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Week 3 exercises Name _____________________________________ G 10

For each of the following arguments, determine whether it is inductive or

deductive.

1. Given present growth rate in underdeveloped countries, the limited practice of birth
control, and the difficulty of slowing the current growth momentum, it can be said
with virtual certainty that none of the people now reading this passage will ever live
in a world where the population is not growing.

2. During lunar eclipses, the projected shadow of the earth on the moon is always
round. Only a spherical earth can project a shadow that is always round. Therefore,
the earth is spherical.

3. If so many planets, created in different locations and under different circumstances,

show the same property, it is likely that our own planet has the same property as
well. All of our observations show that planets are spherical. Therefore, we may
conclude that our planet is also spherical.

4. Some galaxies are invisible to the naked every, for some galaxies are clouds of gas
and no clouds of gas are visible to the naked eye.

5. If you were walking on a beach and saw a watch on the sand, you would assume
that its parts had not come together by chance because it is too ordered and
complicated. Therefore, someone must have designed it, or it would not work.
Because the universe is also ordered and complicated, someone must have
designed that too.

6. Two independent witnesses claimed that the defendant committed the murder. The
defendant’s fingerprints are the only ones on the murder weapon. She also
confessed to the crime. Therefore, the defendant committed the murder.

7. The earth does not rotate from west to east. Proof: if it does rotate from west to east,
then anything that is dropped from a tower should land to the west of the tower.
However, nothing dropped from a tower behaves in this way.

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8. Deaths from heart disease are three to four times lower in France than they are in
Britain. Yet known risk factors such as smoking levels, and fat or cholesterol
consumption are similar in the two countries. The French, however, consume much
more alcohol than the British. And in particular, they drink a lot of red wine, which
everyone now knows is full of antioxidants. Therefore, it must be red wine that is
reducing the French incidence of heart disease.

For each of the following arguments, determine whether the argument is valid or
invalid with the help of circle diagrams.

(1) All apples are oranges (2) No apples are oranges

All apples are pears No oranges are pears
> Some pears are oranges > No apples are pears

(3) All apples are oranges (4) All apples are oranges
No pears are oranges Some apples are pears
> No apples are pears > Some oranges are pears

(5) No apples are oranges (6) All apples are oranges

Some pears are oranges Some oranges are pears
> Some apples are not pears > Some apples are pears

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(7) Some apples are oranges (8) No apples are oranges

Some oranges are pears Some pears are oranges
> Some apples are pears > Some pears are not apples

(9) Only apples are oranges (10) All apples are oranges
All pears are oranges Not all pears are oranges
> All pears are apples > Some pears are not apples

If something follows logically from the given propositions, write it down.

Otherwise, write, “nothing can be deduced”.

1. All top universities are expensive. Yale University is expensive.

2. All dolphins are mammals. No dolphins are fish.

3. Only useful subjects are taught at SMU. Financial accounting is a useful subject.

4. Invalid arguments do not establish their conclusions. Some arguments for the
existence of God are valid.

5. Wherever there is a McDonald’s, there is junk food. There is no McDonald’s on

Antarctica.

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6. No SMU students are part of the Merdeka Generation. All SMU students are
millennials.

7. Only citizens are entitled to a subsidy. Don is a citizen.

8. The set of integers is infinite. The prime numbers is a sub-set of the set of integers.

9. Not all reptiles are snakes. Not all snakes are poisonous.

10. All banknotes carry a metal strip and X-rays can detect anything with a metal strip.

Let P, Q and R be three propositions. For each of the following, say whether it is
true or false.

1. If Q follows from P, then P follows from Q.

2. If P is true and Q is false, then Q does not follow from P.

3. If P is false and Q is true, then Q does not follow from P.

4. If Q follows from P and Q is false, then P must also be false.

5. If Q follows from P and R follows from Q, then R follows from P.

6. If Q follows from P and R does not follow from Q, then R does not follow from P.

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Who is correct?

In a certain flower garden, each flower was either red, white, or blue, and all three
colours were represented. A statistician once visited the garden and made the
observation that whatever three flowers you picked, at least one of them was bound to
be red. A second statistician visited the garden and made the observation that whatever
three flowers you picked, at least one was bound to be white. Two logic students heard
about this and got into an argument. The first student said: “It therefore follows that
whatever three flowers you picked, at least one is bound to be blue, doesn’t it?” The
second student said: “Of course not!” Which student was right? Why?