PHIL 1010 Final ExamChapter 1: Critical Thinking and ArgumentsCritical Thinking: the skill of correctly evaluating arguments made by others and composing good arguments of your ownArgument: an attempt to provide reasons for thinking that some belief is true- All arguments have two partso Premises: the reasons that support the beliefo Conclusion: the belief being supportedStatement: a sentence that makes a claim that can be either true or false- Premises and conclusions are statements- One sentence can contain two or more statements; two or more sentences may contain only one statementThree steps to finding an argument- Look for an attempt to convince- Find the conclusion- Find the premisesUnstated Conclusion: a conclusion that isn’t explicitly stated in the author’s argumentUnstated Premise: occurs when an author (1) believes that a statement is true, (2) intends for this statement to be a premise of an argument, but (3) doesn’t include any sentence that asserts the statementThings that are not arguments:- Assertions- Descriptions- Questions (rhetorical questions can be premises though)- Instructions- Explanationso Explanandum: the statement in a explanation of what’s to be explainedo Explanans: the statements in an explanation that do the explainingo An argument is an attempt to SHOW that some statement is true. An explanationis an attempt to tell someone WHY a statement is true. Basic model of the standard form:(1) First premise(2) Second premise[3] Third premise*Therefore,(3) Conclusion*use brackets when indicating a premise or conclusion that is unstatedChapter 2: What Makes a Good Argument?Two characteristics of a good argument:- The premises are true- It has a proper formProper Form: an argument has proper form when, if the premises are true, they support the conclusionAudience: the group that the person making the argument wishes to convince- If the premises are true, but the audience doesn’t know they are true, then the argument is poorThe Problem of Ignorance: we don’t know everything so it makes it hard to know if premises are trueDeductive Argument: an argument that claims that the truth of the premises shows that the conclusion MUST be true- A deductive argument that passes the proper form test is valid- A valid deductive argument that has all true premises is soundTwo forms of deductive arguments:(1) If S1, then S2(2) S1Therefore,(3) S2(1) All G1 are G2(2) All G1 are G3Therefore, (3) All G2 are G3Inductive Argument: an argument that claims that the truth of the premises shows that the conclusion is LIKELY to be true- An inductive argument that passes the proper form test is strong- A strong inductive argument that has all true premises is cogentRelevant: premises are relevant to the conclusion when the truth of the premises provides evidence that the conclusion is true- Relevance is a matter of degreeFallacies: bad arguments that are so common they have been given a name- Easy Target/Straw Man Fallacy: Someone makes an inaccurate claim about the views held by someone else. They then argue that the inaccurately describes view is false. Finally, they assert that this argument shows that the accurate view is false.- Appeal to Popularity: when someone argues that a view is true on the grounds that it’s popular/most people believe it- Appeal to Novelty or Tradition: when someone argues that a statement is true because people have either believed it for a short time or for a long time- Ad Hominem: attacking a person rather than the person’s viewso Fallacy of Guilt by Association: when people are attacked based on their association with a person, group, or view that’s considered unfavorable- Appeal to Ignorance: claiming that a statement is true because it hasn’t been shown to be false- Begging the Question: when a premise of an argument asserts the conclusion of the argumentChapter 3: Premises and ConclusionsThree kinds of statements used as premises:- Empirical statements: statements that report what people observe through their senseso Can be direct (you observe it) or indirect (someone else observes it)o Testimonial empirical statements: the reports of what others have experienced to be believable, testimonial statements must be plausible and reliable- Definitional statements: a report about how a word is usedo Are uncontroversial- Statements by experts: statements by people who have specialized knowledge about a particular fieldo must pass five criteria to determine if it is an assumed premise appropriate credentials reliability lack of bias- Transparent bias: a bias that’s known to those evaluating the argument appropriate area of expertise- The Fallacy of Inappropriate Expertise: when an argument contains a premise that’s assumed on the basis of expertise but is about an issue outside an expert’s area of expertise expert consensus Two features of a conclusion to assess them with:- Strength: the degree of certainty that the author of an argument attributes to the conclusiono the stronger a conclusion is, the more evidence it needs to support it - Scope: the percentage of a group in a conclusion that’s claimed to have a particular featureo The broader the scope, the better the argument in support of that conclusion needs to beo If a conclusion refers to more than one group, it will have more than one scopeo Some conclusions have ambiguous scopesChapter 5: Propositional ArgumentsSimple statement: a statement that doesn’t contain any other statementCompound statement: a statement that contains at least one other statementNegation: a statement that denies another statement- Can be put into the form: Not S1Disjunction: a compound statement that contains two or more statements joined by an “or”- Can be put into the form:S1 or S2- Inclusive disjunction: when “or” is used to mean “one or the other (or both)”- Exclusive disjunction: when “or” is used to men “one or the other (but not both)”Conjunction: a compound statement that contains two or more statements joined by an “and”- Can be put into the form:S1 and S2Conditional statement: a statement that asserts that if one statement in the compound is true, then the other statement in the compound is true- Can be put into the form:If S1, then S2- Antecedent: the “if” statement- Consequent: the “then” statementFour forms of denying a disjunct(1) S1 or S2 (or both)(2)