Critical Thinking: Consider the Verdict

by Waller, Bruce N.

• ISBN13: 9780130896032
• ISBN10: 0130896039
• Edition: 4th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-01-01
• Publisher: Pearson College Div

Summary

For undergraduate-level courses in Critical Thinking, Informal Logic, General Logic, and Critical Writing (typically taught by English Departments), as well as introductory or advanced argumentation courses. Organized around lively and authentic examples drawn from jury trials, contemporary political and social debate, and advertising, this introduction to critical thinking shows students not only how to detect fallacies, but also how to examine, appreciate, and construct cogent arguments. Accessible and reader friendly--yet thorough and rigorous--it shows them how to integrate all their logic skills into the critical decision-making process they undertake in their own lives as citizens and consumers.

Table of Contents

Preface	xiii
Introduction	1	(11)
Critical Thinking in Everyday Life	1	(1)
Play Fair	2	(1)
Seating a Jury	3	(1)
Jury Research: Eliminating or Selecting Bias?	3	(1)
Impartial Critical Thinking	4	(3)
Deliberating Together	5	(2)
Critical Thinking: Adversarial or Cooperative?	7	(5)
A Few Important Terms	12	(13)
Arguments	12	(1)
Statements	13	(1)
Premises and Conclusions	14	(3)
Deductive and Inductive Arguments	17	(1)
Deduction, Validity, and Soundness	18	(2)
Induction and Reliability	20	(5)
What's the Question?	25	(8)
Determine the Conclusion	26	(1)
What Is the Exact Conclusion?	27	(6)
Relevant and Irrelevant Reasons	33	(16)
Premises Are Relevant or Irrelevant Relative to the Conclusion	34	(5)
Irrelevant Reason Fallacy	39	(10)
The Red Herring Fallacy	39	(10)
The Burden of Proof	49	(15)
Who Bears the Burden of Proof?	49	(2)
Appeal to Ignorance	51	(1)
The Burden of Proof in the Courtroom	52	(5)
Presumption of Innocence	52	(1)
When the Defendant Does Not Testify	53	(3)
Juries and the Burden of Proof	56	(1)
Unappealing Ignorance	57	(7)
Analyzing Arguments	64	(24)
Argument Structure	65	(4)
Convergent Arguments	65	(2)
Linked Arguments	67	(2)
Subarguments	69	(12)
Assumptions: Their Use and Abuse	81	(7)
Legitimate Assumptions	81	(2)
Illegitimate Assumptions	83	(5)
Necessary and Sufficient Conditions	88	(27)
Necessary Conditions	88	(3)
Distinguishing Necessary from Sufficient Conditions	90	(1)
Sufficient Conditions	91	(1)
Necessary and Sufficient Conditions in Ordinary Language	92	(3)
Conditional Statements	95	(1)
Alternative Ways of Stating Necessary and Sufficient Conditions	96	(1)
Both Necessary and Sufficient	97	(7)
Valid Inferences from Necessary and Sufficient Conditions	104	(3)
Modus Ponens	104	(2)
Modus Tollens	106	(1)
Fallacies Based on Confusion Between Necessary and Sufficient Conditions	107	(2)
The Fallacy of Denying the Antecedent	107	(1)
The Fallacy of Affirming the Consequent	108	(1)
Detecting Argument Forms	109	(6)
Symbolic Sentential Logic	115	(35)
Truth-Functional Definitions	116	(5)
Negation	116	(1)
Disjunction	117	(1)
Conjunction	118	(1)
Conditional	118	(1)
Material Implication	119	(2)
Testing Validity and Invalidity	121	(3)
Punctuation	124	(6)
The Truth-Table Method of Testing for Validity	130	(4)
The Short-Cut Method for Determining Validity or Invalidity	134	(16)
Arguments about Classes	150	(31)
Types of Categorical Propositions	151	(1)
Relations among Categorical Propositions	152	(2)
Venn Diagrams	154	(18)
Diagramming Statements	154	(5)
Diagramming Arguments	159	(13)
