A cognitive-phenomenological interpretation of a rhetorical example

This paper zeroes in on an example (paradeigma, argument based on parallel cases), which is, according to Aristotle, one of the two modes of rhetorical persuasive arguments. It was an idea of Vit-torio Gallese, a prominent cognitive neuroscientist and neuropsychologist, one of the discoverers of mirror neurons, concerning the close relationship of simulation mirror resonance mechanisms and Aristotelian paradeigma, that served as a motive for the paper. First, the author considers Aristotle's interpretation of paradeigma in detail. In so doing, the appropriate paragraphs of Rhetoric and Prior Analytics are examined. After that, to make the paper self-contained, the key conception of transcendental appresentation (analogizing apperception) is briefly outlined as it was introduced and considered by Husserl in the Fifth Cartesian Meditation. The ground of this cognitive procedure is formed by the embedded and embodied mechanism of pairing, which makes it especially interesting, when a rhetoric example is concerned. With that in mind, the author proposes a novel reconstruction of pa-radeigma based upon the phenomenological conception of apperception, which provides the comprehension of a situation-as-stimulus in accordance with a paradigmatic model example. The core feature of this reconstruction lays in a very specific premise asserting the sameness of the stimulus and the model example within a certain category. The author consider this cognitive procedure to be grounded in a more fundamental faculty in charge for categorization and typefication. Thus, Aristotelian pa-radeigma (a) accompanied by an appropriate syllogism ad hoc (b) corresponds to Husserlian apperception containing pairing (a) and apperceptive transfer of sense from a model object to a new stimulus (b). The author argues for essential irreducibility of a rhetorical example to standard types of deductive and plausible arguments, including inductive generalization and analogical inference. The closing section sums up all the above and provides a suggestive explanation of the persuasive power of a rhetoric example.

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