Part 1- Introduction to Critical Thinking

Critical Thinking
Session 2
Critical thinking:

• Term given to a wide range of cognitive and intellectual skills needed to:

- Effectively identify, analyse and evaluate arguments to decide whether to accept or reject these
arguments.

- Discover and overcome personal prejudices and biases not entirely but to the extent possible.
This is done with practice and applications

- Formulate and present convincing reasons in support of conclusion

- Make reasonable, intelligent, reflective decisions about what to believe and what to do. If
broken down further,

• Reasonable: how to differentiate between reasonable from unreasonable critical thinking: 1)

critical thinking is sensitive to standards and 2) we have good reasons for the decision we
make through critical thinking

• Reflective: apply correct method, keep evaluating the method to make sure it's working. It
allows us to go back and forth and make you think about the problem in different ways

• What to believe: decisions taken on factual matter (stand taken on what the facts state) vs
evaluative matter (stand taken on what is good or bad)

• What to do: this is based on two things 1) what to value, what aligns with our goals/ends and
2) how can we achieve our goals in the best possible manner. These questions dictate what
kind of life do we want and how will we live it
Session 3:
Critical thinking standards:

• No possibility of differentiating between thinking and critical thinking without standards. There
are:

- Clarity: it is the gateway standard since we can’t hope to apply the rest of the standards
without this. Further elaboration on a point should be available. The point should be
expressible in another way. Illustrations and examples should be available. Not only is clarity
of language needed, clarity of thought is also needed. Self-understanding can only be achieved
with clarity of thought

- Accuracy: it should be true and there should be ways to check if it is true of not. A statement
can be clear but not true.

- Precision: can it be more specific about the topic? Can you give specific details about the
statement? This can be achieved by careful and highly trained observation to discover clues
like Sherlock Holmes, and then by a process of precise logical inference, reason from those
clues to discover the truth. Precision is important to cut through the confusions and
uncertainties.

- Relevance: information and ideas discussed must be logically relevant to the issue being
discussed. Statements should be connected to the questions being discussed.

- Depth: the answer should address the complexities within a question. How are you taking into
account the problems in the question? Is that dealing with the most significant factor?

- Breadth: should consider another point of view, other ways to look at the question. Achieving
breadth and depth is very hard and requires time

- Logic: the statement should make sense. Two statements coming together should lead to a
third. Statement should be resigned correctly- that is to draw well founded conclusions from
the belief we hold.

- Fairness: one should be open minded, impartial free of distorting biases and preconceptions.
The more exposure we get the less we are fair.

- Consistency: with inconsistent beliefs, at least one of the beliefs must be false. There are two
types of inconsistencies: 1) logical inconsistency, which involves saying or believing
inconsistent things (i.e., things that cannot both or all be true) about a particular matter.and 2)
practical inconsistency, which involves saying one thing and doing another.

Session 4:
Barriers to critical thinking:

• Uncritical thinking is common because critical thinking is difficult and requires time and practice
to develop

• 5 most powerful barriers:

- Egocentrism: self centred thinking. The “ I” always exists and sometime truth is mediated
through this “I”. Self interest thinking and that their interest are most important and should be
met. This can be in two ways: 1) self interested thinking: tendency to accept and defend beliefs
that harmonise with one’s self-interest. For examples, giving a bad review of a college because
with his promotion he will not be able to pick you for work and you’ll have to use the bus and
2) self serving bias: tendency to overrate oneself, to see oneself as better in some respect than
one actually is. For example, thinking that you are better than average at driving.

- Sociocentrism: group entered thinking. There is a tendency to assume the superiority or

rightness of one's own social group and this might manifest egocentrism too. Having and
elevated view of your own group. Focuses on “we” and sometime truth is mediated through
this “we”. This can distort thinking in two ways: 1) group bias: tendency to see ones own
group as being inherently better than others. 2) conformism: tendency to follow the crowd,
abide by the authority or to group standards of conduct and belief. This can be done because of
the desire to be a part of in in-group. Example is the line experiment

- Unwarranted assumption: beliefs that are presumed to be true without adequate evidence or
justification. Stereotyping (believing all politicians are alike, all Muslims are alike an so on) is
a problem here too and it exists because we want to reduce complexity around us due to us
committing logical fallacies. Hasty generalisation is coming to conclusion without evidence.
With this, we draw a conclusion about an individual of a group and apply that conclusion to
every other person of that group

- Wishful thinking: believing that something is true because one wishes it were true. One would
want to do this because we need psychological comfort. For example, a person diagnosed with
a fatal disease may turn to a treatment with no scientific evidence of success but he believes it
would work as he wishes it works.

- Relativistic thinking: the truth is “just” a matter of opinion. Influenced by subjectivism (what
the individual hold to be true and can be contradictory to what another individual takes as the
truth- individual level) and cultural relativism (view that what is true for person A is what
person A’s culture or society believes is true- group level). Truth is objective and accepting this
doesn’t make you tolerant and patient.
Knowledge, Belief and Truth

Logic and Critical Thinking

Session 5:
- Critical thinking important and valuable for two reasons:
• It increases our chance of gaining knowledge. Since knowledge is valuable and so acquiring it
is also valuable

• It is essential to being autonomous

- Traditional definition of knowledge: Justified True Belief. For understanding the word
“knowledge”, understanding of these three distinct terms is necessary

Knowledge and Truth:

- Correspondence theory: statement is true when it corresponds with the facts

- The word “truth” can be understood by exploring three words: realism, relativism and nihilism
- Example case: how many marbles are there in a jar?
• For a realist: there are truths about a subject matter and these truths about the answer is
independent of what others think. He does not have to believe that we can find a definite
answer about the number of marbles in a jar. He could also believe that any of us can make
mistakes in understanding the truth. He can be skeptical and doubtful about what we know
about a given subject. For him, there is a single right answer for the number of marbles in a jar
and would not care what other people think about that answer

• For a relativist: there are truths about a subject matter, but what they are depends on what we
take those truths to be. A relativist can be fine with different truths of 10/11 people and it is
almost impossible to be wrong for him.

• For a nihilist: no single single right answer to the question. Every opinion is just as good as
any other. There are no truths for this subject of matter

- Both realist and relativist agree there are truths. Where they disagree is how they take these
truths. These are two distinct attitudes

- Logic is a tool and can be applied to statements to check if they make sense or if they lead to
other statements or not. Not being able to use this tool properly is on us. Mistakes in application
of this tool can lead to answers that can be wrong. For a realist, This does not mean that truth
changed, for them it was us who made mistakes in accessing the truth. From the relativist
perspective, the answer would be different.
Knowledge and Belief:

- Believing something to be true is taking a certain attitude towards it.

- The word “believe” shows lack of confidence in the subject matter and an attitude of acceptance.
For example “I believe 2+2=4” is less confident than “I know 2+2=4”

- It acts as an attitude of acceptance and this attitude of acceptance is differentiated from other
forms of acceptance like assuming or presuming something

- Freedom of belief is important. There should be no force and compassion to accept a belief and
we should be free to form our own beliefs but these can be subject to investigations and some
standards

- Beliefs can be critiqued without forcing that person to give them up

Knowledge and Justification:

- To say that a belief is justified is to say that it is based on or grounded in good reasons
- There are reasons why people have some beliefs and so it is important to differentiate between
these reasons to see which ones are justified

- Three possible questions to ask:

• What kind of reasons does one have for believing this?
• What kind of reasons in critical thinking concerned with?
• What is it for reasons of that kin to count as good reasons?
- Distinction between producing and sustaining reasons should be made. Beliefs can be produced
on certain reasons at one point of time but as time passes, these reasons/facts can change and so
the belief might no longer be sustainable

- Whenever a belief is justified as true, it becomes knowledge

- Emotional reasons play an important role in some of our beliefs but these are not the reasons
critical thinking is concerned with. These reasons can be related to an individual to a community,
culture or heritage.

- Pragmatic reasons can also exist. In this, no emotion setback or commitment is involved but
beliefs are held on to to reach your goals. Again, these reasons are not concerned with critical
thinking

- Belief that is based solely on emotional or pragmatic reasons cannot possibly count as
knowledge, even if the belief is true
- Epistemic reasons are the heart of critical thinking. They speak with facts
- A belief is justified enough for knowledge only if it is based on good reasons. Reasons have be to
sufficient to support a belief. Reasons have to be acceptable to support a belief

Emotions and evidence:

- Emotions create hinderance in decision making, rationalisation etc and intervene in areas where
they shouldn’t.

