Question | Answer |
logic | the organized body of knowledge, or science, that evaluates arguments |
argument | a group of statements, one or more of which are claimed to provide support for on of the others. |
statement | a sentence that is either true or false |
truth values | whether a sentence is true or false |
premises | the statements that set for the reasons or evidence |
conclusion | the statement that the evidence is claimed to support or imply |
conclusion indicators | indicator words that provide clues in identifying the conclusion |
premise indicators | indicator words that provide clues in identifying the premise |
inference | used interchangeably with "argument" |
proposition | the meaning or information content of a statement |
syllogistic logic | a kind of logic in which the fundamental elements are terms, and arguments are evaluated as good bad depending on how the terms are arranged in the argument |
modal logic | logic that involves such concepts as possibility, necessity, belief, and doubt. |
Aristotle | Greek philosopher who devised a systematic criteria for analyzing and evaluating arguments. Also, syllogistic logic and modal logic. |
Chrysippus | Greek philosopher who developed a logic in which the fundamental elements were whole propositions. |
Peter Abelard | distinguished arguments that are valid because of their form from those that are valid because of their content, but he held only formal validity is the "perfect" or conclusive variety. |
Peter of Spain | Wrote Summulae Logicales |
Leibniz | Developed a symbolic language ("calculus") that could settle all disputes from theology to philosophy. |
Charles Sanders Peirce | Developed a logic of relations, invented symbolic quantifiers, and suggested the truth-table method. |
Factual claim | A statement that must claim to present evidence or reasons. |
Inferential claim | A claim that the alleged evidence supports or implies something. |
Explicit inferential claim | Asserted by premise or indicator words. |
Implicit inferential claim | Exists if there is an inferential relationship between the statements in a passage, but the passage contains no indicator words. |
warning | a form of expression that is intended to put someone on guard against a dangerous or detrimental situation |
piece of advice | a form of expression that makes a recommendation about some future decision or course of conduct |
statement of belief or opinion | an expression about what someone happens to believe or think about something |
loosely associated statements | may be about the same general subject, but they lack a claim that one of them is proved by the others. |
report | consists of a group of statements that convey information about some topic or event |
expository passage | a kind of discourse that begins with a topic sentence followed by one or more sentences that develop the topic sentence. |
illustration | an expression involving one or more examples that is intended to show what something means or how it is done |
arguments from example | illustrations that can be taken as arguments |
explanation | an expression that purports to shed light on some event or phenomenon |
explanandum | the statement that describes the event or phenomenon |
explans | the statement or group of statements that purports to do the explaining |
conditional statements | "if... then..." statement |
antecedent | the component immediately following "if..." in a conditional statement |
consequent | the component immediately following "then..." in a conditional statement |
sufficient condition | When the occurrence of A is all that is needed for the occurrence of B. |
necessary condition | Whenever A cannot occur without the occurence of B. |
deductive argument | an argument incorporating the claim that it is impossible for the conclusion to be false given that the premises are true. |
Inductive argument | an argument incorporating the claim that it is improbable that the conclusion be false given that the premises are true |
argument based on mathematics | an argument in which the conclusion depends on some purely arithmetic or geometric computation or measurement |
argument from definition | an argument in which the conclusion is claimed to depend merely on the definition of some word or phrase used in the premise or conclusion |
categorical syllogism | a syllogism in which each statement begins with "all" "no" or "some." |
hypothetical syllogism | a syllogism having a conditional "if... then..." statement for one or both of its premises |
disjunctive syllogism | having an "either... or..." statement. |
prediction | an argument that proceeds from our knowledge of the past to a claim about the future |
argument from analogy | an argument that depends on the existence of an analogy, or, similarity, between two things or state of affairs |
generalization | an argument that proceeds from the knowledge of a selected sample to some claim about the whole group. |
argument from authority | an argument that concludes something is true because a presumed expert or witness has said that it is. |
argument based on signs | an argument that proceeds from the knowledge of a sign to a claim about the thing or situation that the sign symbolizes. |
casual inference | an argument that proceeds from knowledge of a cause to a claim about an effect, or, conversely, from knowledge of an effect to claim about a cause. |
particular statement | one that makes a claim about one more particular members of a class |
general statement | makes a claim about all the members of a class |
valid deductive argument | an argument in which it is impossible for the conclusion to be false given that the premises are true |
invalid deductive argument | a deductive argument in which it IS possible for the conclusion to be false given that the premises are true |
sound argument | a deductive argument that is valid and has all true premises |
unsound argument | a deductive argument that is invalid, has one or more false premises, or both. |
strong inductive argument | an inductive argument in which the conclusion does not follow probably from the premises |
cogent argument | an inductive argument that is strong and has all true premises |
uncogent argument | an inductive argument that is weak, has one more more false premises, fails to meet the total evidence requirement, or any combination of these. |
argument form | the arrangement and inclusion of premises and conclusion within the argument |
counterexample method | a substitution instance having true premises and false conclusion |
cognitive meaning | terminology that conveys information |
emotive meaning | terminology the expresses or evokes feeling |
value claim | a claim that something is good, bad, right, wrong, worse, or better |
vague expression | an expression that allows for borderline cases in which it is impossible to tell if the expression applies or does not apply. |
ambiguous expression | an expression that can be interpreted as having more than one clearly distinct meaning in a given context |
intensional meaning | consists of the qualities or attributes that a term connotates |
term | any word or arrangement of words that may serve as the subject of a statement |
extensional meaning | consists of the members of a class that the term denotes |
connotation | the intentional meaning of a word |
donatation | extensional meaning of a word |
conventional connotation | the attributes that the term commonly calls forth in the mind of competent speakers of the language |
empty extension | denotes the empty class that has no members |
increasing intention | when each term except the first connotes more attributes than the one preceding it |
decreasing intention | when each term except the first connotes less attributes than the one preceding it |
increasing extension | when each term in the series except the firstr denotes a class having more members that the class denotes by the term preceding it. |
decreasing extension | when each term in the series except the first denotes a class having less members that the class denotes by the term preceding it. |
definition | a group of words that assigns a meaning to some word or group of words |
definiendum | the word or group of words that is supposed to be defined |
definiens | the word or group of word that does the defining |
stipulative definition | assigns a meaning to a word for the first time |
lexical definition | used to report the meaning that a word has in a language |
precising definition | used to reduce vagueness of a word |
theoretical definition | assigns a meaning to a word by suggesting a theory that gives a certain characterization to the entities that the term denotes |
persuasive definition | engenders a favorable or unfavorable attitude toward what is denotes by the definiendum |
extensional definition | assigns a meaning to a term indicating the members of the class that the definiendum denotes |
demonstrative definitions | the most primitive form of definition |
enumerative definitions | assign a meaning to a term by naming the members of the class the term denotes |
definition by subclass | assigns a meaning to a term by naming subclasses of the class denoted by the term |
intentional definition | one that assigns a meaning to a word by indicating the qualities or attributes that the word connotates |
synonymous definition | in which the definiens is a single word that connotes the same attributes as the definiendum |
etymological definition | assigns a meaning to a word by disclosing the word's ancestry in both its own language and other languages |
operational definition | assigns a meaning to a word by specifying cerain experimental procedure that determine whether or not the word applies to a certain thing |
definition by genus and difference | assigns a meaning to a term by identifying a genus term and one or more difference words that, when combined, convey the meaning of the term being defined |