Cause and Effect

As usual the section that I want to write about is the criteria for cause and effect. I always like the criteria section most because it allows us a tool for confirming the true issue we are dealing with. In this case we have six different necessities for a cause and effect. My favorite of these six is, “The cause makes a difference – if the cause had not happened (been true), the effect would not have happened (been true).” (p. 307) This is easy enough to understand, as it is the premise for the style. If I had not left forgotten to push the parking brake on my car when I parked on a hill, then the car would not have rolled into another car farther down the hill. One thing had to happen for the other to have happened. The text also says, “Checking that the cause makes a difference is how we make sure we haven’t overlooked another possible cause.” (p. 305)

Mission Critical

The mission critical site is a great resource. It clearly lays out the parts of an argument, and ways to analyze them. It also covers the variety of fallacies and emotional appeals. I think I enjoyed the emotional appeals section the most as this is something that I have seen many people struggle with understanding the differences. The site explains the difference between fear, pity, spite, loyalty, produce, and vanity. It also has an exercise for almost every explanation. This is great for people like me who want to cement what I have read in a practice. Often I will read something and it goes in and comes out without sticking, but when we get to practice it in real life scenarios the important parts seem to stay with me. All in all it is a great tool when trying to understand the varying components of arguments, and I would recommend saving it as a favorite for future classes.

Mission Critical

I found the Mission Critical website to be very helpful. It clearly defines and outlines the structure for arguments based on causation. I especially liked the example of the bicyclist and the car accident as it shows the complexity of various situations. We know that the world is intermingled, and that what I do may affect those around me without my ever knowing it. The site says, “These causal arguments, then, follow the form of an inductive argument with one important exception: whereas an inductive argument carries as part of its second premise the implication that there is otherwise no significant difference, these causal arguments carry the implication that there is only one significant difference: for the bicyclist, the truck; for the first driver, the bicycle; for the second driver, the first car.” From this we can easily see how our casual arguments are more self-focused, and inductive arguments look deeper at the root of the issue.

Evaluating an Analogy

One of the things that I learned about from this chapter was how best to judge analogies. I loved the seven steps that we are given to evaluate each example. As I walk through most analogies I can find some reason to pick it apart, but I would guess that is mainly due to my argumentative and critical personality. I constantly look at what people say and do to determine if they match up. Of the seven questions my favorite would have to be, “Can we state the similarities as premises and find a general principle that covers the two sides?” (p. 5) This is great because it looks critically at the ability for the analogy to hold truth. There are always at least two sides to every argument, and the analogy should be able to cover both. This is a great rubric as we often hear people try to reason with analogies.

Reasoning by Analogy

Not sure if I found this the most difficult to understand, but reasoning by analogy is something that I think many people do incorrectly. The basic concept of this type of reasoning is, “Since it was O.K. there, it should be O.K. here. This situation is like that one. Since we concluded here, we can conclude there. That’s arguing by analogy.” (p. 253)

I found a website that explains the variations and usage parameters in a very clear and methodical way. One of the things I enjoyed about it was the use of a chart. Sometimes word problems are not as clear, but the chart allows for easy comparison, and from that we can argue by analogy. The site says, “Comparing oranges with bananas, we find once again that these two fruits are similar in only two of the categories that we examined (i.e., they are both peelable without the aid of a knife and they both have inedible skin). Finally, comparing apples to bananas reveals only one similar characteristic between these two fruits: neither belongs to the "citrus" family.”


http://www4.samford.edu/schools/netlaw/dh2/logic/analogy.htm

Various Ways to Reason

1). Reasoning by Analogy
Premise 1: I have a job that pays me and therefore I have to pay taxes.
Premise 2: My neighbor has a job that pays him.
Conclusion: My neighbor has to pay taxes.

2). Sign Reasoning
Premise 1: I was hiking in Big Sur last year and came across a steaming water hole.
Conclusion: I immediately undressed so I cold soak in the hot water.

3). Causal Reasoning
Premise 1: My wife and I attended a wedding this weekend.
Premise 2: I drank more gin and tonics from the open bar than I can remember, while my wife drank water.
Premise 3: I don’t remember anything after diner, but my wife does.
Conclusion: I must have become drunk.

4). Reasoning by Criteria
Premise 1: That woman must be pregnant. Doesn’t she look like she’s carrying a baby?
Conclusion: She is glowing.

5). Reasoning by Example
Premise 1: Getting your bachelors degree is a great idea.
Conclusion: I have a friend who lost his job recently, and no one will offer him another without a bachelors.