- In order to decide what to believe or not, new evidences are to be found and these can be through
direct observations, testimony, legal argumentations, measurements, personal experience, stats,
surveys, published reports are some kinds of evidence are valid

Opinions:
- If we are free to have opinions, this does not means that it isn’t open to discussions
- Opinions are used to represent personal preference and personal taste which can be different for
everybody

- Opinions can also be used to represent considered judgement open to discussions. All ideas are
not of quality and this distinction should be in our mind and so we should be able to take
criticism against our considered judgements. This criticism should be done respectfully and not
target the individual. Opinions and considered judgements of experts can also be wrong
 Recognising Arguments

Logic and Critical Thinking

Arguments:
- A connected series of statements intended to establish a de nite proposition. They are made in
language.

- Abusing, complaining, contradiction without reason, stating a view without a reason is not an
argument

- A broader de nition: an arguments is a series of statements, claims or proposition where all or

some are the premises, and one is the conclusion where the premises are intended to give a
reason for a conclusion

- At least 2 statements needed to call it an argumen

- Every argument cannot succeed in giving good reasons for its conclusion
- Facts like WW2 happened after WW1 are not statements because they do not have a truth valu

Statements or claims:

- These are sentences that are either true or false, either asserted or denied. All statements are
sentences but the opposite is not necessarily true. There can be two or more statements in a single
sentenc

• The truth value test done to see if it is either true or false. If it has a truth value, it is a
statement. To have a truth value, it can be true OR fals

- People have different writing styles and so statements can take different forms. They can be
joined by a conjunction as well as a punctuation, relative pronoun etc

- Questions, greetings, commands, requests and instructions donot qualify as statements as they do
not have any truth value and neither do they assert or deny anything

- There are two different types of statements that are presented as a question or command and so
we might confuse it as misstatement: Rhetorical questions and ought imperatives.

• Rhetorical question: a sentence that has the grammatical form of a question but is meant to be
understood as a statement. The content of the text has then to be checked to decide if it is a
statement or not. For example “ the common assumption that welfare recipients like being on
welfare is false. Does anyone like to be poor and unemployed?” - the author isn’t looking for
information, he is asserting a point as a reason that the assumption is fals

• Ought imperative: statements written in a way it looks like a command but is intended to assert
a value or ought judgment about what is good or bad or right or wrong. They usually come in
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 moral questions. For example “be a doctor! You’ve got the talent. You would enjoy the work.”
The users tells what you ought to do and then also gives a reason for it.

- Requests, suggestions, exclamations are not considered as statements

Premises

- Common premise/reason indicators include because, since, for, as, after all, the reason is that, in
light of, based on the fact etc.

- Purposes for which premises intend to give a reason/ reasons why people bother to give an
argument instead of just asserting the conclusion without an argument

• Persuasion: with this, one should be aware of logical fallacies and if the other person is sincere
or not. Think is the person trying to change my mind for his bene t or for mine? Success of
persuasion depends on the effect of the argument on the person.

• Justi cation: success of justi cation does not depend on what effect the argument has on the
perso

Conclusions

- Common conclusion indicators include so, therefore, hence, implies that, thus, accordingly,
consequently etc. Some of them can also be sued for other purpose in English language and
hence the context helps identify.

- Even if the statements do not make sense, the indicators can still help identify the premises and
conclusion

- Arguments should be re-written in points by looking at the indicators to separate the premises
and confusion

- The word “since” can also be used as a time marker and so the context is to be seen to identify it
as an argument

- One should be grammatically attentive to separate arguments from non-arguments

- A conclusion is the message that the speaker or writer wishes you to accept. They are inferred
(derived from reasoning). Answer to questions like “what is the writer or speaker trying to prove?
What is the communicators main point?

• For example, factory farming should not be legal. There are other more natural ways to
produce needed thing - underlined part is a conclusion and so the issue would then be “should
factory farming be legal

- Its easier to rst nd the conclusion and then work up to the argument and issu
- Ways to nd conclusion include:
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 • Indicator words include consequently, hence, points to, thus, it follows that, etc
• Look in likely locations. These are mostly either the beginning or the end and the rest are
premises and support.

• Examples, statistics, de nitions, background information and evidences are not conclusion but
can be used to support the conclusion

• Check the contact of the communication and the authors background. Answer the question
“and therefore?” to identify the conclusio

- “After” used to explain a series of event is not an argument. It indicates only a temporal relation,
not a relation of reason or praise to conclusions. The meaning changes if “because” is substituted
with “after

Non arguments
- Unsupported assertions: where a statement is made without an attempt to make an argument.
They are statements about what a speaker or writer happens to believe. Such statements can be
true or false, rational or irrational, but they are parts of arguments only if the speaker or writer
claims that they follow from, or support, other claim

- Report: no reasoning imposed, just facts stated. Main purpose is to convey information. No
relationship between premise and conclusion is made. Example: "Ahmad believes that the earth
is at because his eyes clearly show him that it is at”- in this since one is reporting Ahmad’s
belief and not stating his own opinion or reasoning, it is a repor

- Illustrations: an example is given to clarify a statement and the clari cation along with the
statement is an illustration. They are in and of themselves are non-arguments but can be a part of
an argument. Clari cation does not mean proving something tru

• The word “thus” can also be used with illustrations

• “For example” is no proof and cannot be taken as a premise but can be used within arguments
- Conditional statements: made of “if-then” parts. Are complete statement and are not arguments in
themselves but can be a part of an argument. “If Sarah works hard, then she will get a promotion”
- if the condition holds true, Sarah will get a promotion and so this is a part of an argument but
not an argument on its own.

• Although conditionals, taken by themselves, are not arguments, they may express an argument
in context. “If you want to beat Saad, you should use the French defence” said by a coach is a
conditional statement. Since the coach knew the context of the match, this is the way he speaks
and so this statement might be considered as a part of an argument but not a complete
argument since no conclusion or premise indicator is present explicitly

- Explanations: Uses the words “because/as/since” as an introduction to an explanation or cause

and not a premise. Explanation answers the question “why is that so” or “what made it happen”.
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 • Difference between argument and explanation

- Argument: It is a rational in which the reason presents evidence in support of a claim made
in the conclusion. Its purpose is to provide a basis for believing the conclusion to be true.
Points towards “ how do we know

- Explanation: a rational in which the reason presents a cause for the occurrence of some
phenomenon. Its purpose is to help us understand why that fact occurred. Points towards
“why is that so

• Tests to distinguish between the two

- The common knowledge test. People do not try to prove things that are common knowledge.
Like wars happen everybody knows it and so argument is not needed.

- The past event test: people will provide causes for past events always unless there is a
controversy in that event on to did it happen or not. Past events are established already and
hence are mostly explanations

- The authors intent test: sometimes the intent of the author is itself clear and this needs to be
gured out. The author might not be intending to prove with facts but simply explain the
“why is it so” facto

- The principle of charity test: employed only when all other tests fail to give you a clear
answer otherwise you’ll be misrepresenting the author. Attribute to people something good
and positive rather than something weak because that is what generosity demands. Two
options exist: 1) we take a confused paragraph as an argument and it turns out to be a weak
one or a good one 2) we take is as an argument since the premise is weak. If it is taken as an
argument and it turns to be a weak one, it should then be taken as an argument since this is
what generosity demand

Issues and its kinds

- An issue is a question or controversy responsible for the conversation or discussion. It is stimulus

for what is being said

- Descriptive issues are those that raise questions about the accuracy of description of the past,
present or future and have questions like “do”, “what”, “who”, “how” . They are commonly
found and re ect the curiosity about us identifying structures to make sense of the world.
Answering these issues are one way to understand the world

- Prescriptive issues are those that raise questions about what we should do or what is right or
wrong. answer question like “should”, “what ought to be done” and “must”. These are issues
about morality and ethics

- How to recognise an argument

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• Step 1: Count the claims

- If the passage has fewer than two claims, it is neither an argument nor an explanation
- If it has two or more claims, proceed to Step 2
• Step 2: Determine whether one of the claims offers a reason for another claim
- If no reason(s) are offered, the passage is neither an argument nor an explanation.
- If there is a reason offered, proceed to Step 3
• Step 3: Identify the purpose of the reason(s)
- Do the reason(s) offer proof to convince the reader to accept a conclusion
- If the answer is “yes,” then the passage is an argument
- Do the reason(s) offer an explanation for why a given fact is true? If the answer is “yes,”
then the passage is an explanation
.

