Valid argument philosophy. Evaluating Arguments 2022-12-24

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In philosophy, an argument is a series of statements (called premises) that are presented in support of a conclusion. A valid argument is one in which the conclusion follows logically from the premises, meaning that if the premises are true, the conclusion must also be true.

There are different types of valid arguments, including deductive and inductive arguments. A deductive argument is one in which the conclusion is necessarily true given the premises, whereas an inductive argument is one in which the conclusion is likely to be true based on the evidence provided.

To be considered a valid argument, the premises of the argument must be logically consistent with one another and the conclusion must follow logically from the premises. This means that there can be no logical contradictions within the argument and that the conclusion must be a logical consequence of the premises.

For example, consider the following argument:

Premise 1: All dogs are mammals. Premise 2: Fido is a dog. Conclusion: Therefore, Fido is a mammal.

In this argument, the premises are logically consistent with one another and the conclusion follows logically from the premises. Therefore, this is a valid argument.

On the other hand, consider the following argument:

Premise 1: All dogs are mammals. Premise 2: Fido is a mammal. Conclusion: Therefore, Fido is a dog.

In this argument, the conclusion does not follow logically from the premises. The fact that Fido is a mammal does not necessarily mean that he is a dog, as there are other types of mammals besides dogs. Therefore, this argument is not valid.

It is important to note that a valid argument does not necessarily mean that the conclusion is true. For example, consider the following argument:

Premise 1: All cows are green. Premise 2: Bessie is a cow. Conclusion: Therefore, Bessie is green.

Even though the conclusion follows logically from the premises, the first premise is false, which means that the conclusion is also false. Therefore, this argument is valid but not sound, meaning that it is logically valid but the premises are not all true.

In summary, a valid argument is one in which the conclusion follows logically from the premises and there are no logical contradictions within the argument. It is important to evaluate the validity of an argument, as it helps determine whether the conclusion is likely to be true based on the evidence provided. However, it is also important to consider the truth of the premises in order to determine whether the argument is sound.

validity

valid argument philosophy

This may happen precisely because argumentation would be a good way to track truths and avoid falsehoods, as discussed in the previous section; by being involved in the same epistemic process of exchanging reasons, the participants in an argumentative situation would all come to converge towards the truth, and thus the upshot would be that they also come to agree with each other. In those states, some professional athletes are felons. Premise 1: New York is in Russia. Fidel Castro must be a naturalized US citizen" we can see that although the argument has false premises the conclusion would be a logical consequence if the premises were true. Therefore, Elizabeth owns a Saturn.


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What Is a Valid Argument?

valid argument philosophy

Ultimately, what we usually desire are sound arguments. The term generally used for instances of exchange of arguments is argumentation. The best we can say is that we don't know whether the argument is sound or not. This question in fact corresponds to two sub-questions: the descriptive question of whether instances of argumentation are on the whole primarily adversarial or cooperative; and the normative question of whether argumentation should be primarily adversarial or cooperative. It also allows for the formulation of questions pertaining to individual as well as cultural differences in argumentative styles see Another illuminating perspective views argumentative practices as inherently tied to broader socio-cultural contexts Amossy 2009. A well-studied area of this phenomenon is politics; see e.

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Venn Diagram and Validity of Arguments

valid argument philosophy

The logical form of a statement is not always as easy to discern as one might expect. Definition and Examples of Valid Arguments. Terminological Clarifications An argument can be defined as a complex symbolic structure where some parts, known as the premises, offer support to another part, the conclusion. Or, just ignore the conclusion: can this ever have true premises? Sometimes, just because we have two facts, it does not follow that all conclusions that are based on those facts will still make sense. The argument was based on whether the Cypress Hills are Mountains or Hills.


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Valid Deductive Argument Logic & Examples

valid argument philosophy

Again, we see that our first fact is not true. In an unjust society, what purports to be a cooperative exchange of reasons really perpetuates patterns of oppression. Indeed, contentious cases usually pertain to premise 1, and in particular to whether S and T are sufficiently similar in a way that is relevant for having or not having feature Q. With different sets of colleagues, he has conducted studies by means of surveys where participants typically, university undergraduates self-report on their argumentative practices in countries such as China, Japan, Turkey, Chile, the Netherlands, Portugal, the United States among others; Hample 2018: ch. Good habits and moral virtues are the principle to have a good and happy life. . Therefore, the whole argument does not hold up.


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Valid Argument Forms

valid argument philosophy

The thought is that, while the feminist critique of excessive aggression in argumentation is well taken, adversariality conceived and practiced in different ways need not have the detrimental consequences of more extreme versions of belligerent argumentation. While the main ideas behind abduction may seem simple enough, cashing out more precisely how exactly abduction works is a complex matter see entry on 2. If Obama cannot run, then we will have a new President. It is nowhere near exhaustive, and gives only a few examples of the better known valid argument forms. Conclusion: Therefore, I like ice-cream. This kind of argument is valid and sound because it has …show more content… The …show more content… Aristotle argues that practice virtues, and learning from virtuous people enable us to flourish.

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Validity and Soundness

valid argument philosophy

A basic principle of rationality is that you need to take into account all the evidence available to you. This entry presents an overview of the main strands in these discussions, while acknowledging the impossibility of fully doing justice to the enormous literature on the topic. Types of Arguments Arguments come in many kinds. Goldman 1994: 30 Of course, it is at least in theory possible to engage in argumentation with oneself along these lines, solitarily weighing the pros and cons of a position. Take for example the two statements: 1 Tony is a ferocious tiger. Or, is the argument sound or, at least, strong? Or is the author here referring to "tautologies" in a different sense? According to a popular slogan, "Valid arguments arevalid by virtue of their form" although not all logicians would wholly agree.

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List of valid argument forms

valid argument philosophy

Only whether if they were true the conclusion would have to be true, which is the case here. An opinion holds an element of belief, which. Conclusion Argument and argumentation are multifaceted phenomena that have attracted the interest of philosophers as well as scholars in other fields for millennia, and continue to be studied extensively in various domains. This also allows that a set of sentences can generate as many distinct arguments as there are combinations of premises and conclusions. A Logic Book: Fundamentals of Reasoning. Therefore, John Paul II is a pope. Translated as Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy, William Rehg trans.


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Evaluating Arguments

valid argument philosophy

Valid arguments with contradictory premises This brings us to a last point that is easy to overlook. Be that as it may, the Internet is here to stay, and online argumentation is a pervasive phenomenon that argumentation theorists have been studying and will continue to study for years to come. Naturally, argumentation can unfold orally in face-to-face encounters—discussions in parliament, political debates, in a court of law—as well as in writing—in scientific articles, on the Internet, in newspaper editorials. This argument can never have both premises be true, simply because the two premises contradict each other. To object to an argument, try to show that the argument is unsound or uncogent: that the argument is invalid or weak, has a false or unjustified premise, or both. Indeed, argumentation is often said to be truth-conducive Betz 2013. On the other hand, if we interpret the first premise to mean that bacteria are a cause of some, but not all, diseases, then the argument is invalid and therefore unsound.

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