Standardization                                                                      (Problems printing? Click here.)

The Bones Of Logic

The stuff we do in this chapter is intended to help you figure out all the ins and outs of any argument set, no matter how complicated, so that you can more easily give it the flying fist of death, (keee-yah!) Since I'm just concerned with the way we do things, I'm not overly concerned with you learning much in the way of logic at this point. For this reason, I've tried to make the logical part of what follows relatively easy, so we can devote the bulk of our energies to learning scaefod. So, expect the homework and in-class exercises to be such that it's really easy to see who's right and who's wrong. (The examples I do for you may be a little harder, but that's okay because I'm doing those examples.) So the logic part of what you have to do will be easy, the hard part will be organizing your thoughts into a proper fist of death, and that's what we primarily learn this week.

Oh, I want to emphasize here that the first three phases of scaefod - standardization, contexting and analysis - are done without making any value judgements whatsoever. Figuring out whether an argument is good or bad waits until the evaluation phase. This is so that you know all you need to know about the arguments before you start evaluating them, so that, as much as possible, you avoid jumping to conclusions.

(Because analysis is actually way trickier than standardization and contexting, I'm going to defer discussion of analysis until later in the semester.)

Standardization

Imagine that you meet a friendly stranger who wants you to believe something. Before you met him, you had no particular opinion on the subject, but he wants you to adopt a definite belief. Perhaps he wants you to believe in astrology, or chiropractic, or maybe he wants you to disbelieve in evolution, or socialism. In any case, he wants you to change your mind from whatever you now believe to agree with him. Now also imagine that this stranger states some more of his beliefs, and expects that hearing these other beliefs will induce you to change your mind and agree with him that astrology can predict the future, that chiropractic works, that evolution is unscientific, or that socialism is evil. In other words, he gives you what he thinks is a set of good reasons for you to change your mind, and agree with him. In critical thinking, we would refer to the stranger's whole speech as his argument. This includes both what he explicitly says, as well as anything he might be assuming that you already believe, or will figure out, without him saying it. The thing that he wants you to believe is his conclusion. The reasons he gives you to believe it are his premises. The reasons that he thinks go without saying are his suppressed premises.

The "conclusion" of any argument is whatever single claim it is that the arguer wants you to believe. The "premises" of that argument are the reasons he's giving to try to change your mind to agree that his conclusion is true. The "standard form" for making arguments clear involves making a list of the argument's premises, drawing a straight line under the list, and following the line with the argument's conclusion. When you do this you should, as much as possible, put the argument into your own words without changing its meaning. You should, (but you don't absolutely have to), leave out stuff that's not intended as part of the argument.

If you think the arguer is expecting his audience to assume some claim that he's not explicitly saying, you could add that claim in, in parentheses, as a "suppressed premise" or even a "suppressed conclusion." Suppressed claims are tricky, and you should try very hard not to read any more into an argument than you absolutely have to. Consider two standardizations of the following argument. (Based on an actual newspaper column.)

We should not interfere with people who want to protest the administration's plans to invade Iraq, but we should write down their license plate numbers so they can be identified for future treason trials.

Standardization One                                                                                              Standardization Two
1. (Protesting administration policies is a form of treason.)                         1. (Traitors should be lined up against a wall and shot!)
2. Anti-invasion protestors are protesting an administration policy.            2. Anti-invasion protestors are committing treason.             
C. Anti-invasion protestors should be prosecuted for treason.                    C. (Anti-invasion protestors should be shot!)    

To me, the first standardization seems like a reasonable interpretation of the arguers actual words, while the second standardization goes far beyond what the arguer actually says. Even if I strongly believe the arguer to be harboring such violent thoughts, or if it seems clear to me that treason trials imply executions, standardization two still goes further than I strictly need to in order to make sense of the argument. I can justify the suppressed premise in standardization one by pointing out that the argument makes no sense if the arguer doesn't equate protest with treason. So the rule here is that you add claims only to the extent that you need to to make sense of the argument. Adding more "suppressed" claims puts me in danger of misrepresenting the arguer's position.

