What I learned....

Throughout the semester I learned a variety of things in our Comm 41 course.  The most important item used in our class was of course our textbook, Critical Thinking.  The textbook we used in class went over many different topics and thoroughly explained each one with examples.  Our smaller book which was based off group communication was extremely helpful.   I learned how to communicate more effectively with fellow group members after reading our group communication book.   It gave me more confidence to speak openly about our group and what we would do to create and efficient paper.  A lot of concepts in the course helped me actually be able to think critically and be able to recognize claims, arguments, and statements.  Our readings helped me determine the difference between a strong or valid argument.  It helped that our textbook provided a lot of examples for each new concept I learned about.   The examples were always different from each other that way we can grasp at the idea and be able to determine what the difference is between each concept.

My favorite thing in class

My favorite part of our Comm 41 class was the fact that it was online and we had to have a blog.  I liked how we had to post on our blogs about concepts we learned in class.  My least favorite thing in class was having a time limit on when we can post on our blogs.   I didn’t like the twelve hour limit between posts because I would tend to forget to do my posts.   Perhaps if the time limit were cut shorter to maybe six hours it would be easier to remember.  Also, the group work was pretty cool to do since it helped that we all did not have to do individual essays, but some people did not make any effort on helping with the group work.  I think if team assessment was mandatory when we turned in our papers it would help identify which members actually did the work and which ones did not.

Chapter 14: Interesting Concept

In chapter fourteen it was based on generalizing.  The one thing I found interesting in the chapter that was also helpful was the “three premises needed for a good generalization”.   In order for an argument to be a generalization it needs to have three premises.  The first one listed is “the sample is representative”.  The sample needs to be representative if “no one subgroup of the whole population is represented more than its proportion in the population.”  Secondly, “the sample is big enough”, you need to measure how much more likely your generalization is going to be “accurate as you increase the number in your sample”. Lastly, “the sample is studied well” we need to ask questions that are not bias, in order for it to be investigated well.  All three premises are needed in order for it to be considered a good generalization.  Without the three premises your generalization will be considered bias.

Mission Critical

The Mission Critical website was extremely helpful and useful.  It provided a lot of information on inductive and deductive reasoning, casual arguments, conditional arguments, and a lot more.  It was set up as a table of contents and it broke down the readings and exercises by subject.  It begins with the parts of an argument, to basic relations, analysis, fallacies, and other common fallacies.  All the information provided is similar to what we have read in our Critical Thinking textbook.   It also has all the emotional appeals, which also helped me, understand the emotions better.  They had appeal to fear, pity, spite, prejudice, vanity, and loyalty.  What is helpful on this website is all the exercises and reviews that were provided.  I liked how they provided free exercises to help understand the concepts better, and when you pick your answer and it get it right or wrong, the website takes you to the answer and explains why that was the answer.  So, when I would get an answer wrong I was able to comprehend why it wasn’t the answer I picked.

Inductive Reasoning

The one reasoning that was difficult to understand first was inductive reasoning.   When I first read about it was a difficult subject to grasp.  It took me several times to read it over again, and I was able to comprehend it just a bit more.  Inductive reasoning is when you propose a proposition based off previous observations that were made.  What helped me understand the concept was the example that was given.   The example was made by David Hume:

 Premise: The sun has risen east every morning up until now.

  Conclusion: The sun will also rise in the east tomorrow.

After reading the example I was able to understand inductive reasoning a lot more.  It actually clarified it for me and I was able to comprehend what inductive reasoning was.  I also learned that inductive and deductive reasoning contrast with each other.  Inductive reasoning conclusions contain more information than the premise does.

Chapter 12: Interesting Concept

An interesting concept that I found in chapter twelve is section C: Judging Analogies.  The section breaks it down to the reader on how to determine the differences in an analogy and to see if there is a reason that might not apply to the general principle.  In the section it presented different examples to help determine the analysis of the presented example.  The section also has a box that gives seven questions on evaluation an analogy.  The first question when evaluating an analogy; is this an argument? What is the conclusion?, second question: what is the comparison?, third: what are the premises?, fourth: what are the similarities?, fifth: can we state the similarities as premises?, sixth: does the general principle really apply to both sides?, and finally: is the argument strong or valid?  These are just some of the questions that are listed and more can be found in our textbook on page 257.

Appeal to Fear

The advertisement I chose was the above the influence campaign for the appeal to fear.   The advertisement has two mice sitting on a bed taking rat poison, which is their drug to get high off of.  It represents humans taking drugs that are harmful to their body, examples are people who inhale glue, people who misuse prescription medications, etc.   On the bottom of the advertisement it says in small print, “What’s the worst that could happen?”  The advertisement is trying to influence fear on people who are considering or using drugs.  I believe that the advertisement uses a good argument, since they used mice and rat poison to represent what drugs are too mice.  Drugs in a way are like rat poison, but its “human poison” to our bodies.  Also it shows the two mice hanging out in their room with the box of poison on the floor and one of the mice is offering the other one some rat poison to get high off of.  The question “What’s the worst that could happen?” also helps influence fear because the worst that can happen is death when using drugs.

