I. What is Philosophy? A. The derivation of the word is from the Greek roots: 1.

philolove of, affinity for, liking of As in the words ... philanderto engage in love affairs frivolously philanthropylove mankind in general philatelyto collect postage stamps -phileone having a love for, e.g. anglophile philologyhaving a liking for words 2. sophiawisdom As in the words ... sophistone who loves knowledge sophomoreone who thinks he knows everything sophisticatedone who is knowledgeable B. A suggested definition: philosophy is the systematic inquiry into the principles and presupposition of any field of inquiry. 1. Psychologically, philosophy is an attitude, an approach, or a calling to answer, or to ask, or even to comment upon certain peculiar problems (i.e., problems such as those usually in the main branches of philosophy discussed below). 2. Eventually we must despair of an abstract definition and turn to what philosophers do i.e., the practice of philosophy II. The Main Branches of Philosophy are divided as to the nature of the questions asked in each area. The integrity of these divisions cannot be rigidly maintained. A. Axiology: the study of value; the investigation of its nature, criteria and metaphysical status. 1. Characterization of some features of the definition: a. Nature of value: is value a fulfillment of desire, pleasure, a preference, or simply some kind of human interest? b. Criteria of value: is there no accounting for taste (de gustibus non (est) disputandum) or can rules and standards of values be set? c. Status of value: how are values related to scientific facts? What ultimate worth do human values have, if any? Is value dependent upon the presence of human beings? 2. Axiology is sub-divided into ... a. Ethics: the study of values in human behavior; the study of moral problems which

seeks to discover how one ought to act, not how one does in fact act or how one thinks one should act. b. Aesthetics: the study of value in the arts--the study of the beauty, sublimity, and principles of taste, harmony, order, and pattern. B. Epistemology: the study of knowledge, in particular, the study of the nature, scope and limits of human knowledge. 1. The investigation of the origin, structure, methods, and validity of knowledge. 2. As an example of orders of knowledge, consider the statement, "The earth is round." This can be successively translated depending upon context as ... The earth is spherical. The earth is an oblate spheroid (i.e., it's flattened at the poles). But what of the mountains, oceans, and so forth? Even if we surveyed exactly the shape, the process of surveying would itself measurably change the shape of the earthe.g., footprints and indentations formed by our measuring instruments. In practice, can the exact shape ever be actually known? (No, but even though we can probably never know the exact shape of the earth at any given moment, we do know the earth has an exact shape.) 3. Consider two well-known epistemological problems: the first not solvable, the second solvable. a. Russell's Five Minute World Hypothesis: Suppose the earth were created five minutes ago, complete with memory images, history books, geological records, etc. That is, at the moment of creation, the universe would have all the evidence that it was billions of years old already "packed in." How could it ever be known that the creation of the universe did not occur five minutes ago? b. Suppose everything in the universe were to expand uniformly so that everything was one hundred times larger. How would we ever know it? C. Ontology or Metaphysics: the study of what is "really" real. Metaphysics deals with the socalled first principles of the natural order or the ultimate generalizations available to the human intellect. 1. What kinds of things exist? How do they exist? a. E.g., ideas have no size, shape, color, etc. My idea of the Empire State Building is quite as small as my idea of a book. Do ideas exist in the same manner that physical objects exit? b. E.g., consider the truths of mathematics: How do geometric figures exist? Does a point (Euclid's "that which has no parts") exist apart from the idea of it?

c. What is spirit made of? Or Soul? Or Matter? Or Space? Or a vacuum? III. To which of these branches of philosophy do you think logic belongs? A. Logic: the study of the methods and principles used in distinguishing correct from incorrect reasoning. B. Our knowledge is interrelated by logic. It forms the fabric of the sciences by ensuring the consistency of the statements that compose them. C. Hence, logic is usually considered a subdivision of epistemology, although, of course, logic is used in all areas of philosophy. I. Logic is the study of the methods and principles used in distinguishing correct from incorrect reasoning. B. Logic differs from psychology in being a normative or aprescriptive discipline rather than a descriptive discipline. 1. I.e., it prescribes how one ought to reason; it's not concerned with how one actually does reason. 2. Logic is concerned with laying down the rules for correct reasoning. 3. Consequently, logic seeks to distinguish good arguments from poor ones. II. How Logic helps reasoning: A. "Practice makes better." Some examples of how this course can help reasoning about the world are as follows. 1. Consider this syllogism: All followers of Senator Jones are in favor of higher taxes. All communists are in favor of higher taxes. All followers of Senator Jones are communists. It will become easy for us to recognize the fallacy in this argument as the fallacy of the undistributed middle term. 2. Consider this informal argument: In spite of the large number of UFO spottings that can be attributed to weather conditions and known aircraft and other factors, there are hundreds of sightings that cannot be accounted for. Hence, we can safely conclude that UFO's exit. Consider this counter-example: In spite of the large number of quarters put under kid's pillows which can be attributed to sneaky parents, brothers, sisters, and so forth, there are hundreds of cases which cannot

