Lost Translation (Modern Enthymeme)


Kristen Seas ENGL 624/Sullivan Fall 2005 Purdue University	Lost Translation - Missing Definition of Enthymeme: There is one piece of this puzzle that's missing: a lost translation of the concept that can be traced back to Aristotle but does not appear in the formalist definitions that seem to root enthymeme within logic. This definition distinguishes the enthymeme based on its content not its form, thus evoking a different process of reasoning than the clean deduction of a demonstrative syllogism. Here I quote from De Quincey's "Rhetoric" where he openly challenges the formalist means of distinguishing the enthymeme from the syllogism by merely stressing that the former has one suppressed premise: "An enthymeme differs from a syllogism, not in the accident of suppressing one of its propositions; either may do this, or neither; the difference is essential, and in the nature of the matter; that of the syllogism being certain and apodeictic; that of the enthymeme probable, and drawn from the province of opinion" (222). He grounds this in his reading of the Aristotelian province of rhetoric as dealing with probabilities, not certainties (220, 224). He openly declares that for Aristotle, the office of rhetoric was the finding of enthymeme, and that for Aristotle's rhetor the "true and universal weapon is the enthymeme" (219-20). De Quincey even cites Facciolati's claim that we have inherited the wrong definition of enthymeme from the original Greek and Latin translations (221). Whether De Quincey and Facciolati are correct is likely still up for debate. However, by raising the specter of this alternative definition of enthymeme, originating as it does frome the same source as the formal definition in Aristotle's rhetorical and logical treatises, De Quincey and others suggest the possibility that enthymeme may be much more complex concept - whether approached logically or rhetorically.
Table of Contents: Project Description 19th c. Logical Definitions of Enthymeme Main Contentions of Project: Thought v. Language Logic v. Rhetoric Argument and Reason Syllogistic Reasoning Enthymeme as Abridged Argument Lost Translation - Missing Definition of Enthymeme Works Cited

Kristen Seas
ENGL 624/Sullivan
Fall 2005
Purdue University

Lost Translation - Missing Definition of Enthymeme:

There is one piece of this puzzle that's missing: a lost translation of the concept that can be traced back to Aristotle but does not appear in the formalist definitions that seem to root enthymeme within logic. This definition distinguishes the enthymeme based on its content not its form, thus evoking a different process of reasoning than the clean deduction of a demonstrative syllogism.

Here I quote from De Quincey's "Rhetoric" where he openly challenges the formalist means of distinguishing the enthymeme from the syllogism by merely stressing that the former has one suppressed premise:

"An enthymeme differs from a syllogism, not in the accident of suppressing one of its propositions; either may do this, or neither; the difference is essential, and in the nature of the matter; that of the syllogism being certain and apodeictic; that of the enthymeme probable, and drawn from the province of opinion" (222).

He grounds this in his reading of the Aristotelian province of rhetoric as dealing with probabilities, not certainties (220, 224). He openly declares that for Aristotle, the office of rhetoric was the finding of enthymeme, and that for Aristotle's rhetor the "true and universal weapon is the enthymeme" (219-20).

De Quincey even cites Facciolati's claim that we have inherited the wrong definition of enthymeme from the original Greek and Latin translations (221).

Whether De Quincey and Facciolati are correct is likely still up for debate. However, by raising the specter of this alternative definition of enthymeme, originating as it does frome the same source as the formal definition in Aristotle's rhetorical and logical treatises, De Quincey and others suggest the possibility that enthymeme may be much more complex concept - whether approached logically or rhetorically.

Lost Translation - Missing Definition of Enthymeme:

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