note that the problems for “argument” with regards to the product/process distinction, also apply to Johnson’s “inference” example. There is no doubt the act of inferring—but what is the thing that is the inference that is allegedly the result of the act of inferring? The inference could just be the thing inferred, i.e., the conclusion, but it is hard to see how the conclusion is the prod- uct of the act of inferring rather than just the endpoint reached via the act of inferring. One may be aware of one proposition or sentence and aware of another, and then come to realize that the 























































 4
One
might
point
to
Dale
Hample’s
papers,
“A
Cognitive
View
of
Argu‐ ment”
 or
 “A
 Third
 Perspective
 on
 Argument”
 to
 suggest
 that
 at
 least
 some
theorists
have
argued
for
a
focus
on
the
relevant
cognitive
events.
 Admittedly,
 in
 the
 first
 paper,
 Hample
 claims
 that
 the
 message’s
 only
 function
 is
 to
 “stimulate
 the
production
of
an
argument
within
some‐ one’s
cognitive
system”(Hample
1980,
p.
152),
 though
even
here
he
 is
 more
 interested
 in
 the
 productive
 contribution
 of
 the
 receiver
 rather
 than
the
stimulus
provided
by
the
message.

In
the
second
paper,
how‐ ever,
he
focuses
on
the
arguer
and
argues
that
“argument‐as‐cognition”
 is
what
generates
public
acts
of
argument
making
(Hample
1985,
p.
17).
 Hample
 does
 not
 describe
 these
 mental
 arguments
 as
 themselves
 the
 product
of
self‐arguing.
So
even
Hample’s
call
 for
a
 focus
on
cognitive
 events
does
not
support
the
view
that
arguments
are
the
products
of
acts
 of
arguing.

 Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
 83
 second can be inferred from the first. But the second proposi- tion or sentence existed prior to the inferring of it from the other, so it cannot be the product of the act of inferring. Alternatively, the inference might be the expression of the form “X, so Y”. But the expression captures part of a description of the act of infer- ring. Just as a painting is not the product of what it pictures, the expression, “X, so Y” is not a product of the act of inferring, but rather a partial description of the act of inferring (and if Robert Pinto is right, a partial description that has the power to invite others to engage in the same act of inferring.) Finally, the infer- ence might just be the event that is the moving from, say, X to Y. But what is this event other than just the activity of inferring X from Y described after it has happened? The event is not the product of the activity—it is the activity. So, like “argument”, “inference” is not subject to the process/product ambiguity, even if it is subject to the act/object ambiguity. 5. The danger of the process/product distinction for argu- mentation theory Still, someone might think something is odd about these results. Surely, after acts of arguing we have something we did not have before—surely something was produced. Undoubtedly some- thing was produced, but there is no guarantee that the thing pro- duced was an argument. It is quite possible that what is pro- duced is awareness of an argument—an awareness we did not have before. For example, what seems common to the “act of arguing” case and the “giving an example” case discussed in section II is that in both situations, the activity of arguing and the activity of giving an example made the target audience aware of a given argument. But being made aware of an argu- ment one was unaware of before should not be confused with production of that argument. Surely arguments must be the product of something. Per- haps. If arguments are sets of propositions, then perhaps argu- ments are better described as being discovered rather than pro- duced. Regardless, even if arguments turn out to be the sort of thing that is produced, there seems little reason right now to say that they are the product of acts of arguing. They, or the expres- sions of them, may be the result of various acts of imagination, reflection, etc., but that does not make them the product of acts of arguing. Maybe then I just have too narrow a conception of acts of arguing. Imagining, reflecting, reasoning, and so on are, one might claim, all argumentative processes out of which we gen- G.C. Goddu 