be accounted for. Therefore, the tooth fairy exits. B. As well, this course can help with "the negative approach"that we avoid errors by being aware of them, e.g., being aware of common formal and informal fallacies. 1. Consider the passage, "Napoleon became a great emperor because he was so short." In this short argument, the fallacy of false cause (or non causa pro causa) occurs. If this argument were good, all or most short persons would become great emperors. 2. Consider the passage, "People in developing countries get old as an earlier age, because the average life expectancy is so short in those countries." Due to infant mortality, people do not get older more quickly; the fallacy of division occurs. C. Methods, criteria, and techniques, all are given as methods of testing correctness. These are some of the techniques we will be learning and using in this class. These methods are shown here merely for purposes of illustration.. 1. For example, we can draw Venn Diagrams to show the fallacy of the undistributed middle term in problem I, A discussed above.

2. Or we can show the fallacy in I, A by appealing to specific rules. All P is Mu. All S is Mu. All S is P. The term shared by both premisses is said to be undistributedbecause it does not refer to each and every persons in favor of higher taxes. III. There are several kinds of logic which exhibit a kind of family relation: dialectic, multivalued logic, logic of commands, fuzzy logic, etc. IV. In this course, basically, we will use just two kinds of logic: deductive and inductive. A. Deductive Logic: concerned with determining when an argument is valid (i.e., deals with conclusive inferences). 1. A deductive argument is one which claims that its conclusion follows with necessity. 2. If that claim is not met, then the argument is said to be invalid. 3. Consider this example from Time magazine about the Kennedy assassination:

"Since tests proved that it took at least 2.3 seconds to operate the bolt on Oswald's rifle, Oswald obviously could not have fired three times--hitting Kennedy twice and Conally once--in 5.6 second or less." The first load ned not be counted. 2.3 2.3 + 2.3 6.9 sec. verses 2.3 + 2.3 4.6 sec.

The response by Frederick T. Wehr: "SirThis argument, which has appeared in many publications since the assassination, is faulty, and I am surprised that I haven't seen it refuted before this. Assuming that the bolt of Oswald's rifle can, in fact, be operated in 2.3 seconds, then Oswald definitely could fire 3 shots in less than 5.6 seconds, for a stop watch would be started when the first shot was fired; the second shot would be fired when the stop watch read 2.3 seconds, and the third shot would be fired when the stop watch read 4.6 seconds. You have apparently overlooked the fact that, in the time it takes to fire 3 shots, it is only necessary to operate the bolt twice." B. Inductive Logic is concerned with the correctness of inferences for which the evidence is not conclusive (i.e., probable inferences). 1. Hence, an inductive argument is one whose conclusion is claimed to follow with probability. 2. Consider the example from Mark Twain's Notebook: "at bottom I did not believe I had touched that man. The law of probabilities decreed me guiltless of his blood, for in all my small experience with guns I had never hit anything I had tried to hit and I knew I had done my best to hit him." 3. Or consider extrapolation techniques used in stock market prediction, e.g., the wedge formation. V. What logic is not: A. Logic is not the science of the laws of thought--in which case it would be a descriptive science like psychology. 1. Sometimes people can come to conclusions reliably without being able to know or explain how the conclusion was reached. E.g., the so-called intuitive type of personality. 2. Often people can come to the right conclusion for the wrong reasons. Logic is the study of the modes of correct reasoning as shown in an interpersonal manner. B. Logic is not really the science of reasoning either because the logician is not interested in the psychological processes of reasoning.

1. The logician is interested in the structure of arguments. 2. People infer statements and statements entail other statements. 3. We want to say that the entailment is there even though someone does not at this time understand it.

The Structure of Arguments

Abstract: The concept of an argument is discussed together with the related concepts of premiss, conclusion, inference, entailment, proposition, and statement.