Basic Logic Concept

Logic and Critical Thinking

- Deductive arguments: guarantees the conclusion with a logical necessary premise. It premise
statement should indicate that the case is for sur

• Specifying a characteristic to a smaller sampl

• They try to prove their conclusions with rigorous, inescapable logic
- Inductive arguments: without guaranteeing conclusio
• Generalising a characteristic to a larger population
• They try to show that their conclusions are plausible or likely given the premise(s)
- Tests differentiating between the two
• Use of indicator words. “Certainly”, “absolutely” and “conclusively” hint towards a deductive
arguments. “Probably”, “likely”, “chances” indicate inductive arguments. This test cannot be
used in isolatio

- It has to be kept in mind that authors may use these words carelessly to
• The strict necessity test: asks whether the conclusion follows from the premises with strict
logical necessity, if it does, then it is deductive. Physical necessity is different from logical
necessity and is not considered here. Strictly logical necessity can be away from truth too.
There should be no alternative logical possibility to make it a logical necessity and if no other
possibility exists, it is a deductive argumen

- Even if by strict necessity, the conclusion does no necessarily follow, we’ll take the
argument as deductive if

• The arguer clearly intended, through language or context, to offer a logically conclusive
argument . Using indicator words consistently (more than once) to convey the intent.
Using “hence, therefore” only once in a statement might still leave doubt. Authors intent
has primacy

• The pattern of reasoning is typically deductive and nothing else indicates that it is
inductive. If an argument has been offered through a typical deductive pattern, even if it is
not following strict necessity test, it is taken as deductive only on the bases of its pattern.
Variation in patterns can exist but the use stay the sam

• The common pattern test: Basic fundamental pattern used for deductive arguments is : if A
then B, A, Therefore

• The principle of charity test: when there are no clear indicators about whether an argument is
deductive or inductive, we fall back to this principle. Try to be generous when attributing the
authors generous. Should only be applied in certain cases and not all cases

 - Example: “Andy told me that he ate at Maxine’s Restaurant yesterday. But Maxine’s was
completely destroyed by re less than a month ago. It is certain, therefore, that Andy is
either lying or mistaken.

• If we treat the argument as deductive, it is clearly a bad deductive argument because the
conclusion plainly does not follow necessarily from the premises. On the other hand, if
we treat the argument as inductive, the argument is a good inductive argument because
the premises, if true, do make the conclusion likely.Thus, the most charitable way to
interpret the argument is to interpret it as inductive.This is what the principle of charity
requires that we do

- These tests could be in con ict and hence create confusion.

Common pattern for deductive reasoning

- This pattern is an exception to the strict necessity test as common pattern takes precedence over
logical necessity in cases where conclusion isn’t given

- Hypothetical syllogism:
• Modus Ponens:
- Af rming the anteceden
- A three line argument in which there will be at least one conditional premis
- Basic pattern: If A then B (antecedent) , A, Therefore B (consequent)
- Reliability means that the truth of the conclusion is always preserved assuming that the
premises are true

- This is logically reliable

• Chain arguments:
- Basic pattern: If A then B, If B then C, So, If A then C.
- This is an attempt to prove that a condition is true and to prove, the author provides two
other conditional statements

- Given that the premises are true, the truth of the conclusion is always preserved- it is
logically reliabl

• Modus Tollens:
- Denying the consequent
- Basic pattern: If A, then B. Not B, Therefore not
- Given that the premises are true, the truth of the conclusion is always preserve
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 - This is logically reliable and should be treated as deductive unless it is intended to be

inductiv

• Denying the antecedent:

- This is logically unreliable and should be treated as deductive unless it is intended to be
inductiv

- Basic pattern: If A then B, Not A, Therefore

- The conclusion is not always guaranteed to be true assuming that the premises are true.
Example is the bill gates argument of being immortal. Premises in this example were true
but the nal conclusion was false

• Af rming the consequent

- This is also logically unreliable and should be treated as deductive unless it is intended to be
inductive

- Basic pattern: If A then B, B, Then

- The conclusion is not always guaranteed to be true assuming that the premises are tru
- Stylistic variants of conditionals
• Saying the same thing in different words
• Sometimes the consequent is put rst and the antecedent in the end

- Categorical syllogism:
• Each statements begins with the words “all,” “some” or “no” instead of “if”
• Basic pattern: all/some/no A are B, all/some/no B are C, therefore, all/some/no A are
• When dealing with these, write the argument in the basic structure to decide if tis reliable or
unreliable. Replace A.B, C well known categories and use the common knowledge test to
check if the conclusion is true of not. True premises and a false conclusion cannot happen in a
reliable pattern

• Another way to check reliability is the Venn diagram

- Argument by elimination or disjunctive syllogism

• Set a pattern with two possibilities, deny one possibility and so it is obvious that the other
possibility is tru

• A and B both can be denied

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 - Arguments based on mathematics

• Conclusion depends on mathematical calculation or measurement
• Logical, step by step reasoning given
• They can be inductive if the conclusion does not follow from the premise- the premises can be
true but the confusion is false in this cas

- Arguments by de nition
• A word is used, and based on the de nition of the word, the conclusion is drawn. For example,
“John is an atheist. It necessarily follows that he doesn’t believe in God

Common patterns of inductive reasoning

- Indicative generalisations:
• A sample is taken from a population and some conclusions are drawn about that sample and
generalised to the larger population. Since its regarding only some members of the population
not all, it is stated with a “probably”

- Predictive arguments
• A prediction about the future supported with a reason. For example, “most US presidents have
been tall. Therefore, probably the next US president will be tall

• There can be exceptions

• They are considered as inductive as nothing in the future can be absolutely certai

- Argument from authority

• Our lives rest on this argument around which we build our knowledg
• Argument by an established person in a eld or an expert
• An authority or witness is cited and a claim is made which draws a conclusion
• These are taken as inductive as these authorities can also go wrong and so a room for doubt is
left

• If the authority is a holy book, it can also be taken as deductive by people who take these
books as infallible - in these cases, confusion should follow necessarily from the premise

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 - Casual argument
• A cause of something is assessed or denied
• Taken as inductive as it is very hard to establish something with absolute certainty where
causality is involved since is so complex

• There can be exceptions: one might want to present a cause and effect argument without
leaving any room for doubt - these are then deductive if conclusion follows necessarily from
the premise

- Statistical argument
• Based on statistical evidence - evidence that some percentage of some group or class has some
particular characteristi

• Statistical evidence is not absolute conclusive and so should be taken as inductive

• Can be deductive too in some cases

- Argument from analog

• Two things presented which are similar and one is claimed to have a property and so the other
one is also thought of having that property

• Basic pattern: A is Similar to B. B has property P, So, A has property

• Since both things are similar and not same, the conclusion is not 100% con rmed

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 Standards of Deductive and Inductive Argument

Logic and Critical Thinking

Deductive arguments

- Standards to judge deductive arguments

• Validity/ invalidity: deals with the structure of the argument - conclusion follows necessarily
from the premise through strict logical necessity. The conclusion should be guaranteed too

- Validity preserves the truth of the conclusion

- It should be structured in a way that when we have true premises, the conclusion would be
true

- It is not possible to have a false conclusion if the argument is valid and the premises are true
- Whenever the conclusion of a valid argument is false, at least one premise must be false
- An argument is valid if and only if its not possible that both its premises are true but the
conclusion is false

- Validity and invalidity does not depend not the truth of the premise and conclusion. It
depends on what is possible. We cannot rightly conclude that an argument is valid simple on
the grounds that its premises are all tru

- A valid arguments is a deductive argument in which the premises succeeds to guarantee the
conclusion assuming that the premises are true

- An invalid arguments is a deductive argument in which the premises fail to guarantee the
conclusion assuming that the premises are true

- Unreliable deductive patterns are invalid

• Soundness: (all premises are true

- An argument is sound if and only if all its premises are true and it is valid
- A sound argument is a valid argument in which all of the premises are tru
- Ways an argument can be unsound
• The argument is invalid

 • It has a false premis

• If a deductive argument is not sound, then it is not a good argument
• If you know an argument is invalid, then you also know it is unsound
- Three categories to place unsound arguments
• Category 1: it is valid, bit it has at least one false premis
• Category 2: it is invalid, but all of its premise are tru
• Category 3: it is invalid and it has at least one false premise
- And unsound argument is one that either is invalid or has at least one false premis