6). Inductive
Premise 1: The ocean ebbs and flows with the tides every day.
Conclusion: The ocean will ebb and flow with the tides tomorrow.

7). Deductive
Premise 1: Everyone in my house has Sageant as a last name.
Premise 2: Graham lives in my house.
Conclusion: Graham’s last name is Sargeant

Perscriptive Conclusion

In chapter 10 we read, “An appeal to emotion in an argument with a prescriptive conclusion can be good or can be bad. Being alert to the use of emotion helps clarify the kinds of premises needed in such an argument, so we can more easily analyze it.” (p. 194) I though this was a great point in terms of understating the value to looking for emotion in an argument. It also helps us to see that the use of emotion is not always good or bad. The text also says, “each is an attempt to convince someone that he or she should do something.” (p. 194) I suppose this speaks to the core of an argument, and the various appeals to emotion are tools that we can use in our attempts to sway opinion. Emotion is a powerful tool, but one must be careful as not all people react in the same ways.

Exercise 3 on Page 195

I chose to look at the third exercise on page 195. The question is, “Find an advertisement that uses an appeal to fear. Is it a good argument?” (p. 195) The advertisement that I found is targeted towards parents with children that have been diagnosed with ADHD or ADD. The add starts off by noting that the child’s homework is late again, and then the teacher calls again, and finally the parent starts crying. They are afraid that if they don’t do something then their child will continue to have trouble in school, and in life. The picture on the screen is of a single backpack on a chair in an empty school room. I think this is an effective argument in so much as I would be afraid of what the future holds for both my child and myself without help. Those that have experience ADHD or ADD can understand the impossible nature of the affliction.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/27813/fear_appeal_messages_and_their_effectiveness.html?cat=70

Appeal to Emotion

Appealing to emotion is a common trend here in the United States. We often hear advertisements, see signs, and hear people talk about how we should do something, and they try to encourage our participation through an emotional response. There are various ways to appeal to our emotions such as through pity, fear, spite, and calling in our debts. I think that the appeal through fear is the one that interests me most. I find that all to often people make decisions based on fear, and I will admit that this saddens me. When I was growing up we went to t a church that required us to confess our sins every week. If we didn’t cleanse our soul then we might not make it into heaven. So, the argument is fairly simple. Do the right thing, give money to the church, and confess your sins or you will be condemned to a life in hell. Not a great way to think about things at 6 years old.

Object and Subjective

I choose to go back and think about the difference between subjective and objective. I think this is an important differentiation because most people have a hard time distinguishing one from another when used in conversation. I found a site that had a great piece on this subject, and they open with the following statement:

“In stories, newspapers, and the spoken word, people all over the world are trying to convince you to think as they do. They are bombarding you with facts and figures, opinions and projections. It is up to you to create order within this chaos and find the patterns that will help you to understand what is true, what could be true, and what is outright false. In order to do all this, you need to have a firm grip on what is objective and what is subjective.”

The article continues by defining the differences, and moves on to explain when someone should be objective and when someone should be subjective. Basically objectivity should be used when we are discussing any sort of “rational decision,” and subjectivity when “nothing tangible is at stake.”


Read more: Difference Between Objective and Subjective | Difference Between | Objective vs Subjective http://www.differencebetween.net/language/difference-between-objective-and-subjective/#ixzz1309tmXTM

Assignment Review

I found that the main point of the projects was learning to coordinate our schedules. The reading and writing wasn’t profound for me, but the collaboration was seemingly the point. In the first assignment we picked an editorial and wrote our various opinions on the article. My contribution was organizing the group’s first few communications, dividing the workload, and writing the introduction. For the second assignment the group chose to write about PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. For this assignment I was tasked with looking at the fallacies of the groups message through eh website, and actual purpose of the group. Again with this assignment I found the most benefit in working as a team. The people I am grouped with are awesome. Everyone is understanding of the various scheduling issues, and each person pulls their weight and then some. I’m sure their was more to the assignment, but looking at real world examples seemed comparable to the text examples.

Chapter 8

When reading about general claims and their contradictories I think about all the sales pitches we hear on TV. The chapter explains that terms such as all, some, no and only are “purposely vague.” All can mean everything, but can be as few as one. Some can mean a percentage of the group, but can again be as few as one. On example that comes to mind as it refers to all statements is a car commercial my wife and I saw a few years back. We were looking for a new car, and we heard a commercial that said something to the effect of, All 2007 Honda Civics LXs are on sale at xx,xxx price and 0% financing. This is exactly what we had been looking for, so we went down to the lot that weekend. What we found was a used car that had a ton of miles on it. They didn’t have any other 2007s on the lot, so the advertisement wasn’t false but it was misleading.

