Microsoft Word - Tindale - PROOF.doc © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation CHRISTOPHER TINDALE Philosophy Department The University of Windsor Ontario Canada ctindale@uwindsor.ca Abstract: Of the different modes that characterize Michael Gilbert’s multi- modal theory of argumentation, the kisceral is in many ways the most challenging to understand and em- ploy. It appears to bypass the process- es of reason that have dominated accounts in the Western tradition, diverting us toward the private worlds of hunches and gut reactions. This paper explores the nature of kisceral arguments, comparing them to the way intuition operates in William James’ examination of mystical experience. Having provided an account of kisceral arguments and their operation, the discussion turns to the even more challenging issue of how such arguments should be evaluated. Résumé: Parmi les différents modes qui caractérisent la théorie multimo- dale de l'argumentation de Michael Gilbert, le kiscéral est à bien des égards le plus difficile à comprendre et à utiliser. Il semble contourner les processus de la raison qui ont dominé les récits dans la tradition occidentale, nous détournant vers les mondes privés des intuitions et des réactions viscé- rales. Cet article explore la nature des arguments kiscéraux, en les comparant à la manière dont l'intuition opère dans l'examen de l'expérience mystique par William James. Après avoir fourni un compte rendu des arguments kiscéraux et de leur fonctionnement, la discus- sion se tourne vers la question encore plus difficile de savoir comment ces arguments doivent être évalués. Keywords: informal logic, intuition, kisceral argument, multi-modal argumen- tation, mysticism “There are, indeed, things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. They are what is mystical” (Wittgenstein 1922, 6.522). 1. Introduction The kisceral mode is the most elusive of the primary set of modes advanced in the theory of multi-modal argumentation introduced 604 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. by Michael Gilbert. Commentators have a tendency to avoid it, focusing instead on those modes that invite greater purchase. Or, perhaps, deterred by examples of hunches and intuitions, they feel it unworthy of scholarly discussion. And yet in the contexts of exploring “speech” and argumentative situations in their entirety, and entertaining a range of alternative epistemologies, the realm of the kisceral is an important place to go for insight and analysis. And, as I will suggest, aspects of the kisceral—particularly intui- tion—have played important roles both in historical and contem- porary accounts of how people reason, from William James’ in- sistence on the “sentiment of rationality,” to social psychologists like Jonathan Haidt’s proposal that people are fundamentally intuitive rather than rational (Haidt 2012). It is not difficult to find examples of what Haidt envisages in the philosophical literature. Consider the popularity that reflective equilibrium holds for many analytical philosophers. This tracks back to John Rawls’ (1971) argument that people have a “sense” of justice that can be drawn on to develop judgments which are adjusted until brought into “equilibrium” such that they can then guide practice. In spite of criticism of this idea (and its many varieties), and even of Rawls’ reluctance to use the term “intui- tion,” it highlights the roots of much deliberation in intuitive reac- tions. Or perhaps a better example is the way Judith Jarvis Thom- son (1985) was able to challenge Philippa Foot’s (1967) initial presentation of the “trolley problem” with examples that provided the same outcome as Foot’s example but were deemed intuitively just wrong. Yes, we may feel it is better to divert a runaway trolley from five potential victims onto a track where only one person is killed. But while the alternative action of pushing a very large man from a bridge onto the track to stop the trolley produces the same outcome (five saved; one lost), almost everyone finds that alterna- tive action intuitively wrong (Thomson 1985, pp. 1409-10). We also find comparative cases in less academic sources: In an Op-ed piece in the New York Times, feminist writers Elisa Al- bert and Jennifer Block (2020) offer a spirited defence of Gwyneth Paltrow and her commercial endeavours. They note that Paltrow has a reputation as a purveyor of health misinformation and as someone who represents a danger to critical thinking! Her Goop On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 605 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. industry conveyed through a Netflix show promotes “cold therapy, energy healing, longevity diets, and therapeutic use of psychedel- ics” (2020) and other suspect practices. To begin with, Albert and Block conform to the accepted pat- terns of informal reasoning, advancing an argument that fits the scheme for lack of knowledge (Walton, Reed and Macagno 2008). They observe that so far there have been no documented reports in the medical literature of Paltrow’s therapies causing anyone harm. The inference here is that, given the attention and heightened criticism that has been directed at Paltrow, if there were docu- mented cases, they would be reported. Since no reports have been forthcoming, it’s plausible to conclude that the therapies are not harmful. But the authors then proceed to offer the following observa- tions: Throughout history, women in particular have