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Summary PHI1025F Critical Thinking Exam Study Notes. All content included
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  • PHI1025F Critical Thinking
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  • University Of Cape Town (UCT)

Summary of all content covered in phi1025 (critical thinking) The notes are made from my lecture notes and the info in the provided textbook

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  • June 23, 2017
  • 27
  • 2015/2016
  • Summary

Subjects

  • critical thinking
  • philosohy
  • phi1025f

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  • University of Cape Town (UCT)
  • PHI1025F Critical Thinking
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Glossary
Argument
 Claim with reasons/evidence supporting it
 The relationship between a claim and the reason/evidence
 Claim= conclusion
 Reason/evidence= premise

Deductive argument
 Premises successfully prove the conclusion

Inductive Argument
 Premises give reasons to believe the conclusion is likely to be true
 Therefore never valid even though it can be very strong

Statement
 Doesn’t defend/convince/motivate
 Unsupported claim not supported by premises
 Is true, false, or unknown

Rhetorical question
 Often a statement
 Disguised as a question

Premises
 Reasons backing up an argument

Assumption of bi-valence
 Every statement is either true or false, weather we know it or not

Command
 An instruction

Fallacy
 Bad/problematic way of reasoning

Explanation
 Not an argument
 Doesn’t try to convince the reader a claim/conclusion is true
 Casual story

Normative Claim
 Explaining what ought to happen
 Without a normative claim, a normative conclusion is impossible

Normative conclusion
 Explains what should happen
 Often appeals to morals

,Relativism
 Accepting all arguments/opinions as true
 A load of shit
o Philosophers don’t believe

Valid
 Conclusion is always true as long as the premises are true

Sound
 Must be valid
 Must have true premises
 Conclusion always true
o If the premises of a valid argument are true the conclusion must be
true

Sufficient condition
 X will result in y
 Y can still happen with D or F

Necessary condition
 Without X, Y cannot happen
 X does not guarantee Y, but is needed

Eliminate Syllogism
 Either X or Y
 Not X
 Therefor Y

Or
 Inclusive
 Either P or Q
o Can be P
o Can be Q
o Can be both
Categorical syllogism
 Valid
o All/some X are Y
o All Y are Z
o Therefore, all/some X are Z
o Either use all for both, or some for both
 Invalid
o All X are Y
o All Y are Z
o Therefore, some X are Z

Formal Fallacy
 See it’s a fallacy by looking at the form
 Has an invalid argument form

,Argument
A conclusion with premise(es) justifying it


Deduction and Induction
Deductive argument
 Premises successfully prove the conclusion

Inductive Argument
 Premises give reasons to believe the conclusion is likely to be true
 Therefore never valid even though it can be very strong



Finding an argument
 Find conclusion
 Find premises
 Use indicators
o Words/phrases typically before/after a premise/conclusion

,Obstacles to critical thinking
Bias
 Personal Bias
o Matches your beliefs
 Liverpool are better than united
o Holds beliefs which will benefit you
 People in my profession should be paid more
o Overestimate your own abilities
 Cultural Bias
o Favour views that conform to our beliefs

Language and knowledge/ Rhetoric devices
 Random Sentences
o No logical order to the argument
o Can’t assess it because there is no argument to assess
 Vagueness
o More information needed to critically assess what has been said
o Not specific enough
 “new and improved”
 Empty Rhetoric
o Don’t really say anything, just say what people want to hear
o Information missing that would enable us to assess
 “yeas we can”
 Ambiguity
o Can be interpreted in more than one way
 Nothing is brighter than a supernova
A candle is brighter than nothing
Therefore a candle is brighter than a supernova
 Emotive language
o Appealing to the readers emotion
o Not reasoning using the most neutral language



Relativism/Subjectivism
 Accepting all arguments/opinions as true
 A load of shit
o Philosophers don’t believe

,Fallacies
Fallacy of Evidence
 Can be true but doesn’t completely support/justify the argument
 Premises have some bearing on the conclusion, but not the way the
arguer suggests


Fallacy of relevance
 Can be true but doesn’t support/justify the argument
 Premises don’t support the conclusion because they aren’t relevant


Ad hominem Fallacy
 Attack the person saying the argument instead of the argument
o Usually negative
 “don’t believe what Tracy says about global warming. She is
a dope smoking Hippy”
o Can also be positive
 There must be life on mars. Mr. Jones said so and he is a
college professor

Attacking the Motive
 Inverse of hominem fallacy
 If somebody has a motive to support X, therefore anything he says
supporting X is false
 Just because you have a motive to believe something doesn’t mean you
are wrong
 Once again not looking at the actual argument
 Motive should raise suspicion but doesn’t on its own disprove an
argument. Cause someone to suspend judgment until evidence supporting

Look Who’s Talking
 Premises 1. John says you should stop smoking because it is bad
 Premises 2. John Smokes. Not practicing what he preaches
 Conclusion. John’s claims about smoking are false
 Just because you are a hypocrite doesn’t mean you are wrong

,Two wrongs make a right fallacy
 Structure
o Premise: X is wrong
o Premise: But Y is wrong too or even worse
o Conclusion: Therefore X is really okay
 X can still be wrong as well even if to a lesser extent
 Being a lesser evil doesn’t make it a virtue
 Is it a fallacy if your wrong is preventing a worse wrong?

Scare Tactics
 Threat unrelated to the outcome
o Voting for the ANC is voting for the end of South Africa


Appeal to pity
 Some aspect of your argument appealing to emotions
 A fallacy if you only appealing to pity

Bandwagon Fallacy
 Jumping on the bandwagon
 It is a good argument if the people have had relevant experience
o All eaten at a restaurant and say its good

Straw Man fallacy
 Misrepresents a claim to make it look silly
 Makes a caricature of the argument
 Exaggerate one side completely
 Pick up on one part of an argument and running with it


Red herring Fallacy
 Irrelevant claim
 Aimed to distract from conclusion
 Also used in detective novels
o False clues
 We should ban alcohol consumption
o Very bad for children
o Irrelevant because of the age limit

,Zeno’s Paradox
Achilles and the tortoise
 Read through

The arrow
 Read through

, Deductive Arguments
Deductive argument
 Premises successfully prove the conclusion
 Either valid or sound
o Valid
 Conclusion is always true as long as the premises are true
o Sound
 Must be valid
 Must have true premises
 Conclusion always true
 If the premises of a valid argument are true the
conclusion must be true because it is valid


Valid Deductive Argument Forms
Modus Ponens
 If P, then Q
 P
 Therefore Q

Modus Tollens
 If P, then Q
 Not Q
 Therefore not P

Syllogisms
 3 lines
 First 2 lines = premises
 Third line = conclusion

Categorical syllogism
 At least one premise states something about a category
 Form
o All x are y
o Some y are z
o Therefore, some x are z

Eliminative Syllogism
 Argument of elimination
 Form
o Either x or y
o Not x
o Therefore y
 Not the other way around
o OR IS INCLUSIVE

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