 84
 erate arguments. If by “argumentative process” we merely mean a process associated with or involved in arguing or argu- ments, then or course argumentative processes are involved in the production of arguments (or argument expressions or acts of argu- ing). But to be relevant and non-trivial, we must mean by “ar- gumentative process” processes that are themselves acts of argu- ing. While what is covered by acts of arguing can be quite broad and include internal mental debates, the giving of closing argu- ments in a trial, parliamentary debates, etc., the range is pre- sumably not so broad as to include all acts of imagining, reflect- ing, or reasoning. If “arguing” were construed so broadly, then almost every outcome of intentional human activity would be the product of arguing and every reasoned activity a kind of ar- guing. There are certainly debates about what is and is not an act of arguing, but no argumentation theorist I know of wishes to claim that all reasoned activity is a kind of arguing. Given that we quite reasonably want, in many cases at least, to distinguish arguing from explaining from story-telling from bridge-building and so on, we should not treat all reasoned activities as arguing. By the same token, since these diverse activities involve the same sort of reflectings, imaginings, and reasonings, we should not claim that these mental activities are all mental arguings. Perhaps, some will say, that I am merely quibbling. Yes, the attribution of “process” and “product” may have been ulti- mately unfortunate, but all we really mean is that there are acts of arguing on the one hand and some sort of object on the other. Once we are clear on this, the objection goes, we can understand comments such as, “I will here focus on argument as process rather than as product” well enough. Firstly, of course we can easily understand such comments once the clarification is made. But we should not need to make the clarification in the first place. If we mean acts of arguing on the one hand and arguments-as-objects on the other, then say this. All the use of the process/product locution does is make it seem that there is not only the acts and the objects, but that there is a specific relationship between the acts of arguing and the ar- guments, when in fact there is not. Secondly, if distinguishing arguments-as-acts from argu- ments-as-objects were the only sort of use made of the proc- ess/product distinction, then perhaps what I have done here might be rightly construed as quibbling. But as mentioned in the beginning of this paper, it is not the only use to which the dis- tinction is put. For example, the distinction is used as part of an attempt to ground the difference between the so-called Logical Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
 85
 and Rhetorical perspectives. Appeal to the distinction is also used to justify the adequacy of definitions of ‘argument’— certainly a core notion within argumentation theory. For exam- ple, van Eemeren and Grootendorst provide the following defi- nition of “argumentation”: Argumentation
 is
 a
 verbal,
 social,
 and
 rational
 activity
 aimed
at
convincing
a
reasonable
critic
of
the
acceptability
 of
a
standpoint
by
putting
forward
a
constellation
of
propo‐ sitions
 justifying
 or
 refuting
 the
 proposition
 expressed
 in
 the
standpoint.
(van Eemeren and Grootendorst 2004, p.
1)
 