been mocked, re- viled, and murdered for maintaining knowledge and practices that frightened, confused and confounded “the authorities.” (Namely the church, and later, medicine.) Criticism of Goop is founded, at least in part, upon deeply ingrained reserves of fear, loathing, and ignorance about things we cannot see, touch, authenticate, prove, own or quantify. It is emblematic of a cultural insistence that we quash intuitive measures and “other” ways of knowing—the sort handed down via oral tradition, which, for most women through- out history, was the only way of knowing. In other words, it’s classic patriarchal devaluation. (Albert and Block 2020) I would suggest that where this (admittedly highly controversial) claim leads us is into a discussion of the kisceral mode. Their challenge to a culture that insists we quash intuition and “other” ways of knowing is in turn an invitation to understand intuition as a way of knowing. In what follows, I explore ways in which Mi- chael Gilbert’s kisceral mode not only joins this challenge of a culture that would dismiss or marginalize intuition, but also fits into a tradition of philosophical thought with serious pedigree, extending as it does back through William James to Socrates. Taking kisceral arguments seriously also means that we must confront the thorny issue of how such reasoning should be evalu- 606 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. ated, and this is something I address in the final section of the paper. But first, we should be clear what Gilbert means by the kisceral mode. 2. What is the kisceral? Going to the source. When he first introduces the concept, Michael Gilbert describes the kisceral mode as follows: The term ‘kisceral’ derives from the Japanese word ‘ki’ which signifies energy, life-force, connectedness. I introduce it as a ge- neric, non-value-laden term to cover a wide group of communica- tive phenomena. The kisceral is that mode of communication that relies on the intuitive, the imaginative, the religious, the spiritual, and the mystical. It is a wide category used frequently beyond the halls of academe. (Gilbert 2011, p. 164) He goes on to discuss the “hunches” and “feelings” that are com- mon experiences and yet inexplicable in ordinary terms, while insisting that the kisceral is a crucial element in the frameworks that inform our beliefs (2011, p. 168). But his category is more expansive, and explicitly accommodates the mystical with its private access to experiences that slide beneath the power of eve- ryday consciousness to process them. In a footnote after the intro- duction of the kisceral in Coalescent argumentation (1997) Gilbert ventures a word of caution: I take the liberty of introducing a new term here in order to afford sufficient breadth without at the same time using terminology generally in disrepute. That is, the kisceral covers not only the in- tuitive but also, for those who indulge, the mystical, religious, su- pernatural and extrasensory. ‘Kisceral’ is chosen in order to have a description that does not carry with it normative baggage, like, for example, ‘mystical’ or ‘extra-sensory.’ (1997, p. 79fn29)1 Of course, the degree of disrepute with which a term is marred depends very much on the community that is issuing the judgment 1 Nor does it carry with it metaphysical or spiritual, baggage (Glibert 1997, p. 87). On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 607 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. about it, just as “those who indulge” indicates a specific communi- ty of relevant participants in such practices. So, in the course of our inquiry it is worth considering members of one such communi- ty: that of those religious and non-religious mystics that are part of William James (1902/2004) study of religious experience. 3. William James on kisceral reasoning In The varieties of religious experience (1902/2004), William James argues that “the existence of mystical states absolutely overthrows the pretension of non-mystical states to be the sole and ultimate dictators of what we may believe” (p. 317). This has serious implications for any epistemology, offering a complement to what we might consider “ordinary” consciousness and the in- formation it provides. For James, the “mystical state” is a broad category that includes all states of consciousness, from those that are drug-induced, to the heightened awareness provoked by wonders of nature, and even the effects of chloroform.2 It is the kind of category suggested by Georges Bataille’s (2014) “inner experience” where he considers what he describes as “meditated emotion” (2014, p. 9).3 A problem with the mystical, as James and others describe it, is the subjective nature of the experience and the difficulties the individual has in conveying what has been experienced. Given this problem, it is hard to see it contributing anything useful to our understanding of argumentation. As James conveys this, the expe- riences are authoritative for those who have them, but have little general value. It is therefore common to refer to mystical experiences as “par- adoxical”: people are describing what they experience as inde- scribable. It is important though to recognize here that the so- called paradox is not in the mystical experience itself but arises in the processes of reporting the experience to “rational” conscious- 2 R.C. Zaehner (1957) also based a study of mysticism on an exploration of the effects of mescalin as they are recounted in the experiences of Aldous Huxley. 