Interesting

Something interesting from chapter 15 was how to find causes on page 317. I like how the author compared it to how scientists test a theory. To find the cause of the decrease in water the guy in the example “conjectured possible causes” (a leak in the hose, valves, or pond liner, cracked concrete and evaporation) “and by experiment eliminated them until there is only one.” Once the choices are narrowed down, Epstein says to ask yourself “does it make a difference? Is there still an effect? And could there be a common cause?” After testing for the first four causes, the loss was still there. To confirm the problem was due to evaporation, the water flow was reduced. That led to less water loss, confirming that evaporation was the problem. If I had to guess I would have chosen evaporation because he mentioned that he lived in the desert.

Mission Critical

What was useful about the mission critical website was all of its information. In went into depth with each concept and the links made it easy to get to a concept rather than scrolling down the page. It seemed to provide more information than the Epstein text. A confusing part was when I got to the exercises in the qualified statement section.  When I would click on an answer to see if it was right it would take me to a different part of the page and have two answers, so it made answering the other question pointless. In the emotional appeals section, I liked how it listed out other names an appeal may have. For example, appeal to vanity is also known and apple polishing and appeal to fear may also be called scare tactics or appeal to force. The exercises in this section were better than the qualified and specific statement ones.

Cause and Effect Website

The cause and effect website was just like our Epstein book. It taught the concept and then provided an example and activity. From last week, I remember that causal arguments are like cause and effect. What I liked better about the website was during the activity it would explain the answer, whether it was right or wrong. In our text, we have the questions and answers in the back but no explanations. If we get an answer wrong we have to figure out why we got it wrong by ourselves. One question I had some difficulty with was number two. The “most significant difference” part threw me off and I did not get it right until try three, but each explanation made sense. Another useful thing was the mention of three factors, “how acceptable or demonstrable the implied comparison is,” “how likely the case for causation seems to be” and “how credible the ‘only significant difference’ or ‘only significant commonality’ claim is.

Intersting Concept

My interesting concept for this week is reasoning by analogy. While reading what it was I realized that I already use it. It is kind of like when our parents let one of our siblings go out but tell us to stay behind. Sibling A asked her parents if she could go out. They said yes. Sibling B asked her parents of she could go out. They said yes. That is how I use it in an argument. If one gets to go out why should I stay behind? I have always liked working with analogies. They were my favorite part of the SAT’s. Analogies are comparisons between two things. An example is glove is to hand as scarf is to neck. A glove and scarf are things that you wear. One other thing I thought was interesting was sign reasoning, more specifically the logic section. One of the types of syllogism was hypothetical. I never really understood why people would say “hypothetically speaking” and then ask a question. Now I do!

Difficult to Understand

The hardest reasoning for me to understand was causal reasoning.  When I visited the website on the blog the definition was a paragraph long so it was a lot for me to figure it out. The definitions on Wikipedia were easier to get a grasp of. This website http://www.experiment-resources.com/causal-reasoning.html provides the definition causal reasoning is the idea that any cause leads to a certain effect. Simple, cause and effect. Doctors use this kind of reasoning to get a diagnosis, just watch the show House. Symptoms are used to find the cause. Causal reasoning is split up into five methods. A common example I’ll use is eating then getting sick. The first is method of agreement. Please refer to my first post to read about this one. The next one is method of difference. This is when a doctor has two patients who ate together but only one got sick. The doctor would look for a difference in what they ate. Then there is the joint method of agreement and difference. There could be five patients that ate the same thing but only one did not get sick. The method of concomitant variation is when different amounts of something we eaten so the illness level varies. One patient could have had 3 beers and feels a little buzzed while a second patient had six and is drunk. Last is the method of residues. This is when a patient could have any number of symptoms and the doctor knows what all but one are caused because of prior cases. Say the doctor already had two patients that suffered from a lot of energy caused by eating a lot of candy and going to the bathroom a lot from drinking a lot of water. A third patient has those two symptoms plus a headache. Number 3 tripped on the stairs and since the other two patients didn’t, the trip caused the headache.

Examples

Reasoning by analogy is simple. It compares two things and both sides come to the same conclusion in an argument. The first example in the book was good. Kid A’s conclusion was to hit Kid B so Kid B concludes that it is fair to hit Kid A back. According to the University of Pittsburg, sign reasoning is a way of proving arguments in different forms. Some forms are logic, which are more forms within itself, visual/aural proof, and storytelling. An example of hypothetical logic reasoning would be if I take a sleeping pill (if A), then I will fall asleep (then B), I took the pill (A is present) then I feel asleep (so B is present). Casual reasoning’s different forms include causation, method of agreement, method of difference, and five others. An example of method of agreement is finding out what people had in common that caused the event. If two people went to the same mechanic with the same problem, a flat tire, the mechanic could ask them the where they drove. If both drivers said on southbound 880 by the airport, he concludes that there is something there giving people flat tires. Changing minds says criteria reasoning is “defining the criteria by which the outcome of a decision will be judged, and then identify the best decision, given these constraints.” An example from then is “how will we know when we have succeeded? Let’s discuss this first…” All the examples are in the forms of question and lead to a discussion to define the criteria and are not just a simple statement on how to succeed. Reasoning by example is using examples in your argument. “You will not be bored if you ever visit New York. I was there last month and our day was full of things to do and we already have an itinerary for when we go next” is reasoning by example. Inductive reasoning takes general conclusions from observations. An example of this could be “everyone that I see get on the subway, swipes a card. So to get on the subway you must swipe a card.” Deductive reasoning makes or evaluates deductive arguments. Examples can be valid or invalid but not true or false.

Interesting Concept

My interesting concept for this week is appeal to fear. Out of all the other appeals to emotion, I think this one would be the most effective. It makes people scared and puts them into a vulnerable state. That would make them vote, buy, or do whatever the thing implying the fear wants. Take a look at the following ad. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX-QhoihLeI I have a mirror in my bathroom similar to the one in the commercial with a window opposite to it. After watching a scary movie I always get paranoid about something from the movie happening to me during the night. I think that when I close the mirror something is going to come in from the window and do something to me and the ad just makes me want to have some running shoes on hand. Another example of fear taking over us is the scene on TV with person A holding a gun to person B’s head. Person B eventually spills the beans about something from the fear of being shot.

Exercise

I chose to do exercise 2, find an ad that uses apple polishing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LG6zhoYu6PY

It is like the example in the book. The example is shampoo and the unstated premise is “you want to look good with shiny, well-kept hair.” The ad I chose unstated premise is you want to make up that makes you look beautiful and skincare products that work. Now is it a good argument? Refer to the good argument test on page 40.  The premise is that women want to look good, that is plausible. The conclusion to the ad is to buy Mary Kay products.  I think women looking good is more plausible then that. Is it valid or strong? Women want to look good but may end up not buying the product. So the premise is true but conclusion false. That makes it weak.  It is a bad argument because it did not pass the three tests.                              

Appeal to Emotion

According to Epstien, “an appeal to emotion in an argument is just a premise that says, roughly, you should believe or do something because you feel a certain way.” The different kinds of appeals are appeal to pity, fear, spite and vanity. There are also call in your debts arguments and feel good arguments. Appeals to fear, spite and vanity do not have an effect on me and neither does a feel good argument. If someone brings up a debt in an argument I am likely to fold in. For example, if a coworker worked one of my shifts for me and they needed one of their shifts covered and reminded me of the favor they did for me, I am likely to repay the favor. I feel really bad when someone helps me out but I cannot help them back. Whenever I see the commercials about abandoned pets or poor children I do get an urge to give money so appeal to pity works on me. I hate the idea of a sad world. =(