Posting 3 Chapter 6

One of the concepts in chapter 6 that I found particularly interesting is the indirect way of reasoning with conditionals. The texts says, “Recognizing this form can be hard if ‘not’ occurs in the antecedent or consequent, or if their order is reversed.” (p. 128) An example of this type of reasoning is as follows:

My wife is going to take our son to the park today if she gets her work done before noon.
They didn’t go to the park today.
So my wife didn’t get her work done before noon.

The concept isn’t a hard one to grasp, but I like that things are simple to follow. Some might like things to be clearer, but I find that we aren’t always in a place that allows for that sort of direct conversation. This sort of reasoning also lends itself to deduction. We have to think about what might have happened that lead to the conclusion in front of us.

Chapter 7

Chapter 7 is all about “refuting an argument.” This is a helpful skill to have when it comes time to point out that we know an argument is weak, or flat out wrong. The text explains that there are three ways direct ways of refuting an argument. The first way is “Show that at least one of the premises is dubious.” (p. 149) The second way is to, “Show that the argument isn’t valid or string.” (p. 149) Te final way is, “Show that the conclusion is false.” (p. 149) These are all helpful suggestions, but I think the real key is to find a way to make the person presenting the argument hear your response without reverting to a defensive state. Often I find that if we are too direct with our rebuttal that the other person will stop listening, and our message is not received. However, we also must be careful not to sugar coat the response too much either. There’s a fine line when dealing with humans.

Chapter 6

One of the things I laugh at most is when my wife, friend or colleague tells me that we are going to have to make a choice between two things because we can’t do everything. I laugh because they tend to state the things I want to do only, and forget about everything else. This is called a false dilemma, and the book describes it as, “a bad use of excluding possibilities where the ‘or’ claim is false or implausible.” (p. 118)

Another topic that I enjoyed from chapter 6 is the slippery slope argument. The text says, “A slipper slope argument is a bad argument that uses a chain of conditionals, at least one of which is false or dubious.” (p. 133) We see this happen when people are trying to justify reasons not to do something, and stating long term implications that are based on a chain of events. A will cause b, and that will set of S which will eventually lead to Z.

Plausibility

I really like chapter five’s section D 2. In this section the book discussed the issue of, “confusing possibility with plausibility.” (p. 97)We read a great example that is an obvious cover up for the Tea Party. The basic understanding that the section tries to get across is that even though an argument is possible it isn’t always likely. I like this section because it reminds me about how most people prefer to just go along with arguments simply because they think it might have happened. The section says, “an interesting explanation is at most a good reason to investigate whether its claims are true.” (p. 97) We have a good friend who is a stanch Republican, but when pressed for reasons why he begins to spout out unproven gossip like it is the holy truth. What kills me is that he hears it from some person on the radio, or some editorial, and never looks into the facts.

Online Advertisment

Advertising online is a tricking business. I think that if we simply fall back to the first instruction from the text, “Out most reliable source of information about the world is our own experience,” (p. 84) we should be able to navigate most things we’ll come across online. The truth is that we have had companies trying to sell us things for years in print, on tv, and in person. Online advertising isn’t that different, but there are a few new tricks. The advertisement that I chose isn’t much different that something we might find in a magazine. I don’t know what this is even for, but what a deal. The big bold eye catching components are in the following order: 1. The sales pitch. 2. The brand. 3. Where to apply. 4. Slogan. The add tries to leverage off the name of Compass as a large bank, so in a sense they are asking us to, “accept a claim made by a reputable authority whom we can trust …”

Arguments

There’s a great curry smell coming from across the street. It must be an Indian family that moved in.
Analysis: The argument is that the family that moved in across the street must be Indian because we can smell curry, and all Indians eat curry. The argument is weak because it assumes that only people from India either cook or eat curry. We could add something to the argument to strengthen it such as a personal observation, however, I don’t think even that would make it a strong argument.
Again, when we think about an argument I believe there are two conclusions most people jump to. If it is in the slightest way possible most people will just assume you are correct. I think this is because we have an inherent need to trust others. The second conclusion is to break your argument apart and tell you it’s obviously wrong. Mostly this comes from people who’s trust has been broken is a serious way.