Appeals of Emotion

In our textbook appeal to emotion is defined as, “a premise that says, roughly, you should believe or do something because you feel a certain way.”   Our book lists different types of emotions of appeal; appeal to pity, appeal to fear, appeal to spite, and appeal to vanity.  Each different type of emotional appeal has a different definition.  Appeal to pity means in simple terms to do something if you feel sorry for someone.  Appeal to fear means to do something if you feel fearful and it’s not good if it “substitutes one legitimate concern for all others.  Appeal to spite means to do something out of revenge, the book also states that it, “invokes the ‘principle’ that two wrongs make a right.”  There is also an appeal opposite of spite, which is “call in your debts” appeal.  The book says that it means, “you should believe or do something if you owe someone a favor.”  The last appeal that I found in the book was appeal to vanity, which is defined as a feel good argument.  The one appeal that caught my attention was the appeal to spite.  It was interesting to read that in some cultures that appeal to spite is actually acceptable, but then again in a way it is kind of saving face which can be both good and bad depending on the situation.

Further Discussion Ch. 6

A concept that I believe needs further discussion in our class is chapter six compound claims. The chapter had a lot more information than previous chapters we have read in our class. The text provides different types of information on compound claims. Each section has a lot of information along with excercises. I think that the chapter had too much information to be able to completely understand it. There are a lot of different claims that the chapter discusses. We need to spend more time going over the examples to help ourselves have more comprehension on the different types of claims. The claims can br difficult to understand and if we focus more on them and even create our own claims that way it can be easier to understand the significant differences. A website that I found and thought that it can help out with understanding compound claims is olemiss.edu/courses/logic/prop1.htm, the site has examples and explanations.

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Assignment 2

Both of our group assignments were useful for our class.  The second assignment we had to do was helpful because we had to research an organization and see how they conceal claims, what types of fallacies they use in their organization, and how they use emotion in reasoning.   Our organization was PETA.  I got to learn how they got started in 1980, and how their public service announcements use partial nudity to make a statement on the use of real fur in clothing and accessories.  It was interesting to learn that they are the only animal rights organization in the world and that their mission to stop animal abuse in the world.   PETA is known for its demonstrations against corporations and other places that are known for violating animal rights.   They get endorsement from celebrities and have them star in their public service announcements partially nude for their “I would rather be naked than wear fur” campaign.  The second assignment was easier to understand and helped incorporate concepts we learned from our book. 

Chapter 8 Concepts

In chapter eight the first concept I learned about general claims is general claims and their contradictories.  The book discusses that people need “to know how to reason using general claims that assert something in a general way about all or a part of a collection.”  Some arguments that are made may sound valid but they are not because the words “all” and “some” have various meanings.  The book states that “all” means “every single one, no exceptions” and sometimes can mean “every single one, and there is at least one.” The word “some” is defined as “at least one” and sometimes can be defined as “at least one, but not all.”

An example: A contradictory for, “Some cats can swim” is “No cat can swim” or “Not even one cat can swim.”

A second concept that I learned was vague generalities, and that most do not fit into good arguments or claims.  In order to recognize if an argument is valid or not, we need to take the look at the words “all” and “some”.   The rest of the words that are in the sentence with “all” or “some” are too vague to determine if the argument is valid.

An example:  “Almost all teenagers listen to rock music.” – A lot of teenagers listen to rock music or many teenagers listen to rock music.

Interesting Concept

Chapter six contained a lot of useful information for compound claims, but one section I found really interesting is false dilemmas.   The textbook defines false dilemmas as “a bad use of excluding possibilities where the ‘or’ claim is false or implausible, and sometimes just the dubious ‘or’ claim is also a false dilemma.”   I also found the slippery slope argument helpful, which is an argument that is bad and uses conditional which one is either dubious or false.  The book gives an example of a slippery slope argument on page 133.  The argument is presented between two girls, where one would like to go out with a football player, but the other girl insists that she does not go out with one because she assured her friend she would sleep with him and end up pregnant, and live a regretful life.  Her friend then agrees with her and decides she should go out with a basketball player.   This is an example of slippery slope, because the argument was a bad one and it presented conditional claims that were only dubious, her friend cannot guarantee she would end up pregnant and live a regretful life and gave her false reasons.

Chapter 7

In chapter seven the main theme of the chapter was Counterarguments.  The chapter broke down into two topics, which I believe were interesting to learn.  The first topic is raising objections.   The book describes raising objections as “a standard way to show that an argument is bad.”  Objections are raised when a claim is put forth and one of our claims is either wrong or doubtful. 

The second topic in the chapter is “Refuting an Argument” which then breaks this topic into three different sections, the first, refuting directly, second; refuting indirectly, and third; attempts to refute that are bad arguments.

Refuting directly is when an argument “shows that at least one of the premises is dubious, the argument isn’t valid or strong, and that the conclusion is false.”  I also learned in this chapter that there are four specific ways that imitate reducing the absurd; “phony refutation, slippery slope arguments, ridicule, and straw man”

Chapter Six

Chapter six in our Critical Thinking textbook provided a lot of new information on compound claims.   It goes into detail about how there are two different kinds of compound claims which are: “or” claims and conditionals.   The book defines a compound claim as, “a compound claim is one composed of other claims, but which has to be viewed as just one claim”  So we have previously been introduced to compound claims, but now we are presented with “or” claims.  The word “or” can be used to connect two claims and turn it into a compound.  Another claim that the book presented are conditional claims, which are “if…then…” claims.  Our book shows examples of conditional claims, and example; “Bring me an ice cream cone and I’ll be happy.” It then is a “if…then…” claim because if you take your friend the ice cream, then they will be happy.  It takes awhile to understand these claims, but the textbook examples help out a lot to make sense of them.