Note 91 — Chapter X · SOPHISTICI ELENCHI.
Reading edition
Ibid. b. 1-14. Compare Topica, VIII. vii. p. 160, a. 29.
Aristotle tells us that this demand for a reply brief and direct, without any qualifying additions or distinctions, was advanced by dialecticians in former days much more emphatically than in his own — ὅ τ’ ἐπιζητοῦσι νῦν μὲν ἧττον πρότερον δὲ μᾶλλον οἱ ἐριστικοί, τὸ ἢ ναὶ ἢ οὒ ἀποκρίνεσθαι τὸν ἐρωτώμενον, ἐγίνετ’ ἄν. I presume that he makes comparison with the Platonic dialogues — Euthydemus, p. 295; Gorgias, pp. 448-449; Protagoras, pp. 334-335.