 An argument is an exchange of ideas or opinions between individuals, in which the individuals express different opinions about some topic. The process of argumentation is studied in a number of different contexts, from philosophy, mathematics and science, to law, politics and psychology. A defining feature to arguments of all kind is excludability. That is to say, both members are engaged in some mutually dependent situation that excludes the possibility of each holding their beliefs or following their independent desired actions. Due to this excludability, the members engaged in an argument must go through a process in order to generate a combined outcome. In so doing, one person's argument will prevail over the others, or they will synthesize their different opinions or ideas. Arguments may be rational or non-rational. A rational argument is one that is based on objective reasoning, where the most cogent argument prevails. A non-rational argument is one based upon the subjectively motivated reasoning of the individuals, where the exchange is affective in nature, meaning that it's emotionally charged, as opposed to being logical. Likewise, arguments may be categorized as being formal or informal. Informal arguments, as studied in informal logic, are presented in natural language and are intended for everyday discourse. Inversely, formal arguments are studied in formal logic and are expressed in a formal language. A primate distinction can be made between arguments, depending on whether they are rational or non-rational, where rational means conducted or in accordance with objective reason. Rational and non-rational arguments have very different structures and dynamics that define their overall workings and how the conclusion is reached. A rational argument is one where the members hold objective reasons to support their case and are prepared to alter their conclusions according to that derived from the most sound reasoning. Thus a resolution can be reached based upon objective reasoning. In contrast, a non-rational argument is one based upon the subjective reasoning of the individuals. Their beliefs or opinions are not affected by objective reason and thus a conclusion cannot be reached based upon objective reasoning alone. Something that is rational is based upon reason. Something that is non-rational cannot be explained through reason alone. Non-rational arguments are obtained through intuition rather than through reasoning or objectivity. Intuition is the ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reasoning. Thus, arguments that are based on intuition are firstly derived from emotional instinct and then the holder may construct conscious reasons to support them, but the conclusion does not follow from a conceptual construction. The conceptual reasoning is just used to defend the argument, thus changing the reasons for the argument will not change the conclusion for the holder of a subjective idea or opinion because it was not created originally through objective reasoning. Non-rational arguments are based upon the subjective emotions of the individual and are driven by motivated reasoning, where members hold conclusions that are not explicable by reason and cannot be altered by reason alone. For example, the individual may hold subjective beliefs or opinions that are non-generalizable, such as the belief in the superiority of their cultural society. Such subjective beliefs cannot be supported by objective reasoning that would be applicable to all. The arguments and opinions offered by the members are subjective in nature. The opinions offered by the members in a non-rational argument have no objective grounding, that is to say one believes X because one's parents believed X, or one believes X because it makes one feel good etc. Instead of an exchange of ideas, non-rational arguments are more often effective in nature, where effective means relating to or arising from influencing feelings or emotions. Without the resort to objective reasoning, non-rational argumentation is primarily driven by the capacity to affect emotional states within the other members involved. This may take many forms, the most readily identifiable being the use of forceful coercion in order to induce fear and control over other members in the argument. However, force is most often the last resort in the interaction between people and is typically a product of all other strategies failing. More often, individuals will use positive associations to enable an effective influence that persuades or motivates a particular audience in a specific situation. The classical example of this being advertising. Advertising can be used as a form of argumentation, different members are interacting to achieve some combined outcome, typically the purchase of a product. The advertiser has a subjective argument that is to buy their products and are likewise driven by motivated reasoning to conclusions that make their products appear favourable. Advertisers typically do not use objective reasoning to persuade customers but more often engage with them on an affective level in order to appeal to their emotional desires and fears. They do this by associating a product with some positive emotional desire of the individual, most evidently the sexual desires of male consumers and trying to convince them that if they purchase the product they will achieve the desired state or inversely the relief of some undesirable state. Likewise, the same can be seen in a political debate where candidates will practice limited use of objective reasoning but instead engage in the use of affective terminology and associations to persuade the audience towards certain conclusions based upon emotional sentiments. Non-rational argumentation can be seen as an extension of motivated reasoning where there is a preconceived conclusion on the behalf of the individuals and the aim is then to simply defend that irrespective of the evidence and case that others may make against them. The agency of the members in the argument is often emotionally manipulated in order to achieve the desired conclusion. Rational arguments involve the exchange between members who believe that they have some grounds for their argument based in objective reason. To engage in rational argument, members have to be prepared to alter their opinions, beliefs or actions based upon the soundest reasoning given by any member. Rational arguments involve a reason or set of reasons given in support of an idea, action or theory. A person gives the reasons supporting their claims in order to influence others to adhere to their claims and thus reach a conclusion to the argument. Rational arguments are guided by the process of objective reasoning whereby different claims are made by the different parties involved. Individuals present evidence to support their claims and use logical inference to draw conclusions hoping to influence others to adopt their case while all the time remaining open to being influenced by the case presented