The first thing to do in any standardization is find the conclusion. Since the conclusion can come at any point in the argument, this can be difficult. Sometimes, there will be some word or phrase to indicate that whenever follows is conclusion. Some of these words are:

so        finally      so, duh         entails that       proves that         it is clear that       we can see that
thus     hence      therefore       implies that      we may infer      it follows that       we can conclude
then     shows     as a result     accordingly      consequently      it must be that      you'd be an idiot not to think that

Once you have correctly identified the conclusion, all of the other points in the argument will be premises. Unfortunately, it is not always the case that an arguer bothers to indicate his conclusion by using a conclusion-indicating word. So it helps to be familiar with the premise-indicating words, such as:

for        in that      because       insofar as      inasmuch as         this is implied by        due to the fact that           may be concluded from
since     after all    given that     in view of     this follows from   for the reason that     consider the following      for the following reasons

However, many arguments don't have indicator words at all. (The b@$~*rds!)

The bottom line here is that the conclusion is always the "fact" that the arguer is trying to get us to believe, and the premises are the things that she thinks we already believe. For this reason, the most controversial claim in any argument is usually the conclusion.

The following examples each represent one way to standardize the given argument. There may be other acceptable ways to standardize these arguments, and I'm not claiming that the ways I do it here are necessarily the best ways. (By the way, I render arguments in a different typeface, and sometimes I color good ones green and bad ones red.)

Example 1

This chocolate must be the best in the world, because its name is "World's Best Chocolate!"

1. The manufacturer of this chocolate named it "World's Best Chocolate!"
C. This chocolate is the best in the world

Notice that the premise is numbered, and I've idicated the conclusion with a capital "C." (The traditional method of indicating a conclusion is with three little circles arranged in a point-up triangle, but my computer won't easily do that.) Now, is this a good standardization? Well, it seems to cover the main points. If there's anything I've missed, I can restandardize the argument later.

Example 2

You'd better believe that an airplane's "black box" is black. Because, if you don't I'll come over there and slap you silly!

1. The speaker will physically assault the listener if the listener doesn't believe that an airplane's "black box" is black.
C. An aircraft's "black box" is colored black.

The motivation to believe the speaker comes from a threat, so the existance of the threat is the premise.

Example 3

We know that alien abduction stories are valid because the abductees are completely accurate in their recollections of events.

1. People who claim to have been abducted are completely accurate in their reccollections of events.
2. (If people are accurate in their recollections of events, then their stories will be valid.)
C. Alien abduction stories are valid.

Notice that I substituted "people who claim to have been abducted" for "abductees." This allows us to identify the people we're talking about without making any assumptions about whether or not they were abducted. Notice also that I added a suppressed premise. Premise number 2 wasn't explicitly stated in the original argument, but it seems to me that the arguer assumed it, so I put it in. I put it in in parentheses so that if it turns out to be bad in some way, I won't blame the original arguer for the bad suppressed premise.

Example 4

I can't tell much about the logic of this argument, but it's conclusion is true so, yeah, I guess it's a good argument.

1. The speaker does not understand the logic of the argument he's taking about.
2. The speaker believes that the argument he's taking about has a true conclusion.
C. The argument in question is a good argument.

Now, I could have written premise two as just "the argument he's taking about has a true conclusion," which is certainly what the arguer meant. However, in this case I wanted to emphasize that the arguer is just stating his presently unsupported belief that that conclusion is true. This is a judgement call, and I wouldn't complain if you rendered that premise as "the argument he's taking about has a true conclusion." (We'll worry about the logic of the issue later.) Another judgement call here is premise number 1. You may think that it does absolutely nothing to support the conclusion, or even that the arguer didn't intend it as support for the conclusion. And if you're right about that, I should not have included it as a premise. However, I don't see that it hurts anything to be there, so I'll leave it in for now.