I. We have seen that one main branch of philosophy is epistemology and one main branch of epistemology is logic. A. What is epistemology? B. What is logic? Simply put, the purpose of logic is to sort out the good arguments from the poor ones. II. So the chief concern of logic is the structure of an argument. A. Every argument in logic has a structure, and every argument can be described in terms of this structure. 1. Argument: any group of propositions of which one is claimed to follow logically from the others. a. In logic, the normal sense of "argument," such as my neighbor yelling to me about my trashcans is not termed "an argument" in logic. b. By "argument," we mean a demonstration or a proof of some statement, not emotional language. E.g., "That bird is a crow; therefore, it's black." 2. The central parts of an argument include ... a. Premiss: (more usually spelled "premise") a proposition which gives reasons, grounds, or evidence for accepting some other proposition, called the conclusion. b. Conclusion: a proposition, which is purported to be established on the basis of other propositions. B. Consider the following example of an argument paraphrased from an argument given by Fritz Perls in In and Out of the

Garbage Pail. If we set our ideals too high, then we will not meet those ideals. If we do not meet those ideals, then we are less than we could be. If we are less than we could be, then we feel inferior. If we set ideals too high, then we feel inferior. 1. By convention, the reasons or premisses are set above a line that separates the premisses from the conclusion. The line is sometimes thought of as symbolizing the word "therefore" in ordinary language. 2. As you read the passage and come to understand it, you are undergoing a psychological process called "making the inference." a. An inference is the reasoning process by which a logical relation is understood. b. The logical relation is considered valid (good) or not valid (not good) even if we do not understand the inference right away. In other words, it is convenient to consider the logical relation as not being dependant for its validity on the psychological process of an inference. c. In this manner, logic is not considered as "the science of reasoning." It is prescriptive, as discussed in a previous class. 3. So, this logical relation between the premisses and conclusion of Perl's argument holds regardless of whether we pay attention or not. a. Using the bold letters, we can symbolize his argument as follows: HN NL LI HI b. This kind of logical relation is called an entailment. An entailment is a logical relation between or among propositions such that the truth of one proposition is

determined by the truth of another proposition or other propositions, and this determination is a function solely of the meaning and syntax of the propositions concerned. c. Another way to remember the difference between an inference and an entailment is to note that people infersomething, and propositions entail something. d. The argument structure is the sum and substance of logic. All that remain in this course is to sketch out a bit of what this means. (Note that Perls', argument has a good structure, so if the conclusion is false, one of the premisses has to be false.) III. We have spoken earlier of the relation between or among propositions. What is a proposition or statement (we will use these words interchangeably)? A. Statement: a verbal expression that can be regarded as true or false (but not both). Hence, a statement or a proposition is a sentence with a truth-value. We can still regard a sentence as a statement even if the truth-value of the statement is not known. B. Hence logic is just concerned with those statements that have truth-values. (There is very much of life that is irrelevant to logic.) Consider the confusion that would result if we considered the following sentences as statements: 1. "Good morning." (What's so good about it?) 2. "You are looking good today." (Well, I just saw my doctor and ...) 3. "What is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days..." (Well, I don't know about that.) 4. To a waiter: "I'd like a cup of coffee." (Yeah, but I think bigger, I'd like a BMW.) Thus, phatic communication, greetings, commands, requests, and poetry, among other uses of language, are not mean to be taken as statements. C. Which of the following sentences are statements? 1. There is iron ore on the other side of Pluto.

2. Tomorrow, it will rain. 3. Open the door, please. 4. Whales are reptiles. 5. "Yond' Cassius has a lean and hungry look." 6. Pegasus has wings. 7. You should vote in all important elections. IV. More distinctions with regard to statements are worth suggesting. A. Consider whether there are two statements in the box: A Republican is President (of the U.S.). A Republican is President (of the U.S.). 1. Aside from the ambiguity of when the statements are uttered, of which President is being spoken, and so on, we would say that there is one statement and two sentences in the box. Sometimes logicians make a distinction between a sentence token (the ink, chalk marks, or pixels) and a sentence type (the meaning of the marks). 2. Every statement comes with an implicit time, place, and reference. B. Summary of the distinction between a sentence and a statement assumes that adequate synonymy of expression and translation between languages is possible. 1. One statement can be expressed by two different sentences. For example, the sentence "The cup is half-empty." expresses the same statement as "The cup is half-full." A sentence can express different statements at different times. For example, the sentence "A Democrat is the U.S. President" as expressed in 1962 and 2002 is two different statements. 3. A statement is independent of the language in which it is asserted, but a sentence is not. For example, the sentences "Das ist aber viel!' and "But that is a lot" express the same statement,ceteris paribus. 4. A sentence can express an argument composed of several

statements. For example, the sentence "The graphical method of solving a system of equations is an approximation, since reading the point of intersection depends on the accuracy with which the lines are drawn and on the ability to interpret the coordinates of the point" can be interpreted as two or three different statements depending on how we wish to analyze it.