- We can’t know if the argument is sound or not unless we know the premises are true in reality
- Deductive arguments can have two possible vices:
• The conclusion does not follow necessarily from the premise and by avoiding them, we can get
the corresponding virtues namely validity and soundnes

• One or more premises are false

- Validity requires only one virtue whereas soundness needs both virtues
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 Inductive argumen

- Standards to judge inductive arguments:

• Strengths/ weaknes
- Strong indicative arguments are well reasoned
- The conclusion follows probably from the premis
- A strong argument is one in which it is possible but improbable that the conclusion is false
given the assumption that the premises are tru

- Weak indicative argument is one in which it is not probable that, if the premises are true,
then the conclusion is tru

- 98% probability is stronger than 14% probability

- When talking about argument from analogy, the property being discussed should be related
to the similarities between the two subjects. For example when talking about two horses’s
ability to jump, their size, speed, training etc should be the similarities to make it a strong
argument and not eye or hail colour

- Strength and weakness come in degrees but validity and invalidity do not. It is either all or
nothing but not anything in between whereas in indicative arguments, they can be slightly as
well as completely weak specially when there are no numerical are concerne

- Conclusion of a strong argument can be fals

• Cogency
- An inductively strong argument with all true premises is a cogent argument
- This is what soundness is for deductive argument
- An inductive argument that is either weak, or strong with atlas one false premise is an
uncogent argument

- Three categories of uncogent arguments

• Category 1: It is strong but has at least one false premis
• Category 2: Is it week but all of its premises are tru
• Category 3: Is is weak and it has at leats one false premis

 Using Language: Issues and Strategies

Logic and Critical Thinking

- We understand sentences through language and so logic and language are connecte
- Usage of language can create issues
- Two functions that language perform:
• It is used to convey information: The extent to which any statement conveys informations, it is
supposed to have cognitive meaning. Use of words like “records”, name of a country, facts and
gures etc used to convey some strong cognitive meanin

• It evokes emotions and feeling in people and help them express them. The extent to which any
statement conveys informations, it is supposed to have emotive meaning. Words like cruel,
inhuman, vengeful, slaughtered used to convey some strong emotive meanin

- This becomes relevant to us because when we speak of logic, we speak primarily about cognitive
meaning. We need to disengage cognitive meaning of statements from their emotive meanings.
We should focus on the information content only. The emotive force has no bearing on the logical
relationships

- Cognitive meaning is actually the information covered by it. Emotive meaning is the feelings or
emotions it tries to bring in the reade

- Many errors of logic stem from a careless or imprecise use of language. It can happen from
ambiguity and unawareness

- 2 ways in which emotionally loaded language can create problems

• Loaded language can interfere with out attempt to understand the cognitive meaning of a
sentence. When this happens, one is supposed to rewrite the argument in a way that the
emotive element is separated and only the cognitive element remains which is then used to
understand the meaning of the argument

• Emotionally loaded language can blind us to the need for evidence. When positive emotions
are evoked, it is easy for us to simply accept those statements without asking for evidence for
it.

- For example when we read the word “harvest”, it is taken as a positive emotive force as the
rst thing that comes to our mind is agriculture and food supply. So when this word is used
for harvesting organs, the negative effect is nulli ed. Using “yank out” instead of “harvest”
presents a negative emotive affect. Using “remove” presents a neutral tone

- The argument should be selected on merit- validity/Soundness or strength/cogency, if these

criteria is not ful lled, the argument should not be accepte

- Advertisements frequently rely on emotive meaning. This is because

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 • They don’t have much time to convey information conten

• They realise they need to connect on an emotional level to convince customers to buy a
produc

Issues in using words

- Ambiguity: can interfere with out ability to properly understand the cognitive meaning of an
argument. There are multiple distinct interpretations of this word with no clarity of which one is
to be use

• Lexical ambiguity: a single word or term having more than one meaning in the language. For
example, if words like “critical” “sound” etc are used without a given context, it hinders our
ability to understand the cognitive meaning of the sentence

• Referential ambiguity: it is not clear which thing or group is being referred to. For example
“everybody” does not specify what group of people is included

• Syntactic ambiguity: two or more possible meanings within a single sentence or sequence of
word

- Vagueness: there are no distinct multiple interpretations but there is a single entire range of
interpretation with an unclear boundary. There are two sets of people on which a word can be
applied but there is a very unclear boundary between these two sets

• Some of these words are problematic because they can interfere in our ability to understand the
cognitive sense of the argument and hence evaluat

• A word can be both ambiguous and vague

• Not all cases of vagueness are problematic because it is understood that times and contexts can
change and so these vague words provides exibility for these words to be interpreted in a way
the situation at that time demands (example are the vague words used in constitution which can
be understood depending on the time and situation

• Vague terms can make a claim vague and impossible to con rm or disapprov
• Vagueness can be used by people at their advantage too since they are not committing to
anything by using a vague term. They do this to be non-committal or imprecise. For example
“i’m responsible to some extent”- at what extent do you become responsible is not know

- There are many forms of expression that are ambiguous in on context and vague in anothe
- Ambiguity and vagueness are important in logic because there are countless occasions in which
the evaluations of an argument leads to the observation, “well, that depends on what you mean”.
Debate is about what exactly is the meaning of a speci c term under discussion in the argument.

- The role of these two in arguments may be conveniently explored in the context of con icting
arguments between individuals. Some speci c words causes dispute between two people. It can
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 either be vagueness or ambiguity of these words that there can be different interpretations of
these words and hence a con ict of opinion. For example, the word “guilty” can be used in a
moral sense as well as in a legal sense and so these two distinct understanding cause a con ict of
interest

- Types of disputes
• Verbal disputes: These dispute are centred on the difference in meaning of the words. Many
verbal disputes can be solved if the way way the word is to be used is speci ed

• Factual disputes: are different from verbal disputes. Here, the difference of opinions is on facts
and not meaning of words

- Ways in which these ambiguity and vagueness can be removed

• Lexical de nitions:
- Conventional/Established meaning of the word is used. The meaning that is in the
dictionary. These meanings are how majority of the people understand and de ne the

- Lexical de nitions have a truth value- they are either true or false. When an established
conventional meaning is correctly used and reported, this means that the lexical de nition is
true. If it is not correctly reported, the de nition is false

- These remove ambiguity

• Stipulative de nitions
- De nitions used to assign new meanings to a term. This meaning is independent of the
conventional/established meanin

- People with different disciplines come up with new words. For examples, the word “sel e”
was once stipulated and gained attention and currency. If it becomes accepted widely only
then it becomes part of the lexicons

- They are neither true nor false as these are recommendations and suggestions
- Stipulative definations are misused in verbal disputes when one person covertly uses a word
in a peculiar way and then proceeds to assume that everyone else uses that word in the same
way.

• Precising de nitions
- Combination of lexical and stipulative de nitions. It is lexical because it is not entirely
independent of the conventional meaning. But this lexical meaning does not exactly draw a
line and so the stipulative de nition is used to draw this line

- A precising de nition is intended to make a vague word more precise so that the word’s
meaning is not left to the interpretation of the reader or listener
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 - For example, lexical meaning for “old” is “somebody advanced in age” and the stipulative
meaning can be above “above 70”. Stipulative de nitions depend of the persons using the

- They do not always resolve differences in opinion. They reduce vagueness of a ter
• Persuasive de nitions
- Those in which a speci c positive or negative meaning attaches an emotive, or derogatory
meaning to a term where it is none

- Puts a neutral word in a speci c biased negatively or positively slanted way, an argument is
presented and then convinces audience to believe

- When discussion happens around some speci c key terms, make sure you know the
established meanings of these terms before the argument is taken ahead. Otherwise the
argument takes a bias route in convincing the audience

- Although persuasive de nitions are often presented as objective and authentic, they are
convincing only if they are very well defende
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 Logical Fallacies

Logic and Critical Thinking

- Fallacy: a mistake in reasoning.
- Some mistakes are very clear to identify but some cannot be. So there might not be a logical
reason to accept these arguments but there might be a psychological reason to accept them

- Formal fallacies: explicit use of an invalid form

• Use of Af rming the consequent as this is an invalid pattern (If A, then B; B; so A
• Use of Denying the antecedent as this is an invalid pattern (If A, then B; not A; so, not B
- The structure is such that is does not preserve the truth of the conclusion given the premises
are true

- We have to deal with the structure of the argument to determine if it is a formal fallacy or
no

- Informal fallacies: no explicit use of an invalid form but still a mistake in reasoning exists
• In order to determine this fallacy, we’ll have to deal with the content of the argument.
• They can be psychologically very tempting but, when we analyse and understand them, there is
a chance we won’t be tempted to accept these wrong argumen

• The patterns of these fallacies are almost always fallacious, but they are sometimes not.

