Understanding the role of premises within an argument is something that I think is undervalued when teaching history. When I was a teaching assistant at Carleton University, I repeatedly saw students struggle with understanding how premises, opinions, arguments, and theses build on each other. Logic studies and philosophy spend more time on premises, but getting your head around how premises play a role in historical arguments helps create strong arguments.
The relationship between a premise and an argument is not absolute: a strong premise does not mean a strong argument, and vice versa. In academic writings premises must often be inferred because they are not explicitly stated, and they are not always directly discussed in the paper. Nevertheless, they are usually quite clear.
There is always some disconnect between an individual premise and the argument. So a strong or correct premise does not ensure a strong argument. Disputing one premise does not disprove the argument. And there is no such thing as an argument that is automatically correct because the premises are correct.
Let’s walk through the relationship of premises, opinions and arguments. I’ll use Canada’s contribution to the War in Afghanistan as an example because of the wide range of possible premises.
Argument: “Paul Martin’s government made the correct decision in 2005 to escalate Canada’s involvement in the war in Afghanistan.”
What premises are behind that idea? At that point, Canada was not under threat from anyone in Afghanistan. So were we placating our major allies? Spreading human rights and liberal ideals? Combatting terrorism? Correcting historical wrongs? Defending the state-based international order by supporting a weak central government? Exacting retribution on a nation whose former government supported terrorists? Taking part in a neo-Cold War effort to limit Iran’s influence in the region? There is a very wide range of ways to defend that simple statement.
I put premises before opinion because most people’s opinions are influenced by their basic worldviews. When a worldview is applied to a topic, it becomes an opinion. I tend to think that Canada needs to work together with its allies to achieve common goals, so when I apply that idea to Canada’s involvement in Afghanistan I am likely to be of the opinion that Canada made the right choice to send forces. I can argue for Canada’s involvement by discussing how Canada and NATO allies have a long history of working together to achieve their common defence and security goals.
Premises are never absolute. Worldview + topic does not always result in a particular opinion. Canada rightfully stayed out of Iraq because there were no common goals to achieve. So my basic premise that Canada needs to be military involved does not guarantee support for military involvement.
Premises and opinions have the same colour (blue) in the model because they are personal. A TA does not have the job of changing or influencing a student’s worldview or their opinions. However, when a worldview is used as a premise to support an argument, then it is fair game to comment on how the interact with the argument. Topics are also a different colour because they are external to argument or a worldview. There can be dozens of arguments about one topic and a million worldviews that lead to those arguments, without the topic inherently funneling people to a certain idea.
Ian Weatherall 