I. What is an Enthymeme?
An enthymeme (pronounced EN-thuh-meem) is a kind of syllogism, or logical deduction, in which one of the premises is unstated.
A syllogism is a logical deduction from two premises. The classic example goes like this:
- All men are mortal
- Socrates is a man
- Therefore, Socrates is mortal
#1 and #2 are the premises. #3 is the conclusion. To turn this into an enthymeme, just remove one of the premises (#1 or #2). Once you do that, you’ll see that the argument still makes sense (after all, no one would doubt the truth of any of these statements), but it’s not logically complete, since one of its essential premises is missing.
In practice, nearly all arguments depend on one or more enthymemes – after all, we have to assume that the audience already knows that all men are mortal, so it would be a waste of time to state it explicitly if you were trying to persuade them of this syllogism.
II. Examples of Enthymeme
Most moral or ethical arguments contain an essential, but easily overlooked enthymeme: they argue for the wrongness of an action based on facts about that action, but they often leave out any statement about the wrongness of the facts, meaning the syllogism is logically incomplete.
Example 1
- Drunk driving hurts innocent people.
- Hurting innocent people is wrong.
- Therefore, drunk driving is wrong.
Ordinarily, we wouldn’t actually come out and state #2. We’d assume that the audience already believes it. Most moral arguments similarly leave out an important moral premise, assuming that the audience will already be on board with it. Thus, such an argument would leave out premise #2, and would become an enthymeme composed only of premise #1 and the conclusion:
- Drunk driving hurts innocent people.
- Therefore, drunk driving is wrong.
Example 2
Enthymeme is also a common feature of political rhetoric. For example, watch out for cases where someone is attacking a politician using a “dirty word” like anarchist, socialist, imperialist, or Nazi. This is almost always hyperbole, but it’s also enthymeme. Here’s a typical example:
- Governor Johnson wants to reduce government regulation and oversight
- Therefore, Governor Johnson is an anarchist
The hidden premise, of course, is that anyone who reduces government regulation is an anarchist (or, to put it another way, that such reduction is tantamount to anarchy). This hidden premise is obviously false – at the very least, it’s a gross oversimplification – and so the argument is unpersuasive.
III. The Importance of Enthymeme
In order to make a persuasive argument, you have to assume certain things about your reader. You have to assume, at the most fundamental level, that they speak your language and understand certain basic facts about the world. Without such assumptions, we could hardly communicate, let alone persuade one another of anything! Moreover, if we constantly had to pause to specify each and every one of those assumptions, then even the must rudimentary arguments would be painfully long and repetitive. So enthymeme is more or less inevitable, and it helps make arguments more efficient and readable.
However, there is a downside to this efficiency: because enthymeme hides the premises of an argument, false or unpersuasive premises may slip by unnoticed. If the reader doesn’t notice this, then it’s no problem – the argument might still be persuasive. The problem occurs when the writer fails to notice his or her own hidden premises, but the reader picks up on them! In these cases, the writer cannot anticipate the reader’s possible doubts, meaning that the argument may be less persuasive than it could be.
IV. Examples of Enthymeme in Literature
Example 1
“Because I am a girl, I do not get a gun.” (Alice Walker, Beauty: When the Other Dancer is the Self)
This is part of Alice Walker’s autobiographical story of a young girl whose brothers all get pellet guns for Christmas. As always, the “A, therefore B” structure is logically incomplete. The hidden premise, obviously enough, is that girls don’t get guns.
Example 2
“He would not take the crown. Therefore ‘tis certain he was not ambitious!” (William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar)
In Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Marc Antony delivers a funeral oration in which his purpose is to convince the audience that Caesar was not ambitious. One part of his argument is to show that Caesar refused to accept the crown, and therefore he was obviously not ambitious. The hidden premise is: an ambitious person would have accepted the crown, and indeed would have eagerly leapt at the opportunity.
V. Examples of Enthymeme in Pop Culture
Example 1
“You’re forcing an entire village out of their homes just for you!”
“And thaaaaat’s….bad?” (The Emperor’s New Groove)
Kuzco, the young emperor from The Emperor’s New Groove, points out exactly the sort of moral enthymeme that we saw in §2. He is so selfish that he doesn’t even see anything wrong with being selfish! Pacha tries to change the emperor’s mind by pointing out his selfishness, but it doesn’t work because the emperor refuses to accept the hidden premise (i.e. that he should not be selfish).
Example 2
“I’ve never met my candidate; and for that reason I am more apt to say something good of him than anyone else.” (Will Rogers)
The actor Will Rogers said this about a political candidate that he was (supposedly) endorsing for public office. The hidden premise here is that if Rogers had met the candidate, it would be harder to speak positively about him. The humor, of course, is that Rogers knows this, and still supports the candidate all the same.
VI. Related Terms
False Premise
In any valid syllogism, both premises must be true. If one of them is false, then the syllogism as a whole fails. For example:
- You should get your mother the best possible gift for Mother’s Day.
- A pet shark is the best possible gift.
- Therefore, you should get your mother a pet shark for Mother’s Day.
In terms of its logical structure, there’s nothing wrong with this syllogism! However, many people would be inclined to doubt premise #2, and thus they would not find the argument convincing. The danger with enthymeme is that because one of the premises is hidden, it’s harder to check whether or not your reader will be persuaded by it. In this case, the premise is obviously questionable, but in many real-world contexts this is much harder to see.
Confounding Variable
People sometimes confuse confounding variables with hidden premises, but they’re actually very different. A hidden premise is part of the argument’s logical structure, even though it’s unstated; a confounding variable, on the other hand, is not part of the argument, even though it should be. Here’s an example of an argument that ignores possible confounding variables:
- People in the Middle Ages were unclean
- People in the Middle Ages suffered from plagues and disease
- Therefore, poor hygiene was the cause of Medieval plagues
Both of the premises are stated in this argument, so it’s not an enthymeme. However, the author has failed to account for some confounding variables: for example, it could have been a lack of medical science, not poor hygiene, that caused the plagues. Since all the premises in this case are stated, there’s no hidden premise and therefore no enthymeme.