Diagramming Arguments
Abstract: Analyzing the structure of arguments is clarified by representing the logical relations in diagram form.

I.

Arguments in logic are composed reasons being offered for a conclusion. (The use of the term "argument" in logic does not carry the everyday connotation of a quarrel in everyday discourse. The presence of an argument in a passage is discovered by understanding the author's intention of proving a statement by offering reasons or evidence. Generally speaking, these reasons are presented as verbal reports although they might not be initially presented in declarative sentences. There are three main ways of judging the presence of an argument: A. The author or writer explicitly states explicitly lists the reasons, evidence, justification, rationale, or proof of a statement. Example: (1) I conclude the dinosaurs probably had to cope with cancer. These are my reasons: (2) a beautiful bone found in Colorado filled with agate has a hole in its center, (3) the outer layer was eroded all the way through, and (4) this appearance closely matches metastatic bone tumors in humans. B. The author uses argument indicators signifying the presence of an argument. (Common premiss and conclusion indicators are listed below in Section IV). Example: (1) Since the solution turned red when the indicator was added, (2) I

II.

III.

conclude it is acidic, inasmuch as acidic substances react with this indicator to form a red color. C. The passage under question implicitly provides an answer to the sometimes irreverent question of "What are you trying to prove?" The presence of an argument cannot be always known with certainty. A charitable, conventional interpretation of the content and context of the passage is assumed. Example: (1) The types of sentences you use are quite varied. (2) I've noticed that your essays are quite sophisticated. (3) You have been learning much more about sentence structure. [The conclusion is statement (3)]. IV. In order to analyze simple and complex arguments, we will find it useful to construct a diagram of the structure of the argument that details the relations among the various premisses and conclusions. A. A conclusion of one argument can become a premiss for another argument. Thus, a statement can be the conclusion of one argument and a premiss for another argument just as a daughter in one family can become a mother in another family. The number of arguments in a passage is conventionally established by the number of conclusions in that passage. In analyzing the structure of an argument, whether simple or complex, the all-important first step is to find the conclusion. Here are some specific suggestions as to how to find the conclusion. 1. The conclusion might be evident from the content and context of the paragraph structure. The sequence of sentences is often an indication of the conclusion. Arrangement of sentences from most general to specific is a common form of paragraph or passage; the arrangement of sentences from specific to general is a bit less common. Considering both cases, the conclusion is often the first and sometimes the last sentence in a passage. Example:

B. C.

(1) John didn't get much sleep last night. (2) He has dark circles

under his eyes. (3) He looks tired. The conclusion is the first sentence in the passage. 2. Nevertheless, the conclusion can occur anywhere in the paragraph, especially if the passage has not been revised for clarity. Usually, if a conclusion is not the first or last sentence, a conclusion indicator is present, or the last sentence is presented as an after thought with a premiss indicator. See below for lists of premiss and conclusion indicators. Example: (1) Studies from rats indicate that neuropeptide Y in the brain causes carbohydrate craving, and (2) galanin causes fat craving. (3) Hence, I conclude that food cravings are tied to brain chemicals (4) becauseneuropeptide Y and galanin are brain

chemicals. 3. The structure of the argument (and, of course, the conclusion, as well) might be inferred by the following kinds of indicators. a. Premiss indicators are words which often indicate the presence of reasons. Common premiss indicators include the following: for since as because for the reason

follows from after all in light of the fact *for the reason Example Argument: (1)The graphical method for solving a system of equations is an approximation, (2) since reading the point of intersection depends on the accuracy with which the lines are drawn and on the ability to interpret the coordinates of the point.

Another example argument: (1) Questionable research practices are far more common than previously believed, (2) after all, the Acadia Institute found that 44 percent of students and 50 percent of faculty from universities were aware of cases of plagiarism, falsifying data, or racial discrimination.

b.

