Discussion On The Disputations Of The School Of Ming In Ancient China:a Perspective Of Rhetorical Enthymeme

Rhetoric studies the art and the practice of language, including the research of reasoning and persuasion. The core of rhetoric is the attention of audience. According to Aristotle, the rhetorical persuasion shall primarily be subject to "logos"(logical rationality) to ensure the rhetorical ratiocination stands up the rational mentality of the audience. Meanwhile, the existence of irrationality in audience’s thinking determines that enthymeme----rhetorical reasoning, which shall equally attend to "logos" and probabilities caused by the irrationality, is distinguishing from the pure logic demonstration since it has a little strict request in the formalness and intactness of the reasoning form or in the preciseness of processing and utter trustworthiness in content. Rather than thesis beyond debate, rhetorical enthymeme mainly acts on the arguable discussion. It can be applied to disputant propositions or the demonstration of personal opinion and the persuasion with auxiliary reasoning open to the public. The propositions from the School of Ming in ancient China bear such kind of rhetorical nature.The theory of the School of Ming generated in the period of Spring and Autumn and Warring states of ancient China (770-221B.C.). Compared to the previous days, people’s recognition towards the world, though had taken a great leap, but due to the unadvanced development of science and knowledge, still crept in primitive stage. It resulted that some of their descriptions about the objective entity could be reasonable, but some were fallacious. The thought of School of Ming was one of that type, and their unique perspective and argumentation had attached criticism as "quibbling" in Chinese history. Meanwhile, in the early introducing literature about the School of Ming western scholars tended to explain and interpret it under the theories of oriental philosophy, polemics or paradox. As the recent years have witnessed the renew study on the School of Ming, both Chinese or foreign scholars who summarize the previous relevant theories, are trying to reconsider its value with the angles of philosophy, logic, semeiology and so forth. But still, there is huge potential for rhetorical study of the School of Ming either at home and aboard since only a few results have come out and such research is far from satisfaction. The rhetorical value within the thought of School of Ming is waiting to be explored.This article will firstly specify and discuss relevant theories of rhetorical enthymeme, bases of which it tries to explore rhetoric nature of the School of Ming with the perspective of rhetoric by the narration about the social environment and the original motive of their debating activities. After that, the article will make enumeration on propositions of Deng xi, Hui shi and Kung-sun long from the School and then the respective analysis on three aspects of "audience orientation, probabilities argumentation and mode of enthymeme" in their rhetorical appliance. Finally, the conclusion is able to prove that the School of Ming’s argumentation is not "quibbling" but a kind of rhetorical reasoning which integrates rhetoric, logic and debate organically. It possesses not only the unique oriental characteristics but also the meaning of universality that shares the common grounds with western rhetorical reasoning thought in different approaches. That can be regarded as the School of Ming’s own contribution to the development of ancient cognition. What’s more, by the discussion, this article is hoping to enrich the correlative studies of western enthymeme theories and the practical appliance of argumentative skills of Pre-Qin period at home and abroad.