Journal

Required Resources Read/review the following resources for this activity:

Textbook: Chapter 8, 9, 17 (Introduction); review Chapter 7

Lesson

Introduction Remember – your actual journal entry should be somewhat brief; most of your time should be spent thinking about the questions asked and the issues raised. Your thoughts should then be distilled into a mini-argument that will respond affirmatively to the four tests for evaluating arguments: truthfulness of premises, logical strength, relevance, and non-circularity.

Instructions For this journal assignment, briefly answer each of the following prompts:

Inference: The differing meanings of “valid inference” and “warranted inference” are closely related to the differing purposes of deductive and inductive arguments – the purpose of deductive being to prove; the purpose of inductive to make the conclusion most probable.

Look up the words “valid” and “warranted.” Each of these words, you will find, has what is known as a lexical definition – that is just the dictionary definition of the word. Words also have a certain connotations – meanings that go beyond their lexical definitions; associated ideas and concepts – think of terms such a “fur baby” as the name for a pet.

Briefly discuss how the lexical definitions and connotations of “valid” and “warranted” can help us understand the differing purposes of deductive and inductive arguments.

Fallacies: In Section 8.2, the text states that there are “fallacious argument templates” (Facione & Gittens, p. 167) and then gives a number of examples. The authors further state: “Analysis of the meanings of the terms used and the grammatical rules of the language reveal the source of error” (p.167).

Choose one of the fallacies in this section, such as Denying the Antecedent or False Classification and pair it with the valid argument template. For example, if you choose Denying the Antecedent, the valid argument template will be Denying the Consequent. False Classification would pair with one of the fallacies in Reasoning About Classes of Objects.

Explain, in your own words, how the fallacy is revealed through analysis of the valid argument template. Think of it this way – if you know how the heart works, you will know that certain malfunctions will prevent it from working.  For example, if you know that the coronary arteries supply the heart with blood, then you can reason that a blockage will stop that vital flow. So this journal prompt asks you to explain, in your own words, how one of the valid argument templates work – and how that exposes the fallacy connected with that type of argument.

Civic Responsibility: At the end of Chapter 9 there is a Bonus Exercise that asks you to research and analyze the 2009 debate over the healthcare public option. If you were actually to complete that exercise, it would take quite a bit of time and effort.

Do you think that completing such an exercise would be time well spent or time wasted? If well-spent, why? If time wasted, why?

Is there any issue on which you think a comparable amount of time and effort would be worthwhile?

As a critical thinker, do you believe that citizens have an obligation to be informed on topics of current interest? If yes, why, if no, why not?

If you include references to outside sources (beyond the textbook), make sure you cite them properly.

Writing Requirements (APA format)

Length: 2-3 pages (not including title page or references page)

1-inch margins

Double spaced

12-point Times New Roman font

Title page

References page (as needed)

Running Head: Journal for week 4

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Journal for week Four

PHIL347N-61344 : Critical Thinking

Question 1.

The lexical meanings of the word “Valid” and “Warrant” are as follows according to the Merriam Webster Dictionary (2020).

Valid: having a sound basis in logic or fact; reasonable or cogent.

Warrant: justification or authority for an action, belief, or feeling.

Inference: This is the process of drawing a conclusion based on the evidence available.

When these words are used in an argumentative situation, their meanings go a little bit beyond the lexical meanings of this words. According to Fascione and Gittens (2016), “Valid describes an argument or inference in which the truth of the premises suggests that the conclusion must be true; in other words, it is not likely for the conclusion not to be true if all the premises are true”, while “Warranted describes an inference or argument in which the truth of the premises justifies or strongly supports accepting the conclusion as very likely or probably true, but not necessarily true”. From this we can see that valid inference is very similar to deductive arguments and knowing and understanding what the word and its connotations valid and how to use it will help us understand Deductive arguments better in that they both say that if the premises are true then it’s impossible for the conclusion not to be true. Likewise, warranted inference has similar meaning to inductive argument because they both make the conclusion very probable. Therefore, understanding the meaning of warranted inference will help us understand inductive arguments better.

Question 2

For this question, I will choose one of the examples from such as Denying the Antecedent, and I will try to pair it in one of the fallacies of the valid argument template will of Denying the Consequent.

The example: If we see a light in the window, we know that there is someone at home. But we do not see a light in the window. So, no one is home.

From the example, it might be true that in cases where you see light in the window then that means someone is at home. But it is not really true to say that because you did not see any light in the window, then no body is at home, because there are so many reasons why you might see light in the window, it could be that the fuse went off, or they switched off the light or they might even have gone to bed. And also there might be light in the window, yet no one is at home because they might leave the light on and go out. Therefore, the first premise being true does not mean that the second premise is true because, the second premise being true does not depend on the first premise being true. Also the conclusion does not depend on either the first premise or the second premise being true.

Analysis of a deductive or valid argument could be performed in several stages or steps. The first step is to check if the logic of the statement match with the premises of an argument .This step would follow an analysis of order of the whole sentence in terms of grammar and it’s meaning and checked if this has a connection with the reality or not. Last step is to test if the conclusion and premises has similar meaning and are logically connected to each other. Through these steps, it could be found out if the argument is valid or fallacious in terms of meaning or language rules.

Question 3

I do believe that completing the exercise will a time well spent. That’s because the issue of health care in this country has been a very big problem. The health insurance companies charge so much, and the government does not seem to do anything about it. I will love to do the research because I will learn a lot about health insurance and how it works so my family and I can search for and get a good health insurance coverage. Because this way I will know all the options available to us and there is nothing as good as an informed decision.

There are so many issues that I feel a comparable amount and time is worthwhile. Issues like abortion, death penalty, legalization of prostitution, gun control and a lot more. This are issues that I believe needs to be addressed in this country. There are a lot of people who are either for these issues or against them. For instance, Gun control is really important especially with the current increase in the cases of mass shootings going on now in this country.

I do believe that citizens have the obligation to be informed of topics of common topics. This is because the citizen has a right to make their own decisions on what is right for them. Its always better for citizens when they make informed decisions, that way they have all the facts that they need to make a decision and most times in those types of situations they make decisions that are best for them. For instance, In the issue of health care, there are a lot of people who are either under insured or not insured at all because they do not have the right information.

References:

Marriam-Weber Dictionary (2020). Retrieved from

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/valid

Facione, P. & Gittens, C. A. (2016). Critical Thinking (3rd ed.). Pearson Education, Inc.