3 Bataille’s account is predicated on the absence of god, and so seems outside of some of what attracts Gilbert’s attention. But it still addresses experiences that operate beneath the level of everyday consciousness. 608 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. ness. The paradox is in the struggle to convey something to our everyday consciousness, and this is exactly because “paradox” is a concept from the Critical-Logical (C-L) mode of reasoning. It is a tool of that mode of reasoning, used to expose problems when ideas clash. Accordingly, aspects of mystical experience (like describing what is indescribable) are judged paradoxical. This is the kind of concern to which Gilbert himself draws attention when he insists that we not restrict ourselves to the narrow meanings that “one particular group believes ought to be used” (Gilbert 1997, p. 79). James is pushing the discussion in a similar direction. While Gilbert initially associated the kisceral with religious expe- rience, studies like James’ that advance the discussion beyond the linear rationality of everyday consciousness and strive to under- stand the nature of the mystical, allow it a wider role in human experience that any account of multi-modal argumentation should welcome. Among the insights offered by mysticism are those that relate to the cognitive states involved. The contrast that attracts James is one between intuition and conceptual thought, or the linear reason that Gilbert identifies with the C-L mode. In a footnote that discusses Walt Whitman, James speaks of something in each person that is “apart from mere intellect…that realizes without argument…an intuition of the absolute balance” (Whitman, cited in James 1902/2004, p. 293fn15). An intuitive grasp of the mind is alleged to bypass reason (argument) as a tool of knowledge. This sets up a contrast for James between intuition and the “truths” it supplies and propositional thought and judg- ment. The comparison of note is to the knowledge that might be derived from first-hand perception, where we cannot know directly what another person experiences but have no grounds to challenge their testimony. For James, this is the crux of what the mystical experience offers: Mystical truth exists for the individual who has the transport … it resembles the knowledge given to us in sensations more than that given by conceptual thought. Thought, with its remoteness and abstractness, has often enough in the history of philosophy been contrasted unfavorably with sensation. It is a commonplace of metaphysics that God’s knowledge cannot be discursive but must be intuitive, that is, must be constructed more after the pattern of On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 609 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. what in ourselves is called immediate feeling, than after that of proposition and judgment. But our immediate feelings have no content but what the five senses supply. (p. 300) In earlier work, James had railed against the tendency of writers (particularly philosophers) to limit the full range of human experi- ence in their systems. In “The sentiment of rationality,” one of the “other essays in popular philosophy” that he reprinted with “The will to believe” (1897), James championed the “anesthetic state” of freedom he termed the sentiment of rationality, laying equal stress on both terms.4 Noteworthy for our concerns is the argument he develops against thinkers like Huxley and Clifford who value scientific evidence over the (controversially-phrased) self- verifying evidence of faith. It is his claim about the role that faith plays in philosophic and scientific thought that stands out here. Nowhere in the paper does James refer to intuition. But consid- er the import of the following retort to those he is critiquing: How have they succeeded in so stultifying their sense for the liv- ing facts of human nature as not to perceive that every philoso- pher, or man of science either, whose initiative counts for any- thing in the evolution of thought, has taken his stand on a sort of dumb conviction that the truth must lie in one direction rather than another, and a sort of preliminary assurance that his notion can be made to work; and has borne his best fruit in trying to make it work? (1956, p. 93) Substitute “intuition” and the cognitive conviction associated with it for the two phrases I have emphasized, and you have the groundwork for the ideas that James will develop in The varieties of religious experience. What is to be appreciated in a Huxley or a Clifford, continues James, is not abstract learning of the professor, “but the human personality ready to go in for what he feels to be right, in spite of all appearances” (p. 93). It is this feeling of right- 4 The ideas in this essay extend over a long period of James’ career. Early portions of the essay are extracted from an article printed in Mind (1879), while the crucial sections on mysticism and faith stem from a lecture to the Harvard Philosophical Club in 1880, published in the Princeton Review, July 1882. Citations are from the 1956 Dover reprint. 