Deception in Aristotle's Rhetoric: How to Tell the Rhetorician from the Sophist, and Which One to Bet On

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1994

Disciplines

Ancient Philosophy | Arts and Humanities | Classics | Philosophy | Rhetoric | Rhetoric and Composition

Abstract

“Whenever I give a talk about the Rhetoric, audiences ask about rhetorical deception and fraud, about the morality of rhetoric, and about how to tell a good rhetorician from a sophist. The first and most important thing to say about the Rhetoric in connection with such questions of the morality of rhetoric is that Aristotle has very little to say about them, and, as far as I can tell, very little interest in them.[…]It is worth asking why these questions have so little interest for Aristotle.”

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