40 Adina Moshavi In the majority of the argumentative RQs in the corpus the premise is a negative assertion and the conclusion is negative as well. In other words, the argument, at least in part, can be expressed as “Not B. Therefore, not A.” This, however, is generally not the complete argument, as the proposition “not B” is typically not sufficient in and of itself to refute A. It is common in arguments occurring in natural dialogue for one or more of the premises to be unexpressed by the speaker and left to be reconstructed by the addressee (43). After reconstructing the missing premise, I found that the majority of the arguments have one of two forms: the logically valid modus tollens form (55 RQs), or the invalid denying-the-antecedent form (20) (44). These forms are examined in sections 4 and 5, below. 4. The Modus tollens arguments Modus tollens has the following form: Premise 1: If A then B. Premise 2: Not B. Conclusion: Not A. Modus tollens arguments are logically valid: if whenever A is true B is true, then the falsity of B entails the falsity of A. An example of a RQ expressing modus tollens is God’s accusation of Sarah to Abraham in Gen 18,13-14: “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Shall I in truth bear a child, old as I am?’ Is anything too great for the LORD?” In this argument, as in all the modus tollens arguments, the first premise is not stated explicitly, and must be reconstructed by the addressee. The conclusion is implied by the initial “why” RQ, i.e., “Sarah should not have laughed.” The argument can be reconstructed as follows (45): Premise 1: If Sarah’s laughter was justified, then there is something too great for the Lord to perform. Premise 2: There is nothing that is too great for the Lord. Conclusion: Sarah should not have laughed. In Num 11,23 God uses modus tollens to undermine Moses’ skepticism regarding His promise to provide enough meat for a month to the entire people. The entire argument is represented by a yes-no RQ: “Is the Lord’s power limited?” Reconstructed, the argument is as follows: (43) On the difficulties that can be involved in reconstructing missing premises in arguments in dialogue, see S. GERRITSEN, “Unexpressed Premises”, Crucial Concepts in Argumentation Theory (ed. F.H. VAN EEMEREN) (Amsterdam 2001) 51-79. (44) Most of the remaining RQs involve arguments from consequences or inductive reasoning; these are not addressed further in this article. The conclusions in arguments from consequence generally relate to a future action by the addressee that the speaker does or does not want to occur. Such conclusions are usually expressed as volitive clauses, e.g., Gen 27,43-45; 47,15; Exod 32,12; Num 27,4; 1 Sam 19,17. (45) In this example and subsequent ones, reconstructed premises and conclusions are intended as approximations rather than exact representations.