Conclusion indicators are words which often indicate the statement which logically follows from the reasons given. Common conclusion indicators include the following: thus therefore consequently hence so it follows that proves that indicates that

*accordingly implies that *for this reason Examples of their use in arguments: (1) No one has directly observed a chemical bond, (2) so scientists who try to envision such bonds must rely on experimental clues and their own imaginations.

(1) Math grades for teens with bipolar disorder usually drop noticeably about one year before their condition is diagnosed, thus (2) probably bipolar disorder involves a deterioration of mathematical reasoning.

(1) Coal seams have been discovered in Antarctica. (2) This means that the climate there was once warmer than it is now. (3) Thus, either the geographical location of the continent has shifted or the whole Earth was once warmer than it is now.

c.

Conjunctives (including conjunctive adverbs) often indicate equal status for clauses or sentences. Noticing these conjuncts is especially helpful for argument analysis if one of the elements has already been identified.

Indicators of clauses of equal status include: and but yet however moreover in addition nevertheless (and also the semicolon ";") Examples: (1) Some students absent today are unprepared for this test, since (2) the law of averages dictates that only 10% of students are absent due to illness, and (3) more than 10% are absent.

(1) Lenses function by refracting light at their surfaces. (2) Consequently, not only does their action depends on the shape of the lens surfacesbut also (3) it depends on the indices of refraction of the lens material and the surrounding medium.

V.

When working with complex arguments, it is often helpful to reconstruct the argument backwards from the conclusion. Consider the following argument. (1) If students were environmentally aware, they would object to the endangering of any species of animal. (2) The well-known Greenwood white squirrel has become endangered (3)as it has disappeared from the Lander Campus (4) because the building of the library destroyed its native habitat. (5) No Lander students objected. (6) Thus, Lander students are not environmentally aware.

The premiss indicators suggest that (2) is a subconclusion of (3) since the indicator "as" connects them, and (3), in turn, is a subconclusion of (4) since the indicator "because" connects those two statements.

Statement (6) is the final conclusion since it has the conclusion indicator "thus" and the import of the paragraph indicates that this statement is the main point of the argument. Intuitively, the structure of the first statement (1) together with statement (5) is a common argument form: If students were environmentally Aware, they would Object to the endangering of any species of animal. No student Objected (to the endangering of the Greenwood white squirrel). which can be abbreviated as follows: If A then O Not O and the negation of clause O is logically equivalent to conclusion (6). (Later in the course we will see that this argument structure is termed modus tollens): If A then O Not O _____________ Not A which is the same statement as (6).

Hence the whole argument can now be pieced together as:

VI.

Explanations and Nonarguments

Abstract: Several kinds of nonargumentative discourse are characterized, illustrated, and distinguished from argumentative discourse.

I. We said last period that every argument in logic has a structure-every argument in logic can be described in terms of this structure. A. Premisses: statements which give evidence for, or reasons for, accepting the conclusion. B. Conclusion: statement which is purported to be established or affirmed on the basis of other statements (the premisses). II. Recognizing Arguments: Given these characterizations, then, how do we sort out arguments from the rest of the kinds of linguistic behavior? In effect, what we are doing is separating the territory of logic from the rest of the world. In order to know to what we can apply our powerful methods of analysis, we need to learn how to separate argumentative discourse from non-argumentative discourse. A. Typical argumentative "look-a-likes" fall into four main categories. 1. Fiction, poetry, emotional discourse: the purpose is not factual truth. 2. Commands: they are not statements because they have no truth value. (However, they can be subjected to a "logic of commands" as noted later.) 3. Conditional statements (by themselves) are not arguments.: "If ... then ..." statements, sometimes called "hypotheticals," although many logicians distinguish different various forms of conditionals. 4. Explanations: their purpose is not to prove, but to explain. In general explanations are not arguments. (Some good

