Now the third common move in arguments to protect premises and, and avoid the skeptical regress is discounting. Discounting is basically citing a possible objection that you think other people might be thinking of in order to head it off by providing a quick and dirty response to it right then and there. For example, you might be talking to someone and say, well, you know, I'm thinking of buying that ring, and it's really beautiful. And your thinking, well they're going to object that the ring is very expensive, too. So you say, well, the ring is expensive, but it's beautiful. So what you're doing is citing the objection. It's kind of odd if you think about it. If you want to buy the ring why are you saying that it's expensive. And the reason is that you have already cited that objection which makes it less likely that a person on the other side who doesn't want you to buy the ring is going to say it. Because you've said I know that but it's more important to me that the ring is beautiful. So I want to buy it. So when you say the ring is expensive but it's beautiful you're saying that it's expensive. That's the first thing. You're saying that it's beautiful. That's the second thing. You're saying, with the word but, that there's a contrast between the two. And you're indicating that the fact that it's beautiful is more important than the fact that it's expensive. You're saying all of that simply by saying that the ring is expensive but it is beautiful. So first, to say that the ring is expensive but is beautiful is to say two things. It's like saying the ring is expensive and it's beautiful. But in other ways it's very different from and. Because if you say the ring is expensive and it's beautiful you can switch them around. It's beautiful and it's expensive. It's expensive and it's beautiful. It's beautiful and it's expensive. You can say it either way. If you say, it's expensive but it's beautiful that's very different from saying it's beautiful but it's expensive. Think about it. If you were trying to argue for buying the ring, which would you say? Well, I would say, it's expensive but it's beautiful. And if I'm trying to argue against buying the ring, I would say, it's beautiful but it's expensive. Because the word but indicates that the sentence after it is in some way more important than the other clause. You're discounting the other objection and citing after the but clause the reason for the belief or action that you favor. Thus, and, and but are very different. The sentences on either side of and are reversible. And the sentences on either side of but are not reversible. And there are other words that are discounting phrases like but that work the same way but fall in a different place. Consider the word although. You can say although the ring is expensive, it's beautiful. And that sounds like the ring is expensive but it's beautiful. So those are the sentences that someone would use if they're arguing for buying the ring. Because they want to emphasize that the ring is beautiful. The difference is that the word but occurs right before the clause that's getting emphasized where as the word although occurs before the clause that's de emphasized and it's the other clause besides what the speaker takes to be more important. So but and although are each discounting words but the but occurs before the emphasized clause and although occurs before the de-emphasized clause. What is common to these words like but and although is that they do three things. They assert two claims. They contrast those two claims, and they indicate that one of those claims is more important than the other. And there are lots of words that perform these functions. It's not just but and although. You have even if, even though, whereas, nevertheless, nonetheless, still. And, as with other words that we've been studying, like argument markers for example. Some of these words get used in other ways. So, the word still isn't always a discounting term. You say he's sitting still. You're not discounting an objection. It's when you use the word still at the beginning of the sentence. Still, the diamond is beautiful or something like that. Then the word still getting used in discounting word. And like with other words that we've studied if you want to know in a particular case whether the word still is being used as a discounting word. You ask whether you can substitute a different discounting word. And the sentence will function in basically the same way and mean basically the same thing. And if it does then is being used as a discounting word and if it's not. Then, it's not being used as a discounting word. So we can use the substitution method to test for what the function of the word is. So why do people use discounting words like these. They use them in order to head off objections. Because, if you state the objection first, then your opponent seems a little silly to be saying it again. You just responded to that. And so you can defend your premises, or protect your premises. And avoid the skeptical regress by discounting the kinds of objections that people would raise that might seem to call for further argument. And that's a perfectly legitimate use. Sometimes you want to do that. You don't want to let your opponent raise an objection. Because that might be misleading and get you off on a tangent. And it's a perfectly effective and useful legitimate move in an argument. But you also have to watch out. Because there's some tricks associated with discounting terms. In particular I want to talk about the trick of discounting straw people. Well one effective move and argument if you're just trying to persuade people is to make them not see the problems with your position. And one way to do that is to say I've got five objections I'm going to respond to you know. You might say this but you might say that. However you might say this whereas. You might say that still you might say that although. Right and you discount all of those five objections. And yet what you do is you get to pick the objections, right? So you can pick the easiest objections, not the hardest objections. And then you've got the whole discussion focusing on the easiest objections and as people are trying to keep all five of those in their mind straight, they forget about the other objections which might not be even stronger. So you discount these straw people. Straw meaning easy to knock over, easy to destroy, and make people forget about the objections that are harder to destroy that are going to cause more serious problems for your theory. So if you don't really want to know whether your theory is right or wrong, your just trying to persuade people, that can be an effective move. And if you don't want to be persuaded by people who are trying to trick you like that, then you have to watch out for other people discounting strawmen and not facing the really more difficult objections to their views. And, here's is an even trickier trick. You can combine this trick of discounting straw people with other tricks that we saw for other words. So, suppose somebody says, well you know the president is all in favor of some kind of public health service. But a public health service is not going to solve all the medical problems of our people so, I think the president is off on the wrong track. Well, notice what has happened here is you've discounted the objection that the public health service is going to solve all of the medical problems from our people. Who ever thought that a public health service would solve all of the medical problems of the people? So you are discounting a straw man by using an unguarded term all. You put the unguarded term in the mouth of the objector, by not guarding it you make their view more susceptible to refutation, and make it easier for you to respond to that objection. Whereas the objector really would never have used the unguarded term but would've used a guarding term like most, or many of the health problems of our people. So by using discounting terms along with guarding terms, and also assuring terms. You can make moves in argument that will point people towards issues that are framed in the way you want them to be framed. Instead of the way that they want them to be framed. That's the trick that you have to learn to watch out for. So here's a simple rule of thumb. When you think someone is trying to use discounting terms to lead you to look at the easiest objections instead of the most difficult objections then you can think about just forgetting the ones that this person mentions. And ask what did they leave off the list. And as a rule of thumb that's is usually a good idea but it's not always going to work. You're going to have to use your judgement. Still, try it. Maybe it'll work in some of the cases where you want to stop other people from tricking you. Now, you should have a pretty good grasp on assuring, guarding and discounting, three common moves in argument, that are aimed at stopping the skeptical regress, and building common assumptions with the people you are talking to. Let's do a few exercises in order to contrast these three and make sure you understand them.