Critical Thinking Midterm

Critical thinking is being open-minded, yet skeptical, and using evidence to prove or disprove an argument that has, at best, one conclusion. It matters because it requires learning how to think rather than simply what to think.

• Deductive reasoning is an argument that claims its conclusion necessarily follows from the premises.
• If all the premises are true, and if the argument is in the correct form, then the conclusion is necessarily true and cannot be false.
• Deductive reasoning matters because it implies certain truth.

• Inductive reasoning is an argument where the conclusion is more likely to be true than false based on the evidence.
• It is a probability statement.

• Inductive reasoning is important because we use it just about every day when we extend what we already know to situations that are not as familiar to us.

• Deductive reasoning implies certain truth, and inductive reasoning is a probability statement.

• A proposition is a sentence that admits truth value.
• A premise is a proposition in an argument that supports the conclusion.
• A conclusion is the proposition in an argument that is supported on the basis of other propositions.
• They are different to one another because they all represent different parts of an argument, but they are alike because they are all found in a good argument.
• They are related because they are all found in a good argument.
• They work to distinguish between a good argument and a bad argument because if there is no truth to them then the argument isn't valid.

• Bias is a pre-position, and it usually has a negative connotation.

• Stereotype is a label given to individual people based on their inclusion in a group.

• It is valuable to get them out on the table because people that are biased or believe in stereotypes won't be the best resources for evidence.

• If a deductive argument is valid it has the correct form.

• If a deductive argument is sound then it is valid and all of the premises are true.

• Modus ponens: affirms the antecedent
• If A, then B
• A
• B

• Modus tollens: negates the consequent
• If A, then B
• Not B
• Not A

• Disjunctive Syllogism: second premise is a negation premise
• Either A or B
• Not A
• B -or-
• Not B
• A

• Chain Argument: A=B, B=C, A=C
• If A, then B
• If B, then C
• If A, then C

• Classic Argument: what is true of all has to be true of one
• All humans are mortal <- universal proposition
• Socrates is a human <- particular proposition
• Socrates is a mortal
• Ex:
• All Packers are football players
• Aaron Rodgers is a Packer
• Aaron Rodgers is a football player

• Deductive soundness means the argument is valid and the premises are true.

• Inductive strength is how good is the evidence and how much evidence is there.

A confirmation bias is when someone has a set idea, and anyone who thinks otherwise is wrong. If a person has a confirmation bias they tend to only associate with other people who have the same opinions as them.

• Education in field of expertise
• Experience making judgments in the field

• Have a good reputation in their field (peer-reviewed)

• Have some accomplishments in the field

• Sample: subset of the population
• Random
• Represents the population
• Relevant
• size

• Generalization
• Come up with a conclusion about a population based on evidence from a sample of the population
• Ex: 8 in 10 people like Crest

• Polls and Surveys
• Collect information from a sample in order to make a generalization about a population
• Many polls are not good samples
• Ex: self-selection: CNN, Dancing with the Stars
• Good survey/poll
• True premises
• Right size(sample)
• Represents the population
• Random sample
• Data is current
• How much [sufficient evidence]

• Analogies
• Comparative argument
• Something we know about to something we don
• Ex: flow of water in a water pipe :: flow of electricity in a wire

• Cause and Effect
• Correlation does not equal causation
• Ex: Cheerleaders wear blue ribbons does not equal the basketball team winning
• Causation (Hume)
• Causes have to precede effects in time
• Causes and effects have to be continuous in time and space
• History of 1 and 2

• Rationalism (Plato)
• Reason rules
• Truth and knowledge is constant, knowable through the act of reason; is different from mere appearances

• Empiricism (Hume)
• 5 senses
• Applying 5 senses by means of scientific method
• Knowledge is testable, falsifiable, confirmable, tentative

• Not too broad; not too narrow

• Accounts for all the essential characteristics (AFACE)

• Not circular
• Avoid obscure speech

• Avoid emotive language