Dilemma

Dilemma, in syllogistic, or traditional, logic, any one of several forms of inference in which there are two major premises of hypothetical form and a disjunctive (“either . . . or”) minor premise. For example:

If we increase the price, sales will slump.

If we decrease the quality, sales will slump.

Either we increase the price or

we decrease the quality.

Therefore, sales will slump.

In logic ⊃ signifies “if . . . then”; ∨ signifies “either . . . or”. Symbolically, therefore, a dilemma is an argument of the form A ⊃ C, B ⊃ C, A ∨ B, therefore C.

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It is not necessary that a dilemma should have an unwelcome conclusion; but from its use in rhetoric the word has come to mean a situation in which each of the alternative courses of action (presented as the only ones open) leads to some unsatisfactory consequence. To take a familiar example, a person who is asked, “Have you stopped beating your wife?” is presented with a rhetorical dilemma. In this more complicated version of the dilemma, however, two unwelcome results are presented instead of one (C, above). Thus, the conclusion itself becomes a disjunction:

Either you have been beating your wife or you are continuing to beat her.