610 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. ness that belongs to the kisceral mode. Although it needs to be recognized that, should this point find agreement, then what is we are doing is assigning the kisceral a much broader role in human cognitive activity than might previously have been appreciated, laying it beneath the motivations of philosophy and scientific discovery.5 We should be adding James to the list of philosophers that Gilbert identified as having appealed to intuition (2011, p.164). James concludes his essay with the claim that any philoso- phy which is to earn the label “rational” by everyone must to a great degree “make a direct appeal to all those powers of our nature which we hold in highest esteem” (1956, p. 110). This is a call echoed by Gilbert: As philosophers and scientists we must rely on kisceral arguments in order to create our theories; they are the foundations of our intel- lectual edifices. It is the kisceral, that which is true (or accepted) but unproven that prevents the inevitable infinite regress that would otherwise appear in every argument we have. (2011, p. 165) I think the key point we might take away from James’ reflections on mysticism, and particularly The varieties of religious experi- ence, is the parallel suggested between these intuitive states and everyday first-person perceptions. As James insists towards the end of his lectures: “Our own more “rational” beliefs are based on evidence exactly similar in nature to that which mystics quote for theirs” (p. 314, my italics). What he means is that we derive our beliefs about the world largely through sensory experience which is individual in nature and later submitted for corroboration by others. Similarly, mystical experiences “are as direct perceptions of fact for those who have them as any sensations ever were for us” (p. 314.).6 Here, James is returning to the authoritative nature 5 Compare also the role that surprise plays in the heuristic searches of scientific discovery, where facts become incoherent because they are exceeded by insight (Thagard 2006, p.253). Paul Thagard’s work here would connect the emotional and kisceral modes. 6 There is still an “us versus them” dynamic at work here with which some may be uncomfortable; it encourages the belief that one position sets the standard by which another is to be measured. But, minimally, this allows us to advance the discussion. On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 611 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. of the experiences, and the quality of felt emotion that is attached to the information received, assuring the recipient of its value. The contrast at work here, between the direct perceptions of one “rationality” and the linear inferences of another, parallels that which characterize some of the infamous studies of “rationality,” like the experiments conducted by Alexander Luria (1976) and his colleagues in the 1930s,7 where “subjects” had their persistent recourse to first-hand experience devalued in the face of the de- mands placed on them by the more abstract rationality of a differ- ent, more formal, system. This is the same contrast between the immediacy of intuition and the sequential inferences of linear rationality that the kisceral mode brings to light. In the ways in which it accommodates the mystical, with its private access to experiences that operate in a different register from so-called everyday consciousness, Gilbert’s kisceral mode not only has an authoritative philosophical heritage, it also widens the range of the evidentiary to which appeals are regularly made, and it gives those appeals renewed credence. On James’ terms, such appeals are no less “real” than other sources of evidence for positions and the decisions that may follow from them. We can pursue this point further by delving further into the history of Western thought and considering some of the argumentation asso- ciated with Socrates. 2. Socrates’ dream There might be no better mode than the kisceral to accommodate evidence extracted from dreams.8 To illustrate this, consider the 7 Luria and his colleagues in 1930s Uzbekistan explored cognitive development through a series of studies that tested the ability of non-literate subjects to “reason logically.” Restricting this logic largely to the Aristotelian syllogism, they were met with repeated failures to draw the “logical” conclusion. A careful review of the subjects’ responses, however, suggests they reasoned quite well by appealing to what they experienced (See Tindale 2021 for a discussion of these experiments). 8 It is the extraction that is important. That is, the dream itself, while being the source of belief, has no voice other than that which the interpreter provides. So, 612 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. case of Western philosophy’s favourite reasoner, Socrates. In the Crito, Plato offers the following support for Socrates’ belief that, having been condemned to death and imprisoned, he will not die on the day after Crito visits him in jail. Socrates: What is it? Has the ship arrived from Delos, upon whose arrival I must die? Crito: No, it hasn't arrived, but it looks like it will arrive today, based on what some people who have come from Sounion report, who left it there. It's clear from this that it will arrive today, and you will have to end your life tomorrow, Socrates. Socrates: May it be for the best, Crito. If this pleases the gods, so be it. However, I don't think it will come today. Crito: Where do you get your evidence for this? Socrates: I will tell you. I must be put to death sometime the day after the ship arrives? Crito: That's what the authorities in these matters say, at least. Socrates: In that case, I don't think it will arrive this coming day, but the next. My evidence