Example 5

The CIA funneled drugs to the inner cities? Uncle Sam a drug smuggler with an eye-patch and a wooden leg? God you're gullible! I suppose you also think the US government irradiated retarded kids, or withheld treatment so that some black men died of syphilis. What an idiot you are!

1. The idea that the CIA funneled drugs to the inner cities evokes an allegedly humorous image of "Uncle Sam" as a smuggler.
C. The CIA did not funnel drugs to America's inner cities

The arguer is trying to change our minds by comparing the idea of CIA drug smuggling with the image of a piratical Uncle Sam, so that's the premise.

Example 6

Kiley: The black community should not be upset that we created a marketing campaign and special brand names to appeal to young black people. This wasn't intended to get people to start smoking. It was designed to get people to switch brands, so it's a brand identification issue, not a health issue!

Now, this may turn out to be more complicated than it looks, and you might choose to standardize this argument this argument differently from the way I do it here. And you might be right to do so! But I don't feel like working hard at this point, so I'm just going to give what I think is at least a reasonable standardization.

1. The tobacco company's campaign that appealed to young blacks was intended to get people to switch brands.
2. The tobacco company's campaign that appealed to young blacks was was not intended to get people to start smoking.
3. The issue of this advertising campaign is a brand identification issue, not a health issue.
C. This advertising campaign is not anything anyone has any reason to get upset about.

The bottom line here is that standardization is meant to clarify the argument for you. If you need to break the argument down into two or more little arguments to make it clear to you, then that's what you need to do. If a simple standardization makes the argument as clear as you need it to be to do the rest of scaefod, then you don't need to standardize it any further. Heck, if you see the argument so clearly that you can easily do the rest of scaefod without standardization, then you don't need to standardize at all!

Some useful tricks

There are a number of different strategies that arguers can find themselves using to support their conclusions. We will discuss each of the various strategies in detail in later chapters, so I don't really expect you to remember much about the particular strategies I talk about in this section, since they will all be covered in depth later. What I would like you to remember from the following section is that arguments often do have recognizable strategies, and that thinking about what strategy an argument might be using can often lead to a much clearer and more effective standardization.

1. Does the speaker rely on someone else as the source of his information? If he does, this should be a premise.

Argument
You surely must understand that the God Esculapius is real. Not only does the historian Pausanias report that Esculapius raised several people, including Hippolytus, from the dead, but he was able to point to a stone monument that local people erected to commemorate the event!"

Standardization
1. Pausanias says Esculapius raised Hippolytus from the dead.
2. Pausanias says Esculapius raised several other people.
3. Pausanias says local people raised a monument to commemorate the raisings.
(4. Esculapius couldn't raise people from the dead if he didn't exist.)
C. Esculapius really exists.

Notice that I split Pausanias's three points into three separate premises. Also notice that premise number three clarifies the source of the information about the monument. Finally, I added a suppressed premise to make the logic clear.

2. If the speaker makes a point of comparing one thing to another thing, that comparison is probably a premise.

Argument
The war on drugs is like any war. We will not begin to win until we begin to shoot drug dealers on sight.

Standardization
1. The government campaign against illegal drug use is like a literal war with shooting and bombing and napalm and so on.
(2. You can't win a real war without shooting at the enemy every time you see them.)
C. The government won't win the drug war without a "shoot on sight" order against drug dealers.

Notice the comparison is clarified in the first premise. Sometimes the comparison is hard to see, so I've given you another example.

Argument
Every time I argue against condom distribution in schools, some idiot pipes up with the idea that at least some teenagers are going to go out and have sex anyway, so the best way to protect them is to try to make sure they do it safely. That is the stupidest idea I've ever heard! Would you give teachers bulletproof vests because you think students are going to go out and start shooting? No of course you wouldn't! Nobody would. And yet these idiots are still out there handing out condoms to schoolchildren.

