The Art of Dialectic between Dialogue and Rhetoric: The Aristotelian Tradition by Marta Spranzi (review)

Ever since G. E. L. Owen’s well-known paper on Aristotelian logic (“Tithenai ta Phainomena,” 1986), there has been a growing interest on Aristotle’s dialectical method and its modern interpretations. Perhaps the most important of all contributions was made in 1997 by Paul Slomkowski with his detailed study of Topics, and in the same year by Robin Smith with his translation of Topics. More importantly, there were different interpretations of Aristotle’s Topics and dialectic among scholars such as J. D. G. Evans and P. M. Huby. In May Sim’s edited collection From Puzzles to Principles?: Essays on Aristotle’s Dialectic (1999), scholars of classical philosophy disputed whether or not Aristotle was a dialectical thinker.

Within this context, Marta Spranzi’s The Art of Dialectic between Dialogue and Rhetoric offers a comprehensive legacy of the Aristotelian dialectic while exploring the significance of the art of dialectic in the development of philosophical methods of inquiry. Spranzi tries to reconstruct an “Aristotelian tradition” in dialectic by using Aristotle’s Topics as a source text for the later philosophical development of dialectic, both in form and content. Spranzi’s central argument is that Aristotle’s text holds the blueprint for the later development of two different types of dialectic: opinion-oriented disputational and truth-oriented aporetic.

She carries out her project in seven chapters. The first chapter discusses the origin and definition of dialectic through a detailed analysis of Aristotle’s Topics. Chapter 2 explores connections between Aristotelian dialectic and the form of dialectic that emerged during the Renaissance. She discusses the dialectics of Cicero and Boethius within the scholastic tradition, and how they also influenced Renaissance dialectic. The author uses this chapter as a transition between Aristotle’s original context and the Italian Renaissance that she subsequently discusses in greater detail. Chapter 3 lays out her points regarding the three ways in which Renaissance dialectic followed in the Aristotelian tradition. Here, Spranzi notes that the Renaissance saw a revival in the Aristotelian model of dialectic, and that those Renaissance authors recovered what they believed to be the “real” Aristotelian view of dialectic.

Spranzi represents Rudolph Agricola in chapter 4 as one of the founders of the “new dialectic” movement, which bridged the gap between rhetoric and dialectic and set the stage for a more thorough Aristotelian approach. She claims that Agricola’s theory emphasizes the development of “probable” arguments rather than “true” arguments. Chapter 5 discusses Agostino Nifo, who defended Aristotle’s Topics against medieval interpretations by utilizing the commentaries of Alexander of Aphrodisias and Averroes. Spranzi then sets up her goal for the following chapters (5 and 6), discussing dialectic and its role on the “road to truth,” rather than winning the argumentation.

In chapter 6, Spranzi draws our attention to the final development of the Renaissance period through Carlo Sigonio’s treatise De dialogo liber, published in 1562. She claims that Sigonio’s theory is a turn back toward the Aristotelian sense of dialectic, in its emphasis on dialectic as a road to truth through the testing of opinions and beliefs in disputation. The seventh and final chapter begins with a discussion of the relative abandonment of dialectic during the Scientific Revolution due to the search for a reliable scientific method. Spranzi then moves the discussion forward into modern times and points out the works of more recent theorists including Stephen Toulmin, Chaim Perelman, Van Eemeren, James Freeman, and Douglas Walton. She discusses whether or not their approaches position them in the Aristotelian tradition in terms of dialectic.

Throughout the book, Spranzi compares and assesses the sources and contents of Aristotelian traditions; however, there are three areas which may need further elaboration and clarification. First, her text is thorough within the context of the Greek and Italian philosophers; however, she does not discuss the way Aristotelian dialectic was developed and modified in other European (i.e. German ars disputandi) and non-European philosophies...