explanations have a deductive character, as discussed below.) B. Fiction, poetry, emotional discourse are to be distinguished as well.. 1. Even though good fiction has a good internal logic, there is usually no proof involved. a. The truth in a story is like the "ah-ha" experience of an explanation. b. Our learning is indirect--i.e., we perceive or understand the truth. c. The investigation of the status of fictional statements is an area in present inquiry. d. The work of fiction, as a whole, can be thought of as a very large conditional statement: If {we assume characters, plot, etc.) then {such and such statements logically follow}. e. This proceeding is the sort of thing that is done in thoughtexperiments. E.g., consider the main point of W. Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage: The Persian rug with its intricate design has no purpose other than itself and is the metaphor of life itself. 2. Poetry's purpose is not to prove or demonstrate, but to appeal to our emotions or insight. a. Often these insights are alogical--hyperbole, contrast, contradiction, analogy, etc., give us insight. b. E.g., consider Stephen Vincent Bent's "The Ballad of William Sycamore": "So I saddled a red unbroken colt And I rode him into the day there, And he threw me down like a thunderbolt And rolled on me as I lay there. The hunter's whistle hummed in my ear As the city men tried to move me, But I died in my boots like a pioneer With the whole wide sky above me." To raise the question of how a dead man can write a poem is to miss the point. 3. Emotional Discourse: in common parlance, these "heated arguments" are alogical--the standards of logic are not meant to

apply. a. E.g., "one man was shot, one man was injured after a heated argument in a bar." b. From a logical point of view, the heated exchange is views is often settled by the doctrine that "might makes right." C. Commands, especially those put as imperative statements are not arguments. 1. Again, we could evaluate a series of commands for logical consistency (as when we are told to do different things by the same authority), but commands, strictly speaking, are neither true nor false, so they are not normally part of arguments. 2. As we will see later, imperatives can function as directive (e.g.,"Study hard"), expressive (e.g., "Have a nice day), or informative (e.g., "Study pages 25-140 for the test"). 3. Sometimes you should look at the contextalthough imperatives are used, the passage might be meant to be an argument. 4. Consider the following quotation from Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.: "Be careful who you pretend to be, for that you will surely become." Is he explaining how pretense can be harmful, is he trying to prove it, or is he warning us not to pretend? One could only tell by looking at the context in which this sentence was used. D. Conditionals look very much like arguments and intuitively "feel" very much like arguments, but their antecedents are not asserted to be true. They are no more than complex statements. (Often, we will analyze an argument with conditional statements-e.g., as in the statement, "If the premisses are true, then the conclusions will follow.") 1. The parts of a conditional: If {antecedent} then {consequent} 2. If I say, "If someone fails this class, then I will eat the textbook," I haven't proved anything. 3. A conditional can be thought of as conditionally being an argument if the antecedent is true, but this is not at all what is being asserted. However, in an argument the premisses are asserted as true. 4. Since conditionals are statements, then, of course, they can be

part of arguments: Consider, the hypothetical syllogism If I drop this book, then it will fall to the floor. If it falls to the floor, then it is heavier than air. Therefore, if I drop this book, then it is heavier than air. Or an argument form called modus ponens If you study hard, then you make an A in logic. You study hard. Therefore, you make an A. D. How to distinguish arguments from explanations. 1. By carefully reading the text, you can discern several important differences between an argument and an explanation. a. Do a group of statements give evidence, grounds, or reasons for some other statement? b. Is the purported conclusion better known than the purported premisses? c. Is a causal connection asserted or implied? d. What is the author's purpose in offering the passage? e. What is the context of the passage? 2. In general, these questions point to the difference between arguments and explanations. (Nevertheless, as shown below, arguments and explanations do, on occasion, overlap.) Argument (1) expresses an inference Explanation does not usually express an inference

(2) offers evidence, grounds offers an account why or reasons (3) goes from well known statements to statements less well known (4) draws a logical connection between statements gives less well known statements why a better known statement is true describes a causal connection

(5) has the purpose to establish the truth of a statement

has the purpose to give an account of something

3. Consider the following passage given in an edition of Copi'sIntroduction to Logic: (1) The Roman Empire collapsed because (2) it lacked the spirit of liberalism and free enterprise. a. Which statement is better known (1) or (2)? Since the first statement is better known, we would normally conclude that this is an explanation which shows a causal connection rather than an argument with a logical implication. However, Copi has taken this passage out of context as we will see below. b. If the author were advancing the general thesis "All countries that lack these attributes crumble to dust," therefore the Roman Empire did, then a Deductive Nomological Explanation is being given. In point of fact, this is precisely the argument which von Mises gives in the original passage from which this passage was excerpted:
"The Roman Empire crumbled to dust because it lacked the spirit of liberalism and free enterprise. The policy of interventionism and its political corollary, the Fuhrer principle, decomposed the mighty empire as they will by necessity always disintegrate and destroy any social entity." (Ludwig von Mises, Human Action (Auburn: Mises, 1949), 763.)