Standardization
1. Condom distribution is based on the idea that some teenagers will have sex no matter what you do.
2. Condom distribution based on that idea is like bulletproof vest distribution based on the idea that students will inevitably start shooting.
(3. Bulletproof vest distribution based on the idea that students will inevitably start shooting is a very stupid idea.)
C. Condom distribution is a very stupid idea.

This is actually a fairly complicated argument, so I've done what I can to make it simple. Notice that I've put the comparison in the second premise.

3. Does the speaker make a claim about a large group of things based on knowledge of only some of those things?

Argument
Okay, you want to know the value of pi to at least one decimal place. We don't have any math books, but I found this perfect circle in a picture book. Pi is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. I very carefully measured the circumference and the diameter of this circle. In fact, I measured each one several times to make sure. And then I calculated the ratio between this circle's circumference and its diameter. And I checked those calculations several times! I can tell you for certain, that the circumference of this circle is 3.142 times its diameter. So pi is about 3.142.

Standardization
1. Pi is the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter.
2. Measurements of one particular circle make pi equal to 3.142.
3. All measurements and calculations were checked up several times.
C. Pi is about 3.142.

What is the group here? It's every circle in the universe. How many circles does the speaker know about? One. How many circles are involved in his conclusion? Well, how many circles are there in the universe?

4. Does the speaker base his argument on the claim that two different things happened at about the same time, one just after the other? This kind of point can be very important, so make sure you include it as a premise.

Argument
The need to continue the war on drugs has never been so clear. Every year since we made drugs illegal the violent crime rate has climbed and climbed! Obviously, we need to seriously increase the money we spend on drug law enforcement.

Standardization
1. The criminalization of drug use was followed by a rise in the rate of violent crime.
C. The government should increase the money spent on drug law enforcement.

Notice that premise one says that one thing happened and then another thing happened. (I haven't added a suppressed premise because I can't think of one that would make any sense.)

5. Does the speaker say that one thing causes or will cause another thing?

Argument
First they allow intelligent design in schools, next it will be the flat-earth theory, and then biblical geometry (pi=3). Before you know it, they'll be teaching disease is caused by daemons and floods are the result of singing hymns off-key!

Standardization
1. If intelligent design is taught in schools, it will inevitably be followed by the teaching of the flat-earth theory.
2. Teaching the flat earth theory will cause the teaching of biblical geometry.
3. Teaching biblical geometry will cause the teaching of the daemon theory of disease and the off-key hymn theory of flooding.
(4. It would be a bad thing in schools taught that disease was caused by daemons and floods by off-key hymns.)
(C. It would be a bad thing if intelligent design is taught in schools.)

Notice that you can refer to a cause and effect relationship in a number of different ways. Notice also that I have tried to break down the causal into simple statements of one thing causing another.

Also notice that this argument had a suppressed conclusion. Sometimes arguers are so sure you know what they're talking about that they don't bother to mention their main point! In that case, you can fill it in for them. But beware, don't fill in any more than you have to in order for the argument to make sense.

6. A lot of arguments try to prove their conclusions by claiming (explicitly or implicitly) that their conclusion, if true, would explain some other known facts.

Argument
People who are near death all see a white light, which proves that Heaven must have a film crew at the pearly gates to film new arrivals.

Standardization
1. Near death experiences involve a visual impression of white light.
(2. Film crews always use very bright white lights.)
3. If Heaven had a film crew, that would explain the white light.
C. Heaven has a film crew.

7. Sometimes, the claim that there is no evidence for something is the most important premise in an argument.

Argument
Don't tell me that strawberries explode. No one has ever reported seeing a strawberry explode. No one has ever filmed an exploding strawberry. No one has ever used strawberries as the basis for a bomb. No one has ever tried to demolish a building using strawberries. No one has ever found red goop and little tiny seeds scattered over an explosion site. And finally, no one has gone to a demolished building or burned up car and said "aha, it must have been a strawberry."