by others in an attempt to find a conclusion that is justified by the soundest evidence and reason. There are a number of preconditions to a rational argument. Firstly, those engaged in a rational argument seek the free consent of others involved in the argument. Thus, unlike non-rational argumentation, where people simply use whatever means to get other people to agree with them without respect for the individual agency of those other people, rational arguments require that the members involved respect the free will and agency of the other members. They are not simply trying to get them to adopt their beliefs. They wish for the other person to come to that conclusion themselves through reason. Thus in a rational argument, one simply presents one's evidence and the process of inference used to draw the conclusion and then lets others use the evidence and inference process to derive the conclusion for themselves and thus reach a resolution to the argument. This is similar to the scientific method in the natural sciences, where when a researcher discovers something new before anyone will believe them, they have to present the data used and the process of arriving at that result. Other researchers will then perform a similar experiment. If they come to the same conclusion, then they too will typically adopt the ideas of the first researcher. In such a way, a consensus is reached by everyone having reached that consensus themselves without anyone being rehearsed and everyone's free will and agency is respected. Secondly, although the term argument may often connote conflict to many people, this form of rational argumentation is actually largely cooperative. The members have to agree on something in order to even initiate the argument. Researchers must not only share a common language, but typically share some common context within which they are arguing. For example, many arguments within the scientific community will be based upon agreement on the vast majority of ideas and lexicon within their domain, while disagreeing about some particular area of interest. Likewise, many scientists will not even engage in an argument with those who do not accept basic scientific theories such as that of evolution as they are seen too irrational and this illustrates the level of cooperation that is actually required to have a rational argument in the first place. Third, argumentation occurs only under conditions of uncertainty, about matters that could be otherwise. If the factors surrounding an argument are evident, then an argument typically will not take place. It is difficult to argue whether it is rainy or not, as one just has to put one's hand out and feel that it is either raining or not. The degree of uncertainty is so small that it is difficult to argue about it. People engage in arguments about things that are uncertain and thus controversial. Uncertainty implies that things could be otherwise. The outcome is not known for sure, and in fact it may not be possible to even know it conclusively. For example, one may have an argument about why the Roman Empire fell, because there are many factors involved and some degree of uncertainty. Typically, people will not engage in an argument if they believe that they have certainty on the question under consideration. If it is pouring rain and you are soaking wet when someone comes up and tells you that it's not raining, you will just laugh at them. You are so certain of the fact that it's raining that you will be unlikely to engage in that argument. Fourthly, because things are uncertain, arguments require that members give justification for the ideas and beliefs they support. Members have to offer a rationale for accepting an uncertain claim. Informal arguments do not offer certainty. They simply present a case that is more or less justified, depending on the strength of the evidence and the logical conclusions drawn. Members engage in the argument then either accept those claims and inferences or offer their own. Finally, members entering into a rational argument give over their beliefs to the combined process of reasoning they are engaged in with their interlocutors. In so doing, they run the risk of having to alter their beliefs or opinions. They run the risk of being shown to be wrong. Thus, the decision to engage in rational argumentation suggests a willingness to run the risk of having to change one's currently held ideas. Informal arguments, as studied in Informal Logic, are presented in natural language and are intended for everyday discourse. Conversely, formal arguments are studied in Informal Logic and are expressed in Informal Language. Informal Logic may be said to emphasise the study of argumentation, whereas Formal Logic emphasises implication and inference. Informal arguments are sometimes implicit, that is, the rational structure, the relationship of claims, premises, warrants, relations of implication and conclusions are not always spelled out and immediately visible and must sometimes be made explicit by analysis. Formal arguments are deductive in nature, meaning their conclusions follow necessarily from the premise. With deductive reasoning, the conclusion contains no information not already present, at least implicitly, in the premises. Thus, deductive reasoning does not add to our store of knowledge, it merely rearranges them. The central aim of this type of reasoning is to generate proofs, that is to say, rigorously analyse the structure of a statement to prove it is a sound argument. This deductive reasoning is analytical in nature, it requires no reference to the external world and it may be counterfactual. Although argumentation has been studied from Lenya, for much of the 20th century, the systematic study of argumentation was associated with Formal Logic, which achieved deductive certainty at the price of limited relevance to everyday affairs. However, during the past few decades, there has been renewed interest in the study of informal reasoning, which depends on probabilities. Informal reasoning is inherently uncertain, but it characterises reasoning in most areas of human activity. Very rarely does one actually reason in an analytical, so logistic form. Most real world arguments cannot be separated from their context in the way that is required to apply formal methods. Most argumentation in the world is not represented by a form in which the conclusion contains no new information. Informal logic, which is non-deductive logic, is reasoning using arguments in which the premises support the conclusion, but do not entail it, that is to say the argument is not a closed system. The process of induction that we talked about in a previous video is an example of informal argumentation, a form of reasoning that makes generalisations based on individual instances. An inductive argument is said to be cogent if, and only if, the truth of the argument's premises would render the truth of the conclusion probable, and this would make the argument what we call a strong argument.