[All countries that lack the spirit of liberalism and free enterprise crumble to dust.] I.e., contraposition of the last sentence of the passage above. The Roman Empire lacked the spirit of liberalism and free enterprise. Therefore, the Roman Empire crumbled to dust. c. The complete passage then is an example of theDeductive Nomological Method of Explanation, a method of ordering science as a deductive system of information.. The model for this method is as follows: Explanans Logical Deduction Explanandum L1, L2, ... , Lk General Laws C1, C2, ... , Ck Statements of Antecedent Conditions Description of the empirical

phenomenon to be explained. 4. Some passages are a mixture of argument and explanation. Consider this example:
"There was therefore a sound reason why, despite theological differences, the political theories of Calvinists in France or Scotland should have had certain similarities with those of the Jesuits. Both were in a situation where it was necessary to urge that political obligation is not absolute and that a right of rebellion exits against an heretical ruler. Both depended upon a common heritage of medieval thought and argued that the community itself creates is own officials and can regulate them for its own purposes. Both held, therefore, that political power inheres in the people, is derived from him by contract, and may be revoked if the king becomes a tyrant." (George H. Sabine, A History of Political Theory, 3rd. ed. (London: Haarp, 1963), 388.)

The second and third statements are reasons for the conclusion expressed in the third statement. The third statement is the explanans (that which is the explanation) for the first statement which is the explanandum (that which is to be explained).. D. Explanations often are given for well known states of affairs. In science, the explanation is almost always less well known than that which is to be explained. For example, the answer as to why rainbows form on gasolinestation driveways is expressed in terms of layers of different densities of fluids with different optical properties. The index of refraction, reflection, wavelengths of light, and the electromagnetic spectrum are all mentioned in the explanans. Hence, unlike arguments, the statements in an explanation generally "move" from well known to less well known statements.

I. We have said that the central concern of logic is the evaluation of arguments. In general, for the purposes of this course arguments will fall into two kinds: deductive and inductive. (As noted before there are other kinds of logic not fitting well into either category: e.g., modal logics, logic of commands, some multi-value logics, to name a few.) A. It is sometimes argued that in deduction the particular is inferred from the general, as in All organisms have RNA.

(This fruit fly is an organism.) Therefore, this fruit fly has RNA. B. And it is sometimes said that in induction the general is inferred from the particular, as in A red-eyed fruit fly has RNA. A white-eyed fruit fly has RNA. A Hawaiian fruit fly has RNA. Therefore, all fruit flies have RNA. C. But these definitions are misleading for several reasons. Let us briefly note some of them. 1. In some kinds of deduction, the general is inferred from the particular (e.g., induction by complete enumeration): Only Plato and Aristotle were the great Greek philosophers. Plato and Aristotle lived in Athens. Therefore, all the great Greek philosophers lived in Athens. a. In induction by complete enumeration all the members of a class are listed with some characteristic and then a summary statement is made about the whole class. Entity e1 has property p1 Entity e2 has property p2
________________________

Entity en has property pn This example is a deductive argument. 2. In some kinds of induction, the particular is inferred from the general (with another particular premiss). All the great Greek philosophers wrote treatises on science. All philosophers named Aristotle wrote treatises on science. Therefore Aristotle was a great Greek philosopher. a. This argument is only probable even though all of the statements in it happen to be true. E.g., compare the substitution of "Thales" for "Aristotle." b. The argument is inductive even though it moves from general to specific. (Note that interpretation of this example does not obviate the claim that the argument is an invalid deductive argument, if someone mistakenly claims the conclusion follows with necessity. Apart from the psychological aspects the argument is inductive because the conclusion follows with some probability.)

3. Finally you, yourself, might remember having difficulty in applying the definition as it was given in a science class or education class because it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between a general statement and a particular statement. a. Consider the following cases: 1. "The whale is a mammal" means "All whales are mammals." 2. "All persons whose name is Lee Archie in this classroom are silly persons" means "Lee Archie is a silly person." 3. "All present kings of France are bald" fails to have a reference. 4. "All ideal gasses are perfectly elastic" b. The point is that any specific statement can be written as a general statement or vice versa. Often, when we make a statement, we do not know how many, if any, members of the subject class exist. Consequently, it could be begging the question to say that the statement is specific or general. II. The Difference between Deduction and Induction A. Deduction: an argument whose premisses are claimed to provide conclusive evidence for the truth of its conclusion. (This definition is a bit of a kludge since we want to retain a meaning to the phrase "invalid deductive argument" which might be, in some cases, a correct inductive argument.) In the beginning, it's probably best to think of a good or valid deductive argument as one in which the conclusion follows from the premiss(es) with logical necessity. 1. The "claim" part of the definition is a kludge since the psychological aspect of the process is strictly speaking irrelevant to the logical aspect of rules of inference or entailment. 2. To take the classic example which must be mentioned at least once in this course All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore, Socrates is mortal. 3. Note how the grammatical structure of this argument form makes the conclusion necessarily follow--not with probability, but with certainty.