is something I saw in a dream a little while ago during the night. It's likely that you chose a very good time not to wake me. Crito: Well, what was the dream? Socrates: A woman appeared, coming towards me, fine and good- looking, wearing white clothing. She called to me and said, "Soc- rates, you shall arrive in fertile Pythia on the third day." Crito: What a strange dream, Socrates. Socrates: But obvious, at least as it appears to me, Crito. (Plato 2012, 43c-44b) Now, there’s clearly some C-L inferencing going on here. As we know, the modes do not necessarily work in isolation. But the primary source for Socrates’ belief is the dream he has had. A dream that, strange as it may be, Crito does not question, in spite it is the narrative that ensues—the dream as text and image—that provides the evidence. I am grateful to Blake Scott for drawing these details to my attention. On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 613 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. of his own argument that was based on empirical evidence.9 In so many communities, older and contemporary, Indigenous and non- Indigenous, dreams serve as a source for directing human affairs. A more concerted discussion/study than anything that can be conducted here needs to pursue this avenue of kisceral reasoning. The Socrates of Plato’s dialogues moves around his city di- rected, or at least constrained, by a “voice” to which he lends absolute trust. This is his infamous “nay-saying” voice, that tells him what not to do, not what to do. He does not believe the out- come of his trial to be really as serious as it appears (a death sen- tence!) because his voice did not constrain him from attending the court that day (Plato 1966, Apology, 40b). As much as this feature of his character has received repeated comment, no one (to my knowledge) has offered a clear explanation of its nature. That it serves as a primitive type of conscience might accommodate its directive nature, but conscience leads us to perform actions, not just to avoid them. However, we are on firmer ground if we simply assign the “voice” to the category of intuition. It is to be noted (and this is relevant for our subsequent discussion of evaluation below) that this is intuition aided by experience. Namely, it has worked in the past; it has served as a reliable source of direction. On that basis, Socrates professes confidence in it. As a type of evidence to support decisions, to what other mode could we assign this other than to the kisceral? 5. Intuitive measures and “other” ways of knowing William James and Socrates both endorse other ways of knowing. In light of what we have learned from them, I want now to explore further the earlier example taken from The New York Times. Right- ly or wrongly, Elisa Albert and Jennifer Block assign the backlash against Paltrow to a particular cultural prejudice that has wider ramifications. They are not dismissive of evidence-based research, even though they tend to refer to “science” with the scare quotes, 9 Prodicus relays the famous parable of Heracles at the crossroads, visited by two women representing vice and virtue, the latter dressed in white. In Xeno- phon’s Memorabilia, the character of Socrates refers to this story. So, the story is a possible source of the dream. 614 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. but they seem more eager to encourage a greater respect towards (and thus greater respectability for) alternatives that have been traditionally associated with women. It is the derogation of that tradition, with “old wives’ tales” on one side and “peer-reviewed, lab-generated, randomized, controlled, double-blinded evidence” on the other, that concerns them. The latter will always be “the gold standard,” but it is a standard that can be supplemented. Some people know one way; other people know otherwise. Or, as we might prefer now to state this, otherwise (Tindale 2021, p. 175). Because what is called for is an extension of our understand- ing of wisdom and what should count. Societies have always measured this in different ways and recognized it in different kinds of people. In so far as experience confirms the success of knowledge claims, those claims become an accepted wisdom. This point is particularly cherished by Albert and Block who can refer to a “tradition” of women’s knowing that involves knowledge claims, some based on intuition, that are corroborated by the expe- riences of the community involved. So, whatever may be thought of the particular issue and person that occasions their argument, the points they raise merit careful consideration. Insofar as they see “fear, loathing, and ignorance about things we cannot see, touch, authenticate, prove, own or quantify,” they tap into a common, unconscious prejudice that things like Gilbert’s kisceral mode challenges. Because Gilbert is identifying a level of experience that is shared between and be- yond the communities that interest Albert and Block. It is a bigger step from this to claim, as they do, that the prejudice is “emblem- atic of a cultural insistence that we quash intuitive measures and “other” ways of knowing.” It may simply be the ignorance of which they speak that is most operative. On that front, one remedy is to draw attention to other ways of knowing, and this is what they, along with Gilbert, are doing. 