Fallacies of relevance:

- Logical irrelevance exists between premise and conclusion

- They may seem to be relevant for psychological reaso
- A statement’s relevance to another could be either positive or negativ
- Truth value and relevance are different thing
- Context usually plays a role in determining relevanc
- People are unable to separate the individual from his argument
- A statement can be relevant to another statement even if the rst statement is completely fals
- Whether a statement is relevant to another usually depends on the context in which the statements
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- Positive relevance: when the premise/statements is taken as true and it gives us a reason to
believe that the other statement is also true. Premise provides reasoning for conclusion to be true.
For example, “Dogs are cats. Cats are felines. So dogs are felines.”

- Negative relevance: when the premise/statements is taken as true and hence it gives us a reason to
believe that the other statement is false. For example, “Hassan is a 3 year old child so Hassan is a
teacher at LUMS”. Since it is accepted that Hassan is a 3 year old child, it cannot be accepted
that he is a teacher at Lums and hence is it negatively relevance

- Irrelevance: no relevance between the premises and conclusion. For example “ all US presidents
were democrats so we should eat eggs”

Ad Hominem Fallacy: argument against the perso

- When a person presents an argument, attempt is made to show the premises are not true or do not
lead to the conclusion by attacking the person These attempts/ accusations presented are
irrelevant to the argument

- Involves attacking the person who advances an argument (or asserts a statement) as opposed to
providing a rational critique of the argument (or statement) itsel

- The fallacy of personal attack occurs only if

• an arguer rejects another person’s argument or claim AN
• the arguer attacks the person who offers the argument or claim, rather than considering the
merits of that argument or claim

- Attack on the persons moral to prove his argument as wrong

- Accusations can be direct or indirect
• Abusive ad hominem: a direct attack launched against a person to show he has a aw and so
his arguments should not be accepted. These attacks can be personal, moral etc. The accusation
against the person does not prove that his argument presented is wrong

• Subtle form: indirect attack launched

Circumstantial Ad Hominem: attacking the motiv

- Shown that the circumstances the person is in has been affected the person and his arguments and
so his argument should not be accepted. The arguer might have something to gain from the
conclusion and so it should be taken as a bad argument

- Whatever the situation the arguer is in, it does not affect his argument. Right and wrong of an
argument should be decided on the basis of the premises and logical necessity and not the
circumstances the argument was presented in

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 - Persons motivation for offering a particular argument or claim is criticise
- Basic pattern: X is biased or has questionable motives; Therefore, X’s argument or claim should
be rejected

- It does not consist of simply criticising another arguer’s motives. Instead, it consists of criticising
an arguer’s motives rather than offering a rational critique of the argument itself

Ad Hominem Fallacie

- It is rare for arguers in real life to state their ad hominem arguments as explicitly as the ones
discusse

- It is also rare to conclude explicitly that the opponent’s position is fals

- What is common is to launch into a personal attack in an attempt to distract the listener or reader
from the original argument

- With this, people will focus more on the motive and inconsistency instead of the argument and
hence, end up discrediting and refuting the argument

- Kinds of cases when personal attacks are relevant (only when premises are relevant to the
conclusion)

• Criticising political candidate for various failings: personal attacks with criticise the candidates
for being a lier or stealer, are relevant as these candidates are going to run for public of ce.
There is an issue of public trust here and so if the person has personal aws which can affects
his ability to handle the of ce, they are relevant

- Defects in the person (as premises) are not irrelevant to the conclusion (that the person
should not be elected

• Testimony: reliability of the person testifying is at stake. If a person is not honest, his
testimony should not be believed.

- In testimonies, it is assumed that their testimony is reliable but this reliability has to checked
for lies and biase

- Individual character and reliability is part of the argument and affects the acceptance of the
conclusion

• Personal criticism could be appropriate in arguments by authority. The authority saying

something should be taken as a premise.

- Two things to be seen in such arguments

• Is the authority really an authority
• Is the authority reliable? If it can be shown that is is unreliable, then the argument can be
rejected without committing ad hominem fallacy
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 - With typical ad hominem arguments, defects in the person (my critics also damage the
environment) are irrelevant to the conclusion (my damaging the environment is not wrong).

Look Who’s Talkin

- The arguer is charged with hypocrisy and that he is practically inconsistent and so his arguments
are not worth considering - he fails to practice what he preaches

- Practical inconsistency (violating a given moral) is equated with logical inconsistency in this
fallacy but this is not true in reality. One might be practically inconsistent but not logically
inconsistent. These two are clearly differen

- For example, “ How dare you argue that I should stop doing X; why, you do (or have done) X
yourself

- From a strategic perspective, it is important that when we present an argument, we should be

practical consistent as it then has a greater impact on the evidence. From a logical perspective,
practical consistency is not important

- Basic pattern: X fails to follow his or her own advice; Therefore, X’s claim or argument should
be rejected

- Unless an argument is not rejected due to the presenter being an hypocrite, this fallacy is not
committed. Criticising a hypocrite is allowed

Two Wrongs Make A Righ

- An attempt to justify a wrong act by claiming that some other act is just as wrong as this one too.
For example cheating in exam because others also do it

- Exception: for example “ X –murdered three people in cold blood. Therefore, X should be put to
death.” Suf cient and relevant justi cation has been offered for why X should be put to death so
fallacy not committed

- Difference between TWMAR and LWT

• This fallacy always involves an attempt to justify an apparently wrongful act; the look who’s
talking fallacy often does not

• The look who’s talking fallacy always involves a charge of hypocrisy or failing to practice
what one preaches; the two wrongs make a right fallacy often does not

Straw Man Fallac

- A straw man is easy to bring down and so when one is able to create a straw man, he is easily
able to bring it dow
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 - The arguer attacks a misrepresentation of the opponent’s view but missing out a few words or
changing words. Since the audience doesn’t know the opponent, they believe the argue

- In other words, an arguer distorts an opponent’s argument or claim to make it easier to attack
- Misrepresentation of the view is irrelevant to the view being true or fals
- Straw man fallacy results from a failure to be fair (in representing the idea as fairly as possible)
and charitable (in picking up the best possible argument) in interpreting an argument

- One can see through a straw man fallacy by asking such appropriate questions as
• What were the exact words used in the original
• Have any key words or phrases been changed or omitted
• Does the context suggest that the author was deliberately exaggerating or leaving obvious
exception clauses unstated

- Example: not allowing people to go to mosques so the covid curve can be attened. This
argument was presented in a way that said these policy makers are stopping muslims from
practicing their religious duties and so are doing wrong

- Sometimes these can be committed because people present a persuasive de nitions (biased
de nitions) along with their argument. When this happens, the audience should refer to the
lexical de nition to check is this fallacy has been committed or not before accepting the
conclusion.

- The straw man fallacy is also committed when a view or argument is alleged to involve
assumptions that it does not (or need not) involve.

• For example, “Fahad advocates the legalisation of cocaine. But I cannot agree with any
position based on the assumption that cocaine is good for you and that a society of drug addicts
can ourish. So, I disagree with Fahad” - the underlined assumptions weren’t necessary as
people might advocate legalisation without thinking that is is good for you. Because of these
assumptions, Fahad has been misrepresented

Appeal to force/ scare tactic

- If someone tries to make someone accept a conclusion of an arguments threatening him in any
way, this fallacy is committed. In such cases, the threat is completely irrelevant to the conclusion

- Main pattern: “you can avoid harm by accepting this statement. So, this statement is true”. We
shouldn’t just depend on the pattern but also look at the content and context

- Committed when one is not able to convince others on rational basis. If premises are relevant to
the conclusion, this fallacy is not committed
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 Appeal to the people/ bandwagon fallac

- Commonly accepted as a good argument due to its psychological impact

- Rather than pointing to the premises, an attempt is made to persuade a person by appealing to the
desire to be accepted or valued by others

- Reasons to value and accept the group are mentioned and then people who belong to this group
are referred to prove that the conclusion is right. Just because you belong to that group that is
valued and accepted, particular conclusion regarding that group is not necessarily true

- Basic pattern: Everybody (or a select group of people) believes or does X; Therefore, you should
believe or do X, too

- One might not be addressing to a large group only to commit this fallacy. Whenever there is a
feeling of being accepted is there and it is being appealed to, this fallacy is committed