All B is C. All A is B. All A is C. 4. Thus, deductive arguments claim certainty--"claim" is used because some deductive arguments do not meet this claim and are called "invalid." 5. In general deductive arguments fall into several types--these are examples, not exhaustive categories: a. Necessary analytic inferences: Peter is Jon's brother, so Jon must be Peter's brother. (i.e., they follow from the truths of the meanings of words.) b. Mathematical inferences: Since there are more people in the world than there are hairs on your and my head, the population of the world is greater than the hairs on your head. (i.e., they follow from the truths of mathematics.) c. Logical inferences: If you work hard, then you will succeed, and if you succeed, then you will be happy; therefore, if you work hard, you will be happy. (i.e., they follow from the truths of logic.) B. Induction: arguments that establish the truth of the conclusion as probable or probably true. So, informally at least, an inductive argument claims its conclusion follows with some degree of probability. The word "claims" is included in this version of the definition if we want to use the meaningful phrase "incorrect inductive argument." 1. Inductive arguments can range in probability from very low to very high, but always less than 100%. 2. Often (but not always!) it is the sort of inference which attempts to reach a conclusion concerning all the members of a class on the basis of the observations of only some of them. E.g., I've seen many persons with creased earlobes who have heart attacks, so I conclude that (all) persons who have creased earlobes are prone to have heart attacks. 3. These sorts of arguments are often said to be empirical because they depend on observing the world. 4. Some examples of some kinds of inductive argument are (note how these categories can overlap): a. Extrapolations: to infer unknown information from known information. E.g., increasing voltage leads to increasing rpm b. Predictions: the future will be like the past.

E.g., the stock market predictions c. Part to Whole: since some things of a certain kind are this way, all things of that kind are this way. d. Analogies, hunches, and so forth. 5. Unlike deductive arguments in which nothing can be added to make the inference more certain, almost always premisses can be added to inductive argument to make them more probable. Bryan Skyrms provides an example similar to this one: George is a man. George is 85 years old. George cannot run a 4 minute mile. We can always add the premiss that George has arthritis, a broken leg, and so forth to make it more probable. (Bryan Skyrms, Choice and Chance, 4th ed. (Stamford, CT: Wadsworth, 2000), 18.) However, when we note that George is a paraplegic, then the argument becomes deductive.

I. Truth, Validity, and Soundness: probably the three most important concepts of the course. A. First, let us briefly characterize these concepts. 1. truth: a property of statements, i.e., that they are the case. 2. validity: a property of arguments, i.e., that they have a good structure. (The premisses and conclusion are so related that it is absolutely impossible for the premisses to be true unless the conclusion is true also.) 3. soundness: a property of both arguments and the statements in them, i.e., the argument is valid and all the statement are true. Sound Argument: (1) valid, (2) true premisses (obviously the conclusion is true as well by the definition of validity). B. The fact that a deductive argument is valid cannot, in itself, assure us that any of the statements in the argument are true; this fact only tells us that the conclusion must be true if the premisses

are true. 1. Let's look at the variety of valid arguments that can be given as sorted by the truth of premisses and conclusion: Cases > Premiss(es) Conclusion 1 T T 2 F T 3 T 4 F F

If it were possible to have true premisses and a false conclusion, logic would be useless to prove anything. 2. Let's look at the variety of invalid arguments that can be given as sorted by the truth of premisses and conclusion: Cases > Premiss(es) Conclusion 1 T T 2 F T 3 T F 4 F F

That is, all possibilities can be represented; examples are given in the syllabus. II. One way to summarize these concepts is to represent the logical territory in a "tree-diagram." Arguments _________|___________ Deductive _____|_____ Valid Invalid Inductive _____|_____ correct > > > > incorrect

_______|________ Sound (all statements are true) Unsound (at least one premiss is false)