6. A challenge Ultimately, as Gilbert has observed, “[t]he issue is not whether kisceral arguments are used, but, rather, how we can distinguish good ones from bad ones” (Gilbert 2011, p. 169). He offers as On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 615 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. criteria of assessment of this mode an “openness to investigation, plausibility, utility, and ability to withstand inquiry” (p. 170). This approach differs from what is proposed in Gilbert (1997), where he adopts the criteria of informal logic advanced by Ralph Johnson and J. Anthony Blair (1993) as a means of evaluating across modes. Let’s begin with the criteria of that account and look for a way to them combine with the later criteria. Key to this is Gilbert’s evaluation of an example: (7.4) ‘The Wise One.’ 1. “I don’t understand,” the acolyte said. “How do we know that triadism is the true way to view the universe?” 2. “You have but to look into your deepest soul to find the an- swer.” 3. “But I have looked, O, Wise One, and I find it not.” 4. The Wise smiled knowingly. “Then you have not looked deep enough.” (1997, p. 95) The problem with this example, as identified by Gilbert in the text, is that it seems to represent the kind of self-fulfilling case that is impossible to contradict. Whatever answer the acolyte returns, the response will be the same. The Johnson and Blair (1993) criteria of relevance, sufficiency, and acceptability (the R-S-A Tests) have been widely adopted, observes Gilbert, by most informal logicians (1997, p. 97). More- over, he claims, each of the three criteria is “delineated not by their internal characteristics, but by the mode in which they oper- ate. In other words, each of the modes can define, for itself, rele- vance, sufficiency, and acceptability” (p. 97). There are two relat- ed claims at work here. Johnson and Blair would see a criterion like ‘relevance’, I think, governed more generally by the condi- tions that operate in the C-L environment (and Gilbert does allow that his claim applies most especially to the criteria of sufficiency and acceptability). But I want here to address more the second claim—that each mode can define the criteria for itself—and restrict this to our discussion of the kisceral mode. What, for example, makes the kisceral evidence acceptable? And here it is important to ask first “for whom” should it be ac- 616 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. ceptable? The theory of multi-modal argumentation has aspirations to be a general theory, yet its lessons remain individual-, commu- nity-, framework-, audience-specific. Which in turn is to indicate that we are not dealing with an epistemic theory of argumentation. It is a theory that, while it accommodates talk of truths, does not consider the “truth” as a goal. The goals at stake are more directly associated with inter-personal communication. That is the com- mon message of all the principal texts involved, from Gilbert (1997) to Gilbert (2015). If, as William James argues, intuitive knowledge or insight is sufficiently parallel to personal knowledge, then we can approach the first in the way we do the second. Groarke and Tindale (2013), for example, consider the plausibility of personal knowledge claims, shifting the burden of proof on those who would challenge them to support that challenge. We have no grounds to question the testimony of others unless that testimony involves claims that exceed what is plausible,10 and claims from intuition fall naturally under the larger class of testimonial claims. Now, as again Mi- chael Gilbert would rightly note, what counts as plausible may itself be a product of the framework in which people operate. People of various religious persuasions share in belief systems that people outside of those persuasions may not recognize as ground- ing plausible claims. Two things should be noted here: (i) first, this is to recognize the basic importance of acknowledging the audi- ences for argumentation. We have long recognized the failure of uptake when such a fundamental contextual feature is ignored; and (ii) secondly, there is a more general underlying sense to how we judge the plausibility of intuitions. That is, the kinds of experienc- es described in the texts of the multi-modal account must, in order to communicate at the level they do, speak to shared commonali- ties that people can recognize and relate to. We know what it is like to act on a hunch or dismiss one as probably groundless. We have intuitions, they form part of our psychological makeup. It is another thing of note, also long-recognized among argumentation theorists, that we are not dealing with a separated faculty of reason 10 Plausibility, it will be noted, is included among the criteria of the 2011 list. In fact, it recommends itself as the key criterion that the two lists have in common. On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 617 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. that is being addressed in audiences. Argumentation is addressed to the whole person in all her complexity. It is an enduring merit of the multi-modal account to insist on foregrounding this reality and finding ways to accommodate it. On these terms, how “acceptable” is the kisceral evidence accepted by James, Socrates, and our contemporary feminists? For James, we recall, “mystical truth exists for the individual who has the transport … it resembles the knowledge given to us in sensa- tions more than that given by conceptual thought” (James 1902/2004, p. 300). The knowledge derived from sensation is immediate