The Recursive Argument Structure Reconsidered

This chapter examines the recursive argument method of medieval science. The distinctive argument method used in scientific literature from the High Middle Ages to the Enlightenment was the “scientific method” until the scientific revolution. It is traditionally known in earlier scholarly literature as the “scholastic method” or quaestiones disputatae “disputed questions” method. Unfortunately, because of increasing scholarly confusion about the origins and meaning of the traditional term “scholastic method,” and even of the term quaestiones disputatae, it has been necessary to adopt a purely descriptive term, namely recursive argument method, also called recursive method or recursive argument. Many medieval scholars who wrote works using the recursive argument method also wrote treatises. The chapter compares the recursive argument with the treatise and dialogue argument structures and considers diffrent types of formal recursion.