Categorical Propositions That Do Not Fit the Standard Form	172	(2)
Arguments That Do Not Fit the Standard Form	174	(2)
Translating Ordinary-Language Statements into Standard-Form Categorical Propositions	176	(5)
Reducing the Number of Terms	178	(3)
Ad Hominem Arguments	181	(31)
The Ad Hominem Fallacy	181	(1)
Nonfallacious Ad Hominem Arguments	182	(4)
Ad Hominem and Testimony	183	(3)
Distinguishing Argument from Testimony	186	(7)
Tricky Types of Ad Hominem	193	(9)
Bias Ad Hominem	194	(5)
Inconsistency and Ad Hominem	199	(2)
Psychological Ad Hominem	201	(1)
Inverse Ad Hominem	202	(10)
Appeal to Authority	212	(22)
Authorities as Testifiers	213	(1)
Conditions for Legitimate Appeal to Authority	213	(8)
Popularity and Tradition	221	(13)
Cumulative Exercises One (Chapters I through II)	228	(6)
The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth	234	(29)
Eyewitness Testimony	235	(11)
Potential Sources of Eyewitness Error	236	(7)
Judging the Honesty of a Witness	243	(3)
The Whole Truth	246	(4)
Are the Premises True?	250	(3)
Digging for Truth	250	(1)
Consider the Source	251	(2)
Language, Truth, and Ambiguity	253	(10)
The Fallacy of Ambiguity	253	(10)
Strawman, Slippery Slope, Dilemma, and Golden Mean Arguments: Their Use and Abuse	263	(29)
Strawman	263	(7)
The Principle of Charity	264	(1)
The Strawman Fallacy	264	(4)
Special Strawman Varieties	268	(2)
Slippery Slope	270	(6)
The Slippery Slope Fallacy	271	(1)
Genuine Slippery Slopes	272	(4)
Dilemmas, False, and True	276	(8)
Genuine Dilemmas	276	(1)
False Dilemmas	277	(4)
False Dilemma Combined with Strawman	281	(1)
Consider the Possibilities	282	(2)
Golden Mean	284	(8)
The Golden Mean Fallacy	285	(1)
Constructing Golden Mean Fallacies	285	(7)
Begging the Question	292	(28)
The Problem with Question-Begging Arguments	292	(1)
Subtle Forms of Question Begging	293	(10)
Synonymous Begging the Question	294	(1)
Generalization Begging the Question	294	(1)
Circular Begging the Question	295	(2)
Self-Sealing Arguments	297	(3)
Complex Questions	300	(3)
False Charges of Begging the Question	303	(17)
Cumulative Exercises Two (Chapters 1 through 14)	307	(13)
Arguments by Analogy	320	(41)
Illustrative Analogy	320	(1)
Deductive Argument by Analogy	321	(20)
The Fallacy of Faulty Analogy	325	(6)
Analyzing a Deductive Argument by Analogy	331	(4)
The Fallacy of Illustrative Deduction	335	(1)
The Fallacy of Analogical Literalism	336	(2)
Caution! Watch for Analogies That Look Like Slippery Slopes!	338	(3)
Inductive Arguments by Analogy	341	(20)
Questions of Cause	361	(34)
Distinguishing Causation from Correlation	362	(4)
The Questionable Cause Fallacy	366	(1)
The Method of Difference	367	(1)
The Method of Agreement	368	(1)
The Joint Method of Agreement and Difference	369	(1)
The Method of Concomitant Variation	369	(2)
Causal Contexts	371	(24)
Cumulative Exercises Three, (Chapters I through I6)	376	(19)
Thinking Critically about Statistics	395	(40)
All the Children Are Above Average	395	(1)
Empty Statistics	396	(1)
Finding the Appropriate Context	397	(1)
Caught Off Base	398	(1)
Statistical Apples and Oranges	398	(2)
Statistical Half-Truths	400	(1)
Surveys	401	(7)
Consider Your Verdict: Comprehensive Critical Thinking in the Jury Room	407	(1)
Case One: Commonwealth v. Moyer	408	(9)
Judge Carroll's Summation and Charge to the Jury	416	(1)
Case Two: State v. Ransom	417	(18)
Judge Schwebel's Summation and Charge to the Jury	433	(2)
Answers to Selected Exercises	435	(18)
Index	453