Topics (Aristotle) - How Topics Relate To Aristotle's Theory of The Syllogism

How Topics Relate To Aristotle's Theory of The Syllogism

Though the Topics, as a whole, does not deal directly with the "forms of syllogism", clearly Aristotle contemplates the use of topics as places from which dialectical syllogisms (i.e. arguments from the commonly held ἔνδοξα) may be derived. This is evidenced by the fact that the introduction to the Topics contains and relies upon his definition of reasoning (συλλογισμός, syllogismós): a verbal expression (λόγος, lógos) in which, certain things having been laid down, other things necessarily follow from these.. Dialectical reasoning is thereafter divided by Aristotle into inductive and deductive parts. The endoxa themselves are sometimes, but not always, set out in a propositional form, i.e. an express major or minor proposition, from which the complete syllogism may be constructed. Often, such propositional construction is left as a task to the practitioner of the dialectic art; in these instances Aristotle gives only the general strategy for argument, leaving the "provision of propositions" to the ingenuity of the disputant.