Further Discussion Please

A concept from Epstein that can be further discussed is deductive reasoning. When I first read this concept in the book I found it very difficult to understand at first. The book gave a vague delimitation of that I found very difficult to comprehend. It took me until I looked up deductive reasoning online before I could fully understand it. After looking  it up online I what I understood is that Deductive reasoning is a basic form in valid reasoning in which begins with a general case and deduces specific instances. Deductive reasoning begins with a theory. The truth of the premises is supposed to guarantee the truth of the conclusion; in an inductive argument, the truth of the premises merely makes it probable that the conclusion is true. The argument is valid if the conclusion doesn’t really follow from the premise. If the book the book did a better job of explaining this concept it would be much easier to understand.

What I Liked And Disliked

There were many things that I liked about this class. My favorite thing about the class had to be the blog.  The blog post allowed me to show what I learned every week in class. I enjoyed the many different concepts and I like how I was able to post how I understood each concept. Commenting on each person blog was fun as well; I liked sharing my own opinion on various concepts. Only problem I had with the post was making sure I did each post on time. What I disliked most about the class was the group assignments. The group assignments were very time consuming. Often times my group could not agree on a good to work together. Our different agendas were hard to adjust to. I found it very hard to juggle schedule for the group because I was very busy this semester. Aside from that my group worked great together .Overall it was a great class. I enjoyed it a lot

What I Learned This Semester

There are many things I learned in the class over the class over the semester. The book for the course had many different concepts that I found interesting. One of the most interesting concepts from the book too me was the one about arguments. Before this class I never knew how I could properly analyze an argument. The book thought us how to identify a weak argument, and a strong invalid argument. A good argument is an argument in which the premise is true and gives you a reason to believe the conclusion. Another thing I found interesting about the course was the many different fallacies.  After reading over the fallacies it was crazy to me how often these fallacies are used everyday and how effective they are. I don’t think I’m going to fall for these fallacies as much anymore since I’m able to identify each one .Overall this was a great course, I’m glad I took the class.

A concept from chapter 15

A concept from Epstein Chapter 15 that I found useful was the concept of cause and effect. According to Epstein the general cause and effect: for it to be to be true, lots of particular cause and effect must be true. There is also a criterion for cause and effect. The criteria for cause and effect are:

-The cause happened (the claim describing it is true)

-The effect happened (the claim describing it is true)

-The cause precedes the effect.  

-It is (nearly) impossible for the cause to happen (be true) and the effect not to happen (be false), given the normal conditions

-The Cause makes a difference – if the cause had not happened (been true), the effect would not have happened (been true)

-There is no common cause

An example of a cause and effect claim is: Clarence studied all night for his test, therefore Clarence received a good grade

Mission Critical

I found many things interesting about the Mission Critical website. The website was very useful because it gave details on various concepts.  The website explained the concepts so well that you can refer to the website instead of the book if you want to understand the concept.  The website gives you a better understanding than the book does. I liked the introduction of induction.  The website goes into great detail about the concept and gives exercises so that you can understand the concept. It tells you the elements that the argument depends on to tell its strength. They are how accurate and comprehensive the previous observations are, how strong the causal link seems to be, and how similar the two cases are. If you get a question wrong on the exercise then the website explain to you why you got it wrong, I found that very helpful. Overall the explanations were easier to understand. 

Cause and Effect Website

I found many things useful about the Cause and Effect website. What I found useful was how detailed it explained the cause and effect concept. Inductive reasoning is based on observation or experience. There are two rules to remember when dealing with cause and effect.

1. I found the cause and effect website useful for many reasons. What I found useful about the website is. The cause must precede the event in time. On one hand, arguments that have the effect before the cause are examples of the relatively rare fallacy of reverse causation.
2. Even a strong correlation is insufficient to prove causation. Other possible explanations for such a strong correlation include coincidence, reversed causation, and missing something that is the cause of both the original "cause" and its purported "effect."

The website makes it easier to understand the cause and effect concept. It also gave exercises that are helpful too. 

Judging Analogies

After learning about the many types of reasoning, a concept from chapter 12 I found interesting is judging analogies.  There are seven questions to help evaluate an analogy. These considerations clearly matter in determining the relative strength or weakness of an analogy. These questions are:

1. Is this an argument? What is the conclusion?

2. What is the comparison?

3. What are the premises? (one both sides of the comparison)

4. What are the similarities?

5. Can we state the similarities as premises and find a general principle that covers the two sides.

6. Does the general principle really apple to both sides? Do the differences matter?

7. is the argument strong or valid? Is it good?

If you are able to apply these questions to the analogy you will successfully be able to evaluate the analogy.  This was very useful because I can use this to evaluate an analogy each time.