Gaga Logic

You gonna get that,
Then I need the money.

Lady Gaga, lyrics from “Kaboom”

enthymeme (EN-thih-meme), the argument packet. From the Greek, meaning “something in the mind.”

Figaro loves a Lady, even a lady who personifies a foul-mouthed hooker. While we exercise a very broad definition of “lady” (and don’t even think there’s a pun in that), we’re especially enamored of ladies who use Aristotelian logic.

Lady Gaga does in her hit song what the philosopher did in his Rhetoric: both reduce the logical syllogism to the more succinct enthymeme.  The device takes a commonplace—a belief, value, attitude, or (in this case) desire—and uses it as a first step in convincing the audience.

Syllogism:

You desire my, uh, that.
Successful acquisition of that requires a quid pro quo.
Therefore, you must fulfill my need for money.

Gaga Enthymeme (English translation):

You intend to acquire that.
So you must pay money for that.

Aristotle understood that the middle line of a syllogism is painfully obvious, and therefore worth eliminating.

Similarly, Lady Gaga’s That needs no explicit antecedant. And Figaro is happy to avoid it.

Snappy Answer: I’ll see your That and raise you a This.