Sophistikē; sophistry

Japanese: 詭弁 - きべん（英語表記）sophistikē; sophistry

It refers to a deliberately false argument. The emergence of sophistry coincided with the rise of the trend for logical reflection as a way of escaping direct everyday reality. This opened the possibility of using intellectual abilities, and sophistry can be broadly divided into two types. (1) An argument that appears to be logically true on the surface, but in fact contradicts the laws of logic. (2) An argument that is based on logical truth, but takes advantage of the ambiguity and ambiguity of the meaning of the premise, to reach a conclusion that cannot be considered true even from the premise that is considered to be true. Historically, the Greek sophists were the ones who were called sophists, and this is the origin of the word. Originally, sophistēs meant wise people, but from the second half of the 5th century BC, it came to refer to a group of people who traveled from town to town, imparting knowledge to people and receiving a fee for it. Representative figures include Protagoras, Gorgias, Prodicus, and Hippias. The common thread between them was teaching rhetoric, and at a time when excelling in rhetoric was a key to success in life, they attracted many young people. However, the later Sophists encouraged the talent to argue in one's own favor without being concerned with truth or falsehood, rather than philosophical issues, and created a tendency to try to convince people that something was black instead of white, so they came to be called the School of Sophists.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia About Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia Information

Japanese:

故意に行われる虚偽の議論をいう。詭弁の発生は，直接的な日常現実からの離脱としての論理的反省の機運が高まったときと期を同じくしている。そこに知的能力の用いられる可能性が開けたのだが，詭弁は次の2種類に大別されよう。 (1) 外見上は論理的に真理のようにみえながらも，実は論理則に背反した議論。 (2) 論理的真理をふまえながらも，前提となる命題の意味の多義性，曖昧さに乗じて，真とされる前提からも，とうてい真とはいえない結論を導く議論。なお歴史的に詭弁派と称されるのはギリシアのソフィストたちで，これがそのまま語源となっている。元来ソフィステス sophistēsとは賢人を意味したが，前5世紀後半からは，町から町へ巡回しながら人々に知識を授けては謝礼金を取る一群の人々をさす言葉となった。代表的な人物にプロタゴラス，ゴルギアス，プロディコス，ヒッピアスがいる。彼らの共通点は弁論術を教えることであったが，弁論に秀でることが立身出世につながった当時では，多くの青年をひきつけた。しかし後期のソフィストたちは，哲学的問題よりも真偽にこだわらないで自己に有利に弁じ立てる才能を助長し，白を黒と言いくるめるような傾向を生んだので，詭弁派と称されることになった。

出典　ブリタニカ国際大百科事典小項目事典ブリタニカ国際大百科事典小項目事典について　情報

<<: Couvade - Giben (English spelling)

>>: Ghiberti - Lorenzo Ghiberti