 As
part
of
the
explication
and
justification
for
this
definition
 they
write
“the
process‐product”
ambiguity
of
the
word
‘ar‐ gumentation’
is
maintained:

The
term
argumentation
refers
 at
the
same
time
to
the
process
of
arguing
(‘I
am
about
to
 complete
my
argumentation’)
and
to
 its
product
(‘This
ar‐ gumentation
 is
 not
 sound’).”(p.
 1)
 But
 if
 “argument”
 (and
 “argumentation”)
is
not
subject
to
the
process/product
am‐ biguity,
 then
 judging
 the
adequacy
of
definitions
of
 “argu‐ ment”
in
terms
of
the
ambiguity
is
bound
to
lead
us
astray.

 In addition, the distinction is also used to ground claims of priority or importance. Michael Gilbert, for example, takes Ralph Johnson to task for taking written arguments as primary, when Johnson’s own framework seems to indicate that the process should be primary. Gilbert writes: However, the object of NASTy veneration is not the process, but the product of the process: “At a certain point in the proc- ess, the arguer distils elements from what has transpired and en- codes them in the form of an argument”(159). This product is the distillate that is the epitome of the practice of argument. But this seems to indicate that the process is ontologically more fundamental than the product, since without the process the product does not come into existence. It is important to realize that the exclusion of certain fac- tors as arguments seems to rely on the distinction between the process of arguing and the product produced by that process. This is a NASTy distinction that most NICe theorists would not really allow. Rather, the NICe theorist will, at best, see the writ- ten argument or speech as a snapshot of the process at a given moment in time, much as the inventory of a grocery store ac- counts for its contents at some specific moment: as soon as the inventory is complete, it changes with the first customer. I have no problem at all with there being such argument products, though, with Willard, I believe they cannot really be understood independent of the process used in arriving at them. (Gilbert G.C. Goddu 
 86
 2003, p. 6) While Gilbert, in the middle of this extended quote, seems to be disavowing the process/product distinction, he clearly uses the distinction to give ontological and intellectual priority to the process since, according to Gilbert, the argument products “can- not really be understood independent of the process used in ar- riving at them.” But if arguments are just not the products of acts of argu- ing, then such an argument cannot be used to ground claims of either ontological or intellectual primacy to the acts or process of arguing. The debate about the primacy of various aspects of argu- ment is not new. David Zarefsky, three decades ago, suspected, that “our disputes over definition turn on the question of wheth- er argument1 or argument2 should be the primary notion informing our research”(Zarefsky 1980, p. 229). Indeed, at this time, argument1 was tied with argument as product, and argu- ment2 with argument as process. But even Daniel O’Keefe, who originally introduced argument1 and argument2 resisted this identification (O’Keefe 1982, p. 23).5 Zarefsky worried that progress in argumentation theory was be- ing thwarted by “definitional concerns [which] may distract us from the substantive issues we wish to investigate”(Zarefsky 1980, p. 228). But the flipside is that failure to make progress on the definitional concerns may mean that worse than failing to make progress, we are actually producing false theories about the phenomena in question since we have failed to articulate clearly what the various phenomena in question are. This ap- pears to be what is in danger of happening if we insist on talking about arguments as processes and the products of those proc- esses, for it prejudges the relationship between the acts of argu- ing and the things that are arguments in a way that, I hope I have shown, is likely to distort the real relationship between the acts and the objects. 























































 5
Some might suggest however that O’Keefe’s act of making an argument1 and argument1 are the correlates for argument as process and argument as product. Reply: Though O’Keefe does sometimes use the unfortunate locu- tion—the argument made by the act of making an argument, he also talks about the argument conveyed by the act of making an argument. Indeed, I suspect that what O’Keefe wants to capture by the act of making an argument could just as easily be described as the act of presenting or giving an argu- ment. While the act of presenting or making or giving an argument to you may present or convey an argument to you, it is not the act of producing that argument, since it is quite likely the producer of the argument had the argu- ment in mind before it was given or presented to you.
 Is ‘argument’ subject to the product/process ambiguity?
 
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 At the same time, I am certainly not claiming that the arguments as objects are somehow primary. For example, if ar- guments are groups of speech acts, then acts of arguing and ar- guments have the same constituents, and you cannot have the one without the other. Also, while I have given cases where the arguments are temporally prior to the acts of arguing with which they are associated, in no way does this generate ontological or intellectual priority. After all, the arguments may only become a matter of intellectual interest after they have been made evident by an act of arguing. In addition, I suspect we, as theorists, want to have room to say that acts of arguing can go so awry, that the argument presented via the act of arguing is not the argument the author had hoped to convey. But even with some appeal to charity, it is clearly incumbent upon the presenter of arguments to argue in a way that aids rather than hinders in the presentation of the desired argument. Regardless, the upshot of my comments so far is that restricting ourselves to talk of arguments as acts on the one hand and objects on the other in no way supports the in- tellectual or ontological priority of one aspect of argument over the other. 6. Conclusion Despite the longstanding history of treating “argument” as if the arguments-as-objects are the product of the process of argu- ments-as acts, the facts do not support this treatment. Regardless of one’s chosen ontology of arguments (propositions, sentences, utterances, statements, speech acts, or sets or groups thereof), either the arguments exist prior to the relevant acts of arguing or are constituents of those acts of arguing—they are not the prod- ucts of those acts of arguing. If, as part of organizing the domain of argumentation theory, we merely want to distinguish acts of arguing from arguments-as-objects, we should not use the mis- leading process/product labels to do so. At the very least such labels imply a relationship that does not exist and so distort our perceptions of the domain of study. At worst they ground false claims about the ontological or intellectual priority of one per- spective of argument and argument theory over another. Without the distorting lens of these labels, we will be in a much better position to provide accurate answers to some of the fundamental questions of argumentation theory—what exactly are argu- ments-as objects and how exactly are they related to acts of ar- guing? G.C. Goddu 
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