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Tabula Rasa: The Relevance of Debate to Argumentation Theory

1984; American Forensic Association; Volume: 21; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00028533.1984.11951276

0002-8533

Robert C. Rowland,

Education and Critical Thinking Development

Theorists have recently proposed a dialectical test for argument quality. For example, in academic debate advocates of the tabula rasa perspective have claimed that the best test of any argument, theoretical or substantive, is its ultimate success in debate. This essay considers the value of a dialectical standard by evaluating the tabula rasa model. While tabula rasa has produced improvements in debate, it also has encouraged harmful practices that can be controlled only by limiting the model. This essay proposes limitations, and draws implications for a more general dialectical approach to argument evaluation.