- These bandwagon appeals are not fallacious when the premises are relevant to the conclusions

Appeal To Pit

- It can psychologically and emotionally convince a person

- Pity is evoked and based on this evocation, someone is made to accept that arguments. Pity is
logically unrelated to the conclusion in such case

- Basic pattern- Premise: You have reason to pity this person. Conclusion: You should do X for the
bene t of this person (or group), although doing X is not called for logically by the reason given

- Call for compassion is different than appeal to pity. In call for compassion, the information
provided might invoke pity, but the information provided is logically relevant to the conclusio

Red Herrin

- Any argument in which the premises are logically unrelated to the conclusion commits this
fallacy

- An arguer tries to sidetrack his audience by raising an irrelevant issue and then claims that the
original issue has effectively been settled by the irrelevant diversio

- Difference between red herring and other fallacies: in red herring, an irreverent conclusion
derived from the premises that are relevant to the topic of discussion. This distraction helps the
arguer win

- Basic pattern- premise: something relevant to the topic at hand is described. Conclusion: a
distracting but often unnoticed change of subject occurs

- Is an attempt to reject the argument is not made, this fallacy is not committed. Just avoiding the
topic and not rejecting the argument is not committing is fallacy
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 Equivocatio

- Plays on ambiguity in words. Two distinct meanings of a word are used in the same argument and
an impression is given that the argument is valid

- For example, the word “man” can be used to talk about human beings in general as well the male
gender in speci c

- One is making it appear that the word is being used in only one was in the argument but in
reality, it is being used with different meanings in the same argument

- Basic pattern- premise: contain a key work that is ambiguous. Conclusion: Is reached not by valid
logical inference but by trading on the ambiguity of the key word

- Sometimes equivocation can be subtle too. It might seem like that the argument says “ X is
identical with Y; so, Y is identical with X”. But here too, there is ambiguity in either X or Y

Begging The Questio

- An argument begs the question when it assumes the point to be prove

- Two ways to commit this fallacy
• Restate the conclusion as the premise: Conclusion is basically a restatement of the premise
itself and it begs the question. For example “The defendant is not guilty of a crime, for she is
innocent of having committed it”. The argument is defective as the premise is assuming the
point that is to be proved in the conclusio

• Arguing in a circle: occurs when an arguer offers a chain of reasons for a conclusion, where the
conclusion of the argument is stated or assumed as one of the premises. “A because B, B
because A

- Mostly committed in arguments for and against the existence of Go

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Fallacies of insuf cient evidenc

- Here, the problem is not the irrelevance of the premise to the conclusion. The problem here is
that the premise do not provide enough support for the conclusion

Appeal to ignoranc

- Used to show something is either true or false just because it lacks evidence
- Two particular ways in which this is done
• the claim that a statement is true (or may be reasonably believed true) simply because it hasn’t
been proven false

• the claim that a statement is false (or may be reasonably believed false) simply because it
hasn’t been proven true.

- Frequently committed to maintain status quo and change might not be bene cial for everybod
- Exceptions where lack of evidence is enough of a premise
• Fruitless search- a careful search has been conducted and it is likely that the search would have
found something if there had been anything there to be found

• Cases in which special rules require that a claim be rejected as false unless a certain burden of
proof is met

- Sometimes the absence of evidence really is evidence of absence. This is a certain type of
argument known as “Noseeum argument”

• Basic pattern of this argument: I see no X’s; so, there are no X’

• Sometimes These are fallacious as just because you cannot see X, does not mean it is not there.
For example when X is germs
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 • Sometimes there are not fallacious and are inductively strong as if there were any X, they
would have been seen or discovered. For example when X is a juice jug in the fridge. If it was
there, it would have been seen. Since it wasn’t seen, it is fair to confuse that it wasn’t ther

- Some confusion regarding this fallacy may stem from the assumption used in courts of law that a
defendant is innocent until proven guilty. This principle asks us to treat him as innocent for the
trial and not believe that he is innocent. Guilt is not established with absolute certainty.

• Two undesirable outcome: 1) an innocent is punished 2) guilty is allowed to go free. The way
the legal system has been set up, it is to make sure that the rst outcome is prevented as much
as possible. But this increases the risk for the second one

False Dilemm

- Is committed when an arguer poses a false either/or choic

- Occurs when one uses a premise that unjusti ably reduces the number of alternatives to be
considered

- Two alternatives are set in the premise. If Y is not the case, X should be the case
- The attempt to limit to some possibilities, reduces the number of alternatives. For example, “love
Pakistan or leave it if criticising it”. A person can still love Pakistan, live there and also critics i

- Complexity of the issue being discussed makes it dif cult to be identi ed

Inappropriate Appeal To Authority

- Made when the reliability of the authority may be reasonably doubted. There are two
assumptions

• Authority provides us with knowledge due to he’s experience in that are

- Fallacy committed when authority cited in area where he lacks expertis
- For example, fallacy committed when a cricketer is cited is an area of washing powder.
Since he does not have expertise in that area, the argument is fallacious

• Authority is trust worthy. Is he biased, a liar etc?

- When these two assumptions are not correct, this fallacy is mad
- Two important points to be kept in mind
• Appeal to authorities in matters of controversy is often problematic. When authorities are
considered to be clearly divided, then using an authority to convince an individual is
problematic. There is no reason to believe one authority is reliable than the othe

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 • Relationship between ad hominem arguments and appeals to unreliable authorities. It is not a

fallacy when we pose a challenge on the authority regarding his unreliability as it is assumed in
the premise that the authority is trust worthy. But the reverse has to be kept in min

Questionable/ False Caus

- When one possible cause of a phenomenon is assumed to be a (or the) cause although reasons are
lacking for excluding other possible causes

- Common form taken: is post hoc (after this), ergo (therefore), propter hoc (because of this).
Thing X happened after thing Y, therefore thing Y happened because of thing

- Three ways this fallacy is committed

• Post hoc: This form of the questionable/false cause fallacy occurs whenever an arguer
illegitimately assumes that because event X preceded event Y, X caused Y

- A claim of causal relationship is made but since this relationship is not 100% correct, the
fallacy is committed as other causal factors are ignored. For example, “Since I came into
of ce 2 years ago, the rate of violent crime has decreased signi cantly. So, it is clear that the
longer prison sentences we recommended are working.” Just because the Crome rate
reduced after you came in of ce, does not mean it is for sure because of you that the rate
decrease

• Correlation fallacy: Not all false cause fallacies involve the unwarranted assumption that if X
precedes Y, then X causes Y. committed when an arguer assumes, without suf cient evidence,
that because A and B regularly occur together, A must be the cause of B or vice
versa.Correlation doesn’t automatically mean causalit

• Oversimpli ed Cause fallacy: occurs when many causes are (or may well be) operative but one
of them is illegitimately assumed to be the sole cause

- It is not necessary that the word “cause” is used when this fallacy is being committed.

Slippery slop

- Occurs when the arguer assumes that a chain reaction will occur as a result of a particular action
but there is insuf cient evidence that one (or more) events in the chain will cause the others

- You slide down and reach an end when you step on a slippery steep slope. Similarly, when one
action is taken, it gives rise to a chain of unwanted actions with a terrible end and it is argued that
this end should not be reached. So this fallacy is committed when no evidence is provided for the
cause of this chain of argument

- This fallacy is given the name “Catastrophising “- means a person who has fears. One believes
that these insigni cant fears can make us think that a small event can lead to a catastrophe in our
lives
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 - Many slippery-slope arguments leave out some or all of the intermediate steps that an arguer
believes will occu

- It is important to note that not all slippery-slope arguments are fallacious. Sometimes there are
good reasons for thinking that a very bad outcome may result from a seemingly harmless rst
ste

Loaded or Complex Questio

- A question can be asked in a way where it illegitimately presupposes some conclusion alluded to
in the question. It contains and unfair or questionable assumption

- All questions has presupposition. Legitimacy is to be seen to decide if fallacy has been
committed or not. Unless there is suf cient evidence that the point supposed is actually true, this
fallacy can be committed.