and personal. As a type of “truth”—and this is not a subject to divert too far into here—it has the kind of coherence that sensory experience offers. The audience here must be limited. It is very much a framework experience. More sharable is the evidence of Socrates’ dream, in spite of the more private nature of the immediate experience. Crito accepts the evidence of the dream over the eye-witness testimony of those who have seen the ship. That acceptance can only find support in a shared community for whom dreams have cognitive weight. Albert and Block set intui- tion on a par, not with sensation, but with other ways of knowing like the oral tradition. The acceptability of their claims (about Paltrow’s own claims) finds its home again in a community, this one of women whose common experience finds an echo in what they assert. Their reasoning is a mixture of (at least) the logical and the kisceral, brought together to defend Paltrow’s practices. It is to some degree explanatory: if so many women have found comfort in these practices it should be no surprise, because they are therapeutic and provide an experience not available elsewhere. The community judging acceptability, or plausibility, has expand- ed further in each case: from James’s mystic, to the Greek dream- er, to Albert and Block’s brand of feminism. Sufficiency has always been a more difficult criterion to treat. Arguments can have acceptable premises that are relevant to the claim they proport to support, yet still be inadequate in terms of the support they provide. On this front, the corroborative nature of kisceral claims is important. The stand-alone testimony of an individual rarely receives much credence, unless it reports on an experience that very few can have. The wise one in Gilbert’s 618 Tindale © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. example is not addressing an insufficiency in the acolyte’s evi- dence but in his effort. For Gilbert, sufficiency will vary according to the mode (1997, p. 97), an argument needs to be adequate to the standards of the criteria, to the relevant experts and foundational beliefs of the mode (p. 99). In the 2011 paper, with the specific criteria of evaluation it offers, Gilbert traces all intuitions to an underlying Popperian axiom: the principle of defeasibility: which requires the belief that “one could under some conceivable circumstances be wrong” (2011, p. 167). The point here is surely that on almost every occa- sion we cannot wait for absolute certainty before we proceed. This is the understanding that opened up the domain of argumentation as we know it for Aristotle. It is the understanding that divides argumentation from demonstration for later theorists like Chaïm Perelman (1982). It is the understanding that propelled Wayne Brockriede into prominence with his recognition of the need for an inferential leap (Brockriede 2006). It is the understanding that informs the revisions of informal logic announced in the approach by Douglas Walton to defeasible argumentation schemes. We judge or act on the basis of the best evidence available to us, re- viewing and measuring that evidence according the strongest criteria available; but we remain open to a review of our judg- ments should new evidence be forthcoming. Plausible kisceral arguments cannot be of the self-supporting variety that “The Wise One” example illustrates. They must meet the fundamental criterion of strength for rhetorical arguments of any mode: resistance to refutation, as this was detailed, around the same time, by Perelman with Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca (1969) and by Stephen Toulmin (1958). This in turn requires the prior stage of being open to refutation, which is itself to possess the character of defeasibility (Tindale 2020). But Gilbert has shown enough for us to be mode-specific about this requirement. Refutation, itself a concept with C-L associations, should vary according to the mode. It should not be a matter of one mode (largely the logical) chal- lenging the findings of others. As Gilbert repeatedly insists, the modes can operate together and rarely will we find one in isolation from the others. Still, within a mode, if several women intuitively On the Kisceral Mode of Argumentation 619 © Christopher Tindale. Informal Logic, Vol. 42, No. 3 (2022), pp. 603–621. find one of Paltrow’s claims implausible, that tells against it.11 A burden of proof (again a mode-variant feature of argumentation) would then require support for the counter claim. If Socrates’ “voice” issues inconsistent directions, then the conflict needs to be resolved on terms internal to the mode involved. Some conditions of argumentation are mode-variant, some not. What belongs to each of these categories is another subject for future study. The intuition that James championed was an intuition that found its plausibility in its association with testimonial evidence. Both find their roots in human experience. And this, ultimately, is the common feature of the evaluative criteria to which the kisceral reports. The kisceral returns us to the human roots of argumenta- tion is the most powerful of ways, just as the multi-modal account reconnects argumentation to the whole person and not a detached reason. It takes us back to the Greek notion of humanism, where the human being is the measure of all things, those that are, that they are, and those that are not, that they are not. 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