Standardization
1. There are no reports of strawberry explosions.
2. There are no films of strawberry explosions.
3. Bombs are not made out of strawberries.
4. Buildings are not demolished by strawberry.
5. No explosion site has ever given evidence of strawberry involvement.
6. When people see evidence of an explosion, they do not immediately think of strawberries.
C. Strawberries do not explode.

Notice that every single premise mentions a lack of evidence. Also notice that the conclusion is a negative one.

Strategy                                                                    

I'm giving the name "strategy" to the particular way a single argument tries to support it's conclusion. Knowing an argument's strategy can help a lot in terms of evaluating it and its competitors. We have already covered the seven main strategies that direct arguments can use, (Authority, Analogy, Generalization, Causal, Explanation, Burden of Proof, Deductive), each in it's own chapter, and with at least some of the various strategies for countering that particular direct strategy. This chapter will cover pretty much the same strategies we covered before, but will focus on identifying which strategy, or counter-strategy, is at work in any particular argument. You might think that this is a more fundemental topic, and so should be taught before each of the individual strategies is taught, but teaching doesn't work that way. In logic, the more fundemental a topic is, the more difficult it is for students to understand, and so the later in the course it should come. (And boy, did I learn that lesson the hard way!) I'm also hoping that your earlier familiarity with the individual strategies and counter-strategies will give you a basis for understanding this chapter. (We'll just have to see how that goes.)

Here's how to tell what strategy a direct argument is using.
If the arguer relies on the word of some person or group to support it's conclusion, then it's an authority argument.
If the arguer relies on a comparison between two objects to support it's conclusion, then it's an analogy argument.
If the arguer relies on the properties of a sample of some population to support a conclusion about that population, then it's a generalization argument.
If it relies on a correlation between two events or groups of events, or the conclusion says that one thing caused, causes or will cause some other thing, then it is a causal argument.
If the arguer relies on a claim it's conclusion is necessary to explain some fact or facts, then it's an explanation argument.
If the arguer relies on a lack of evidence for some claim to support it's conclusion that that claim is false, then it's a burden of proof argument.
If the arguer relies on none of the above strategies, then it's either a deductive argument or it's a waste of hot air.

Rule one: If you can't figure out what strategy an argument is using, or if you don't know how to analyze arguments using that strategy, treat it as a deductive argument. It's not a perfect rule, but it's enough to get you started.

What strategy is used by each of the following arguments? Click on the appropriate link below the argument to see if your answer is correct.

A. Scientists have proved that we only use ten percent of our brains.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


B. As I've gotten older, I've gotten fatter and balder. Every time I put on a little weight, I lose a little hair. So if I exercise and go on a diet, I'll stop losing my hair.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


C. In 2002 the Psychic Enemies Network asked every one of their 27 million callers whether they believed in sasquatch. 74% of those 27 million people said they believed in sasquatch. So about 74% of Americans believe in sasquatch.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


D. Gun ownership is not a definitive sign of a free society, because private gun sales were big business in Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and Saddam Hussein's Iraq was definitely not a free society!

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


E. My refusal to allow make-up exams is justified by the fact that it is not my policy to allow make-up exams.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive

 
F. Saddam Hussein is a lot like Stalin. Both are vicious dictators with their hands on weapons of mass destruction. Both are self-important megalomaniacs. Both are extremely cruel to anyone who comes in their power. Deterrence kept Stalin bottled up behind the iron curtain until he died. We had absolutely no reason to think that deterrence would not keep Saddam similarly bottled up. Thus we had no reason to go to war with Iraq.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


G. We know that the delegates to the Constitutional Convention did not create a constitution that protected the interests of America's ruling class, because we know that none of those delegates personally profited from the new constitution in any significant way.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive

