[Y]ou cannot refute another philosopher merely by a priori argument, but you may use argument in order to push him into having to rely on premises which he (or others) may feel to be unplausible [sic] in the light of total science.

(J. J. C. Smart, “My Semantic Ascents and Descents,” chap. 2 in The Owl of Minerva: Philosophers on Philosophy, ed. Charles J. Bontempo and S. Jack Odell [New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1975], 57-72, at 66-7)