- “Who is the governor of Punjab?” This is not a fallacy as it has a legitimate presuppose that there
is a place Punjab and it has a governor

- Sometimes two statement are clubbed together. “Will you be kind and loan me 500?” By pointing
two questions out, there is a presuppose that answering one question can lead to the answer of
second

- A loaded question is not the same as leading question. A leading questions is a question that
prompts or encourages the answer wanted. These are usually questions that aim to get a speci c
answer. For example. “Is it true that you saw the defendant kill that man?; yes” these questions
are perfectly legitimate

- “Have you stopped cheating on exams?” is a loaded question because any direct yes or no answer
to it will force Pete to admit something that he does not want to admit

- To respond to a loaded question effectively, one must distinguish the different questions being
asked and respond to each individually

Hasty generalisation

- Occurs when there is a reasonable likelihood that a sample is not representative of the group.
Such a likelihood may arise if the sample is either too small to not randomly selected

Fallacy of inconstanc

- Committed when an argument is self contradictory

- The premises don’t seem to compatible or go against each other and so drawing an acceptable
conclusion is dif cul
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- Basic pattern: since A and not
- Might happen frequently in political discourse. For example. “I will maintain or increase all
present governmental services and also lower taxes” if all present services are maintained, how
can you lower taxes then

Weak analogy

- When an arguer compares two things that aren’t really comparable in relevant respects
- Although two things are compared in the same respect, the same respect can not be acceptable.
For example- lettuce and poison ivy both having green leaves but not tasting great with burgers

- If certain common features exists, does not mean all features would exist

Analysing Arguments

Logic and Critical Thinking

- Through analysing arguments we examine the structure by identifying the conclusion
and the premises
- Not every sentence is a statement or a claim
- Indicator words should not be made part of the identi cation of statements
- Conditional statements are a single statement
- Sometimes it may be challenging to identify when a single sentence contains more than
one statement because the sentence uses a parenthetical phrase or buries one
statement within another.

• Use of the word “which” requires rewriting the sentence to check for claims. This
word usually starts a new claim/statement as “which” can be replaced by the word it
is representing
- A single statement can be represented by more than on sentence. Restatements are
given the same number. Numbers are only given to distinct statements

Placing conclusion and premise

- Underline the statements - exclude the indicator word
- The premise is put above the conclusion and an arrow shows the
premise leading to the conclusion

Types of arguments:
- Most arguments have more than one premise supporting the conclusion.
- Relationship between these premises need to be understood to make the diagram
- Two ways to make sense of the relationship:
• Convergent premises: Premises independently support the conclusion
- If one premise is shown false, the argument is still there as other premises still lead
to the conclusion
- Example: Cocaine is addictive, and it is illegal. Consequently, you should not use
cocaine.
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 - Two distinct arrows independently coming down to the conclusion
• Linked premises: All the premises rely on each other to support
the conclusion
- All linked premises must be true otherwise even if one is proved
false, the argument falls apart
- To check if premises are linked, take out each premise
separately and check if the remaining premises lead to the
conclusion to nor
- Example: Cocaine is a drug, and drugs are addictive.
Therefore, cocaine is addictive.
- A plus sign between the two premises and the underline shows linkage between
the two. Only one arrow shown

Diagramming arguments with unstated conclusions or implied premises

- We should make sure conclusion is stated explicitly, underlined and numbered if it is
originally unstated
- This is done by rewriting the conclusion yourself and numbering it
- Premises can be implied by one statement present in the argument and sometimes
they cannot be present at all
- A given statement might actually imply a premise and so should be rewritten and make
explicit and then numbered
- Rhetorical statement acts as a question but has an implied statement and this
statement should be rewritten and made explicit
- Distinct statements should not be clubbed as a single premise. They can be linked but
cannot be joined together to make a single premise

Arguments and sub-arguments

- A passage has multiple arguments because there are one or more sub-arguments.
• A sub-argument is an argument whose premise(s) provide support for a premise of
another argument.

• In these cases, the conclusion of the sub-argument is a premise of the main

argument.
- When a sub-argument is added, another vertical layer is added to the diagram
How to make a diagram
- Steps:
• Step 1: Underline and number each claim.
- Do not include indicator words. Consider circling or highlighting them.
- Remember that more than one claim can appear in a single sentence.
- If a claim is repeated, assign it the same number each time.
- If a conclusion is unstated, write the claim underneath the passage and assign it a
number.

• Step 2: Pay attention to indicator words.

- Break down the passage into smaller, more manageable parts.
• Step 3: Identify the main conclusion of the argument.
- Place the main conclusion at the bottom of the diagram.
- Do not confuse an intermediate conclusion with the main conclusion.
• Step 4: Identify the premise(s) that support the main conclusion.
- Place the premise(s) above the conclusion.
- For convergent premises, place an arrow from each premise to the conclusion.
Linked premises should be underlined and connected with a “+” with a single
arrow from them to the conclusion

• Step 5: Diagram any sub-arguments.

- Look for claims that support any premise of the main argument.
• Step 6: Check your work.
- Confirm that all claims relevant to the argument have been diagrammed.
- Present the argument aloud to yourself and listen for errors.
 Writing Well-Crafted Arguments

Logic and Critical Thinking

Principles of writing well crafted version of arguments

- Principle 1: Identify the premise and conclusion and number the

• Write the premise rst and number it. Following it, write the indicator word and then the
conclusion and number the conclusion. For example, “1 premise; So 2 conclusion”

- Principle 2: eliminate excess verbiage. Words and statements that add nothing to the argument,
should not be included in the well-crafted version of the argument

• Four common types of excess verbiage

- Discount
• A discount is an acknowledgment of a fact or possibility that might be thought to render
the argument invalid, weak, unsound, or uncogent

• Authors can acknowledge the possibility of having something that can go against their
argument but they still intend to prove their argument correc

• They have rhetorical or psychological effects

• An arguer might cite somebody else’s argument and then refuse it. This is not a discount
and shouldn’t be taken as one since the author aims are rejecting the other argument he
cited and not acknowledge that it can be true

• Discount indicators include: although, while it may be true that, even though, while I
admit that, in spite of the fact that, I realise that . . . , but, despite the fact that, I know that
. . . , bu

• Indicator words removed while writing well crafted versio

- Repetition
• Used when author restate a premise or conclusion, perhaps altering the wording slightly
• Should be given the same number
• Repetition aims memorisation and can correct possible misunderstandings and/or make an
idea more vivid.

- Assuranc
• A assurance is a statement, word, or phrase that indicates that the author is con dent of a
premise or inference
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 • Listener might feel that the person must be saying the truth because of the con dence
with which the person is presenting

• Assurance indicator: obviously, everyone knows that, no doubt, it is well known that,
certainly, no one will deny that, plainly, this is undeniable, clearly this is a fac

• Indicator words removed while writing well crafted versio

- Hedges
• A hedge is a statement, word, or phrase that indicates that the arguer is tentative about a
premise or inference

• Indicator words: I think that, I believe that, it seems that, I guess that, perhaps, it is
reasonable to suppose that, maybe, this seems reasonable, in my opinion, this is plausibl

• Exception to assurance and hedges: Assurance and Hedges cannot always be dropped, for
they sometimes contribute to the validity, strength, soundness, or cogency of the
argument

- Principle 3: employ uniform language. The linkage between premises and conclusion can become
obscured.

• Substitute certain phrases to make the argument more clear. The substitution should make the
structure more clear otherwise it is of not use. It should also not change the intended content of
the statement

- Principle 4: fairness and charity while interpreting an argument

• Fairness: Involves being loyal to the original, not distorting the clear meaning
• Charitable: Needed when the original is ambiguous in some respect; it involves selecting an
interpretation that puts the argument in its best possible light

- Principle 5: do not confuse sub-conclusion with nal conclusion

- Principle 6: make explicit obviously implicit premises in a charitable way. When doing so, the
implied premise is written down in brackets so it is made clear that is has been made explicit

Standardising longer argument

- Longer arguments require paraphrasing to make them more accurate, clear, concise and charitable
- A paraphrase is a detailed restatement of a passage using differ- ent words and phrases
- A good paraphrase is
• Accurate: An accurate paraphrase is faithful to an author’s intended meaning; it reproduces
that meaning fairly and without bias or distortio

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 • Clear: often necessary to translate (i.e., paraphrase) complex or confusing language into
language that’s easier to understand. Here are several examples

• Concise: captures the essence of an argument. It strips away all the irrelevant or unimportant
details and puts the key points of the argument in a nutshell. The point is to make the
paraphrase as concise as possible, provided it remains accurate

• Charitable: we interpret the passage as charitably as the evidence reasonably permit

- Steps:
• Read through the argument carefully and try to identify its main conclusion (it may be only
implied). Once you have identified the main conclusion, go back through the argument to
identify major premises and sub-conclusions offered in support of the main conclusion.
Paraphrase as needed to clarify meaning.