 
H. Mrs Walnut, it is clear to everyone in this court that you have just proved yourself to be a liar. When you were first questioned by the police, you said that you had never met the defendant. Yet now you admit that you did meet him several times while you were starring in a 1968 Broadway production of "Satan's Underpants," and he was a junior stagehand.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


I. Deterrence worked on Stalin? That's a laugh! Next you'll be telling me that deterrence turned Stalin into a pacifist, or that he spent the rest of his life cowering in a secret bunker! Will deterrence do the dishes? Will deterrence cure cancer? Maybe deterrence caused Stalin to have an involuntary sex change, move to New York and have a career on Broadway under the name Ethel Merman! Would deterrence have made Saddam a pacifist? Would it make him grow his hair, wear tie-dye shirts and Birkenstocks? I don't think we'd have seen "Saddam the hippie," do you?

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


J. We must slow our satellite “ChuckDown.” If we don't, it will fly over South America too early to broadcast the afternoon Novellas. People will miss their Novellas and become cranky. Cranky people get road rage when they drive. Gunfights on the roads cause accidents. Accidents can block roads for hours. Blocked roads can hold up road transportation of goods. Failure to transport goods in time causes companies to go bankrupt. A big wave of bankruptcies would cause a whole economy to collapse. So if we don't slow down our satellite, all the South American economies will collapse.

Authority       Analogy       Generalization       Causal       Explanation       Burden       Deductive


K. Now fill in the blanks:

i. If an argument doesn't rely on _________________________________________ then it's just not an authority argument.

ii. If it's an analogy argument, then it's going to have a ____________________________ somewhere in it. (Don't say "analogy.")

iii. Generalization arguments always include ___________________________________________________________________.

iv. To establish that one thing causes another, you have to show that there's a ___________________________________________.

v. An explanation argument will say that it's conclusion is necessary to _______________________________________________.

vi. Burden of proof arguments are based on __________________________ evidence for the opposite conclusion.

vii. Deductive arguments use __________ of the above strategies.

Meaning, Ambiguity and Vagueness

Standardization is the process of making the meaning of an argument completely clear. This means identifying all the terms used in the argument and finding ways to paraphrase the argument as to make the meanings of those terms as clear, as precise, and as unambiguous as possible. While it is often the case that this is a relatively easy task, it is also often true that arguers sometimes use vague terms, they sometimes use ambiguous terms, and sometimes they even fail to understand the meanings of the terms they use. This section is intended to get you started on learning how to negotiate the meanings of terms used in arguments. I will discuss the process of identifying the true definitions of terms in order to be able to expose the true logic of an issue, learning how to identify and deal with vague terms, and learning how to identify and expose ambiguity in arguments. All of these processes are important in evaluating arguments. An arguer who does not understand his own terms, who uses vague terms or uses ambiguous terms is usually failing to prove what he thinks he's proving. Usually, arguments that rely on vague, ambiguous or misunderstood terms fail to prove anything at all. Sometimes, they even fail to provide an argument at all.

Meaning

The simplest way an argument can go wrong with regards to meaning is by using a premise that means exactly the same thing as the conclusion. (This creates the fallacy of "begging the question.") Consider the following argument.

We can see that everyone is really selfish simply by looking at society and noticing that everyone only acts to serve his or her own self interest.

This argument has a conclusion "everyone is really selfish," which is based on the premise that "everyone only acts as his or her own self-interest." So we could standardize this argument as follows:

Everyone in society only acts to serve his or her own self interest.
Everyone is really selfish.

But if we leave it at that, we might fail to notice a very interesting fact about this argument. Consider the definition of the term "selfish." The word "selfish" simply means "only acts to serve his or her own self interest," which means that the premise and the conclusion actually say exactly the same thing. This means that all of the following are in fact completely accurate standardizations of the above argument.

