I thoroughly enjoyed every single one of these, perhaps because we now have two in College. Of all of them, though, this was my favorite:
1. Recognize that knowing a lot of stuff won’t do you much good unless you can do something with what you know by turning it into an argument.
2. Pay close attention to what others are saying and writing and then summarize their arguments and assumptions in a recognizable way. Work especially on summarizing the views that go most against your own.
3. As you summarize, look not only for the thesis of an argument, but for who or what provoked it ”” the points of controversy.
4. Use these summaries to motivate what you say and to indicate why it needs saying. Don’t be afraid to give your own opinion, especially if you can back it up with reasons and evidence, but don’t disagree with anything without carefully summarizing it first.
We engineers are exempt from this, naturally. We’re allowed to grunt and point, so long as we show our work.
Hi Kendall,
Please consider one of my sayings: In an argument, a conclusion based on a false premise is always false, regardless of the logic behind it.
H
i am with you Howie in #2, but my problem is we are now in an environment where people do not even have a common understanding of the word or concept of premise….
[blockquote]In an argument, a conclusion based on a false premise is always false, regardless of the logic behind it.[/blockquote]
No, no, no, no, no! (1) If 1 > 2 then 4 > 3; (2) 1 > 2; (3) therefore 4 > 3. [1, 2, MP] Valid argument, premise (2) false, conclusion true.
#3 …or “common”
#4 Agree! Was married to one of those crazies whose logic was impeccable but whose premises were sometime bizzare, sometimes down right evil; took me ten years to figure out what was going on and escape with my sanity, my life, and my children.
Frances Scott
Three should be added:
1. What will you tell your children when they ask what you did in college?
2. Envision who you wish to be at 40 and set your present life accordingly.
3. Remember that our overriding task is to know yesterday what we know today. Larry
To LogicGuru,
Please explain this then. Statement 2 is false, This negates part of the first statement, leaving only 4 > 3. There is no conclusion since there isn’t a complete argument.
H
I think that LogicGuru’s point was that a conclusion based on a false premise may, by coincidence, happen to be true. I could argue, for instance, that “All male human beings are over six feet tall, and Abraham Lincoln was a male human being; therefore Abraham Lincoln was over six feet tall.” One of the premises is false, so the argument is invalid; but by happenstance the conclusion is true anyway.
In a similar vein, one could point out that your horoscope in the newspaper today isn’t guaranteed to be wrong. It probably is, but by sheer chance it might be right.
A conclusion based on a false premise is always unreliable. It’s truth value is unknown, unless you have some other means for evaluating it. You can’t assume that it is necessarily false just because it was reached by invalid means.
(pedantry warning) The argument in fact is valid: the conclusion, 4 > 3 follows from the premises in that IF the premises were true, the conclusion would be true. It isn’t however sound. A sound argument is a valid argument that has all true premises and so a true conclusion.(/pedantry warning)
But Ross is exactly right. A bad argument can have a true conclusion. But if the argument’s bad we should look for other evidence or argument’s in support of it.