• Omit any unnecessary or irrelevant material. Focus only on the key points in the argument.
Omit any statements that provide little or no direct support for the main conclusion.

• Number the steps in the argument and stack them in correct logical order (i.e., with the
premises placed above the conclusions they are intended to support). State the main conclusion
last.

• Fill in any key missing premises or conclusions. Don’t worry about filling in all missing steps
in the argument. Include only those missing premises or conclusions that are important in
understanding and evaluating the central argument. Place brackets around implied statements
to indicate that they have been added to the argument.

• Add parenthetical justifications for each conclusion in the argument. In other words, for each
conclusion or sub-conclusion, indicate in parentheses from which previous lines in the
argument the conclusion or sub-conclusion is claimed to directly follow.

- Mistakes to avoid
• Don’t write incomplete sentences
• Don’t include more than one statement per line.
• Don’t include anything that is not a statement. Rhetorical questions should be rewritten and
included as a statement an not a question

• Don’t include anything that is not a premise or a conclusion.

 Evaluating Argument

Logic and Critical Thinking

- Evaluation: accept a good argument and reject a bad one
- Can be evaluated positively and negativel
• Negative evaluation:
- Goodness of argument is not necessarily the same thing as agreement with you view. Even if
our view is correct and the argument lines with that view, it doesn’t mean the argument
against it is wrong

- Goodness of argument is not necessarily the same thing as persuasion. If an argument is able
to persuade someone, it does not mean it is a good argument. People can be persuaded
because of multiple other reasons

- Goodness of argument is not necessarily the same thing as felicity of language. Some might
have a way with words and how to convince the other with their style. But this doesn’t mean
that the content of the argument is also great. Some of the best arguments can be presented
in a bland language

• Positive evaluation
- Two criteria of goodness
• True premises
• Premises provide good reasons to necessarily or probably accept the conclusion. With this
we have a deductively valid and inductively strong argument. A good argument can be
strong or cogent but this is not enough

- In order for an argument to be good, it should meet relevant critical thinking standards.
• Accuracy: truth of the premise
• Logical correctness: the argument being structurally correct
• Completeness: all important evidence should be ther
• Relevance: premises should be relevant to the conclusion
• Fairness
• Consistenc
• Clarit
• Precision
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 When to accept a premise?

- Principle of rational acceptance for claims, not arguments

• Claim does not con ict with personal experience that we have no good reason to doub
• Claim does not con ict with background beliefs that we have no good reason to doub
• Provenance of the claim is reliabl
- When descriptive issue is put forward, we need to check the validity and accuracy of the facts
presented

- A communicator would mostly want us to accept as “facts”, beliefs about the way the world is,
was or is going to b

- Some factual claims can be counted on more than the others based on the context
- Intuition as evidence:
• Gut feeling or hunches
• A major problem is that it is private. Evidence in premises can be evaluated by someone else
and since intuition is personal, it might be dif cult to evaluate it

• Sometimes intuition may rely on some other kind of evidence such as extensive relevant
personal experiences which can be helpful. For example, a pilot having a gut feeling that
something is wrong with the plan

• But there are dangers of appealing to personal experience as evidence. Causal link established
on the basis of personal experience can be wrong

Evaluating deductive argument

- Two questions asked
• Structure of the argument: Does the conclusion follow from the premise? If the answer is no,
you do not need to move to the next question

- Corresponding criticism: Show that conclusion doesn’t follow from the premises
• Content of the argument: Should the premises be accepted as true
- Corresponding criticism: show that premises are false or doubtful
- Relying on common knowledge and background information to say premises are not true
- When we have linked premises, showing one premise is false is enough. So, the premise that
can be easily refuted should be targeted. This is the one that can be proven with a little
research, personal experience, common knowledge, reputable source, showing contradiction
between premises, showing that a premise is based on an unwarranted assumptio

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 - Universal generalisation are not easy to defend. Criticism of a premise with this can be by
coming up with a less/ non controversial counter example against the premise. This will show
that the universal generalisation doesn’t hold.

• For example, “no sea animals are mammals” . By just showing dolphins are mammals you can
prove that this universal generalisation is wrong and so premise is false

- Challenging an if-then premise: we should try to think of ways the rst thing (A) could occur
without the second occurring (B). We should show that despite A being the case, B is not the
case, the link s broken and shown that the premise is problematic

- Showing that an important piece of information is missing is also a way to show premise is not
correct

Evaluating indicative argument

- Inductive logic: the part of logic that is concerned with tests for the strength and weakness of
arguments

- Strong argument: one in which it is probable (but not necessary) that if the premises are true, then
the conclusion is true

- Weak argument: one in which it is not probable that if the premises are true, then the conclusion
is true

- A cogent argument is a strong argument in which all of the premises are true
- An uncogent argument is either a weak argument or a strong argument with at least one false
premise

- A sound argument cannot have a false conclusion, but a cogent argument can have a false
conclusion.

- Validity is an all-or-nothing affair; it does not come in degrees

- Although every argument with a valid form is valid, the strength of an argument is not ensured by
its form

Appeal to authority as evidence

- Authorities can be wrong when they’ve been cited in irrelevant elds

- Certain questions can be asked to check if authority should be accepted or not
• How much expertise or training regarding the topic he has been cited for does he have
• Did he have access to all relevant facts and information?
• Is he reliable?

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 • Has he developed a reputation good enough to be cited- has his citations been proven wrong?
• Have we been able to rely on him in the past? And was he right?

Statistical syllogism

- Arguments where statistics are used

- Basic pattern : — % of A are B; c is and A; So, c is a
- 50<%<100 is considered as a strong argument
- Two arguments can have true premises but the conclusions can be contradictory because one of
the argument mentions some additional information not present in the other. Since the other
argument doesn’t provide complete information about the subject, a fallacy is committed

- The form itself can not be enough to determine the strength of the argument. We need to look at
other things too

- Three problems:
• The relevant evidence is readily available, and most people are aware of it. The arguer is not
aware of it, but his ignorance is excusable for some reason (e.g., due to illness or other
circumstances beyond his control, he has been isolated from the ordinary sources of
information)

• The relevant evidence is readily available, and most people are aware of it. The arguer is not
aware of it, but her ignorance is culpable (i.e., she should be aware of it)

• The relevant evidence is available but only through some investigation (e.g., a trip to the
library), and the arguer is not aware of the evidence

- Statistical reasoning: the issue of con icting reference classe

• As a general rule what you ought to do is look at the smallest of those reference classes

Induction by enumeratio

- Pattern: __ % of a sample of A are B; So, approximately __% of A are

- When evaluating this, think in terms of sample size and nature of the statement
- What would count as an appropriate size of the sample? Samples are supposed to be random and
not biased.

• A sample is random if (and only if) each member of the population has an equal chance of
being selected for observation
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 • It is easy to obtain random samples when the members of a population are known to have a
high degree of uniformity

• Random sampling is dif cult when it comes to human opinions

- Appropriate sample size depends on
• The size of the population
- To some extent, the size of the sample depends on the size of the population
- This is especially true when the population is relatively small
- One common misconception about samples is that the larger the population, the larger the
sample should be

• Acceptable degree of error: The sampling error is the difference between the percentage of the
sample that has the attribute in question and the percentage of the population that has it

• Degree of uniformity of population

- Psychological factors also affect the strength of the argument. Even if a sample is randomly
chosen and of the appropriate size, an induction generalisation can still be weak because of
psychological factor

• The manner in which information is presented can make people answer in a certain wa
• For example, “have you stolen anything in the last year?”. With such question, you cannot
expect the response to be correct and accurate

• Answers may be in uenced by the interviewers reaction to i

Argument from analogy

- Evaluate to what degree A’s similarity to B provides support for the statement that A has property

- Three question to ask

• What are the respects in which A and B are similar and are they relevant to the issue at hand?
- Similarities are relevant if they increase the likelihood of A’s having property P.
- And, generally speaking, the more relevant respects A and B share, the stronger the
argument.

• Are A and B dissimilar in any relevant respects?

- That is, does the analogy between A and B break down at any relevant points?
- Dissimilarities are relevant if they decrease the likelihood of A’s having property P. Relevant
differences between A and B tend to weaken the argument
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 • Are there things (other than A) that are similar to B in the relevant respects? If so, do these
things have property P?

- To the extent that there are things relevantly similar to B that lack P, the analogy breaks
down. To the extent that there are things relevantly similar to B that have P, the analogy
holds up.

- We need to do our own research to nd answers to these questions

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