Everybody is really selfish.               Everyone in society is selfish.               Everybody only acts to serve his or her own self interest.               People only act to serve themselves.
Everybody is really selfish.               Everyone in society is selfish.               Everybody only acts to serve his or her own self interest.               People only act to serve themselves.

The advantage of standardizing the argument in one of these ways is that it really makes it clear how the premise is related to the conclusion. Of course, doing it this way also makes it clear that you need to be very careful to make sure that the premise of the argument you are standardizing really is the same as the argument's conclusion. If it turns out that there is actually a significant difference between the two, then you should not paraphrase them as saying the same thing.

Homework: Standardize For your first homework, I want you to pick two of the following argument sets, and turn in a piece of paper containing your name and standardizations of both arguments in each set. (You do four standardizations total.) 1. Marsala. I've seen a summary of the results of all the studies that have ever been done comparing the murder rates in states with and without the death penalty. After all the corrections have been made to account for all the variables and other demographic factors, it turns out that there's no evidence that the death penalty has any deterrent effect whatsoever. Since the effect would show up in a difference in murder rates if it existed, we should conclude that there is no deterrent effect. Naan. You're misunderstanding the nature of statistics. Actually, the evidence for the deterrent effect of the death penalty holds up pretty well. You have to understand that there are all kinds of things that can go wrong with a study. There may be bias, for instance. Or the data may be incomplete. Or the researchers might have compared demographically dissimilar groups. So it should be clear to you now that we can discount these studies, and should affirm that the death penalty does have a deterrent effect. 2. Stuart. Say what you like about the Vietnam War, it certainly proves that the United States government stands by its commitments. U.S. presidents Kennedy and Johnson promised that the United States would stand by the regime it had installed in Vietnam. And they did so for as long as it was humanly possible. Louisa. But we can explain the fact that Kennedy and Johnson stuck with the war by assuming that the Republicans would make a big stink about "losing" Vietnam to communism. Giving up in Vietnam would have been political suicide, especially for Democrats like Kennedy and Johnson. 3. Micaela. Studies have shown that lack of decent paying work is one of the most damaging conditions that people can find themselves in. Having a decent paying job makes all the difference in terms of individual self-esteem, family stability and even crime prevention. Access to living wage jobs is so important that the government should intervene to make the economy produce as many living-wage jobs as needed. Freddy. What kind of talk is that? You'd better give up that idea that people have a right to decent paying jobs. That sounds like socialism, and you know what they do to socialists around here! 4. Dashawn. Doctor Rampant Quackery has a Ph.D. in physiology and another doctorate in anatomy. He's been studying chiropractic for decades and he says that his research, and that of other scientists, proves absolutely that, while some chiropractors do use some medically proven techniques, like massage therapy and spinal manipulation, treatment based purely on the chiropractic theory of health, such as chiropractic adjustment, is actually totally useless for 100% of the people who receive it! Antonia That can't be right because millions of people use chiropractic adjustment of the spine as their primary method of healthcare. If what you say was true, millions of people would be wasting millions of dollars they can't afford to lose. That would be terrible, so chiropractic care must work! 5. Omari. I still don't see why you think that unregulated gun ownership is necessary for the existance of a free society. Great Britain is a very free society, and gun ownership is strictly regulated there. Daisha. Look, the basic question you have to ask yourself is, Do I want to live under a tryannical government that makes it extremely difficult for law-abiding citizens to own guns, or do I want to live in a free society where gun ownership is recognized as a basic right of law-abiding citizens?

Possible Quiz Questions (This ain't homework! Memorize the answers for next class, cuz there will be a quiz.)
1. In your own words, define the term "conclusion."
2. In your own words, define the term "premise."
3. What is a "suppressed premise?"
4. What is a "suppressed conclusion?"
5. What is the purpose of standardizing arguments?
6. What does "basic question" mean?
7. What does "background knowledge" mean?
8. What is a "null hypothesis?"
9. What does "burden of proof" mean?

Copyright © 2006 by Martin C. Young

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