Philosophy is defined, first and foremost, by its commitment to rigorous, logical reasoning. This is especially important when we wonder about questions that can’t be determined through observation alone. In this session, we’ll master some basics of deductive logic: detecting arguments, outlining them in premise/conclusion form, and evaluating them for validity, soundness and informativeness. These skills will come up again and again as we read texts, construct debate cases, and compose your Apology essay. By the end of lecture:
1. You will understand the concepts of validity and soundness and be able to classify arguments based on these two dimensions.
2. You will be able to identify a reasoning structure in real-world scenarios (i.e. newspaper articles).
3. You will appreciate the distinction between criticizing premises and criticizing a reasoning process.
4. You will understand how to turn a weak question into a stronger question.
5. You will understand what an Enthymeme is and how to resolve them.
Consider the following questions, write your responses in your journal, and talk about them with a friend:
1. The Atlantic article about CrossFit considers an argument with this general form.
Premise 1: If [INSERT] has X-features, then [INSERT] is a religion.
Premise 2: CrossFit/adult summer camps/college campuses have X-features.
Conclusion: CrossFit/adult summer camps/college are a religion.
Fill in the missing details, “X-features,” in Premise 1, based on the article. Do you agree with this reasoning? How might you object to Premise 1?
2. If you had to come up with criteria for some activity counting as a “philosophical way of life” or a “religion”, what criteria would you adopt? Try to develop an argument in premise/conclusion form defending one of your criteria.
3. Is your argument question-begging? Is it sound? Why or why not?