Philosophy

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deductively valid

Back 1

all the premisesare true, then the conclusion has to be true as well. If all false premise, conclusion is false also. One false premise and a false conclusion = invalid

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deductively sound

Back 2

(i) deductively valid and (ii) all of its premises are true.

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Immediate Inferences

Back 3

constructed of one premise and a conclusion, both of which are categorical propositions.

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Inductive generalization

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make a claim about a complete set basedon information gathered from an observed subset of that class of individuals.So if every swan I have seen was white, I might conclude that all swans arewhite.

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fallacy of hasty generalization

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when a sample is selected from a pop-ulation in such a way that not every member of that population hasan equal chance of being selected.

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fallacy of begging the question

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An argument begs the question in a context ifand only if any objection in the context to its conclusion is also anobjection to one of its premises, and that premise is not supported byany independent evidence.

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causal slippery-slope

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claim that once a certain kind of event occurs, othersimilar events will also occur, and this will eventually lead to disaster or greatness

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categorical syllogism

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is any argument such that it has exactly twopremises constructed of A, E, I, or O form propositions where one premisecontains the subject term, one premise contains the predicate term, andboth premises contain the middle term.

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appeal to popular opinion

Back 9

is an argument in which a person attemptsto justify a claim on the basis that most people (perhaps a certain group)accept it.

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argument from analogy

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an inductive argument with the general fromof (1) a,b,c... are(have)F,G,H,I...

(2) x is G,H,I...

∴(3) x is F.

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the fallacy of equivocation

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when it uses the sameexpression in different senses in different parts of the argument.

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appeal to authority

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is a form of assurance where we cite an authorityto support what we say.

EXAMPLES

Einstein, a known vegetarian, says to not eat meat.

Cindy Crawford, Bob Dole, and Britney Spears say to drinkPepsi.

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Conceptual slippery-slope

Back 13

gradually make their way through some border-line area in order to show that there is no real difference between thingsat the opposite ends of some scale.

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Inference to the best explanation

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The best explanation will often be the explanation that can take all theavailable evidence and ideally get the right answer. The only catch is thatthe more information one has, the more likely one will be to getting the bestexplanation.