Violating the Principle of Rational Discussion

Violating the Principle of Rational Discussion is something I am all too aware of. My favorite area that is discussed is the Strawman. In this area the text says, “It’s easier to knock down someone’s argument if you misrepresent it, putting words in the other person’s mouth. An example of this in the real world is the debate in California over the legalization of marijuana. In my mind I might feel one way about the subject, but my friend might fell another but assumes we have the same impression of what will happen if the measure passes. For instance:
Joe: I cannot wait to vote to legalize weed.
Sam: That’s crazy because you know that legalizing weed will lead to more children smoking it and eventually over dosing on heroin.
In this example we can see how Sam assumes that Joe knows that the legalization will lead children down a horrible path.

Evluating an Argument

1.I’m on my way to school. 2.I left five minutes late. 3.Traffic is heavy. 4.Therefore, I’ll be late for class. 5.So I might as well stop for breakfast.

Argument: Yes
Conclusion: If I’m going to be late for class I should stop for breakfast
Additional premise needed? I would have add something about not having time to eat and a need for health reasons to support the argument.
Identify any subargument: 1, 2 and 3 support 4. 4 supports 5.
Good argument: Not really. It seems like a personal dilemma, and the student is looking for justification to be late.

This was a fairly simple breakdown of an argument. We can see why each part of an argument is important, and that not many people are good at justifying why they do what they do. We can see that the use of therefore and because become valuable in terms of deciding whether an argument is valid.

Strong vs. Valid

My understanding of a strong versus a valid argument comes down a one simple thing: can it have no other possible conclusion. A strong argument is something that has a premise that seems true, and the conclusion is very plausible. In this way the argument is most likely correct. However, for an argument to be valid it must have a premise that is true, and the conclusion must be beyond any doubt. The example in this chapter would be valid if Manuel had a video of himself in front of a easily identifiable monument in Mexico, and the video was time stamped. While it is possible to Photoshop the video, it would be hard to assume that he is lying, or went to the effort of doing so simply to prove he was in Mexico. I understand there is a difference, but I fail to see the true relevance to such a seemingly slight variation.

Good Arguments

Joe comes to work without glasses everyday. Joe is great as shooting pool after work. Joe must have great eyesight.

The premise can be true, but the conclusion false. The premise is strong because this is something that can be observed regularly. The argument is weak because the conclusion is weak. Many people don’t wear glasses regularly, but wear contacts instead.

AI think it is interesting how we can draw conclusions so quickly based on limited information or premise. In this way we often make arguments that may be considered weak if one were to analysis the argument more closely. However, we assume that people are telling us the truth. This assumption, while often true, can be misleading. We read things on the Internet, watching stories on TV, or hear commentary on the radio that has been sensationalized. This is when the ability to test an arguments components can become increasingly helpful.

Vaguery

I suppose that the most recent statement that I have heard that was either vague or ambiguous would have to be an add on the radio for a new birth control pill. The pill said that it not only helped to prevent the chances of pregnancy, but it also help women control mood swings during their monthly cycle, lessened bleeding, and finally it would improve their acne. What made this statement vague is degree to which it would help to control mood swings, blood flow, and acne. This was actually an article I heard on NPR about the company that produced this add, and the ramifications from it. I was surprised to hear that they were forced to stop the add, and create a new add that gave more factual truth about the scientific accuracies that had been proven in trials. The second add actually confirmed that it didn’t live up to the build up from the original add.

Subjective vs objective

Subjective comments seem to be ever more present in our society. We hear them in the news, read them in the paper, and all over the internet. A great example of a subjective claim that I heard and talked about in a different class was what it takes be considered evil. We read about how some people considered the 9/11 bombers a to be evil, and I claimed that they were doing evil. This is subjective because it is up for interpretation. Recently I was talking to my friend about how my sister had been laid off from her teaching position along with people that had up to ten years of seniority. This is objective because it is stating a fact, and is not open for debate or interpretation. We can research and prove it to be the case. I tend to use subjective claims because I find them to be more stimulating and interesting due to the human factor.

Introduction

Hello world. This is Journey broadcasting live from my coach while watching my son learn to walk (what an awesome sight, but a little scary at the same time). With luck, and some hard work, this should be my last year at SJSU as an undergrad. In a few months I plan on applying for a masters in higher education. Over the past two years I have taken most of my classes online and have found that if people are true in their writing, the class can be very rewarding. I look forward to getting to know everyone.

Cheers,
Sunset