Clarification

3). Pick one concept from throughout the semester that you feel can use further discussion.

I feel that the concept of casual reasoning should be further explained in our class discussion because this is one of the only concepts that I had to really do a lot of additional research on.  The website we were provided that was supposed to help us understand the concept had left me very confused at first, and so I went to other websites to fix this confusion. However, in the process I somehow got confused with some of the other websites as well, and this is evident in the blog I first posted on casual reasoning, as I accidently confused causal perceptions with casual reasoning. In other words, when I explained it to the class I gave a wrong example, as casual perceptions occurs when we make sense of why something occurs and casual reasoning means that everything has a cause and effect. When we know what the effects of certain causes are, we can either make things happen or prevent them from happening in our world from our reason. These are two very different things, and it wasn’t until reading other blogs did I realize that I made this error, and so I believe that this is a concept that should be better clarified.

Likes and Dislikes

2). What was your favorite thing about the class?  What was your least favorite thing about the class?  How can this class be improved?  Again, be specific.

My favorite thing about this class was never having to wake up early to physically go to the class, and that I could basically complete the assignments and tests on my own time. However, I did not like that there was a twelve hour gap between blog submissions because normally I wouldn’t be able to complete the assignments until the weekend, as other class filled up my time during the week. I would then end up finding myself waking up early, or submitting the assignments at random times on Fridays and Saturdays and feeling rushed, which is why I think that we shouldn’t have this 12 hour gap.  I also didn’t like that the days started on Sundays because I don’t want to start my workweek until Monday like my other classes. However, I do feel that if you keep the 12 hour gap, then you should start the workweek on Monday, so that we have all weekend to complete our assignments such as on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, without feeling rushed. I also didn’t like that once we’ve taken the test, we don’t get it back, so I don’t know what I’ve gotten wrong and what I need to improve on for the next test. Maybe by giving us the tests in an email with the answers, we may begin to learn where were making our mistakes and errors.

What I've Learned

1). What have you learned in this class over the course of the semester?  Be specific.

When I first signed up for critical thinking, I was really nervous because I had no idea what a class about critical thinking would be about. When I first thought of critical thinking, what came to mind were questions from math textbooks that said, “thinking critically,” which are always the questions I can never get right. However, I was happy to discover that this critical thinking class would be about analyzing arguments and statements in ways I had never thought of before. This may sound silly, but before taking this class I didn’t even know what a premise was, and now I find myself using the word all the time when I’m evaluating claims (there’s a premise and a conclusion). I also now know how to identify when an argument is weak, or valid or invalid, which is also something I didn’t fully know how to do before taking this class. This class also taught me how to tell when arguments needed repairing and what makes for a good argument such as that the premises are plausible, the premises are more plausible than the conclusion, and the argument is valid or strong.  I also learned what type of strategies to look out for in the real world that people tend to use to convince you of their argument, such as all the appeals to emotions.  Finally, this class has taught me how to work in small groups effectively by the small group communication book. Loved my group!!

Thanks for Reading! 

Tracing the Cause Backwards

3). Pick one concept from the assigned reading (chapter 15), that we have not already discussed, that you found useful or interesting and discuss it.

In the Epstein book, I found tracing the cause backwards to be the most interesting concept because it helped me understand that a line has to be drawn in tracing the cause.

Example: The soccer ball hit my nose, and now it is bleeding. The cause is the soccer ball hitting my nose and the effect is that my nose is bleeding.

We could come up with more causes such as that the girl on the other team headed the soccer ball at my face and now it is bleeding. So really it was the girl who headed the ball at my face that caused my nose to bleed. Or we could say that it was the girl who kicked the ball to the girl who headed the ball, which caused it to hit my nose and make it bleeds’, fault.  

We could go on and on with the possibilities, so having the just one cause makes the process of identifying the cause so much easier. “We stop because as we trace the cause back further it becomes too hard to fill in the normal conditions” (Epstein).

Mission Critical Website

2). What was useful about the Mission Critical website?

The mission Critical Website was helpful because it listed many of the concepts that we have previously learned in the Epstein book, and provided me with more definitions and examples to understand those concepts.  Sometimes just reading the Epstein book isn’t enough to learn the concepts, and so this site is helpful in that it gives other ways of phrasing those definitions to make them easier to understand.  This site was also helpful for me in learning the different concepts, particularly causal arguments because they give us exercises to do. These exercises are extremely helpful because unlike the book, when you select the wrong answers, it will tell you why. Being able to know why your answer is incorrect helps you to not make that same mistake in the future. This to me is the best feature of this website, and I will definitely use it when I’m studying for the tests in this class to make sure I understand the concepts to the best of my ability. 

Cause and Effect

1). What was useful about the Cause and Effect website reading and exercises?

I found that the Cause and Effect website reading and exercises were very helpful in understanding the material in Chapter 15.  When I first read Chapter 15, I was kind of overwhelmed by all the examples and sections that we had to read, but once I read the site and did some of the exercises on the website, I had a lot of “ohhh” moments, when I started understanding the material better, and it really helped clear up some of the questions I had. I especially liked the link on post hoc reasoning! In the book it says that there are two mistakes in evaluating cause and effect: reversing cause and effect and looking too hard for a cause. Post hoc reasoning falls under looking too hard for a cause, and the definition was, after this, therefore because of this. I found the kind of confusing but once I read the website, I understood it so much better! Post hoc reasoning means that just because A precedes B, that doesn’t mean that A caused B. In other words, we have to look at all the possibilities before we can identify if A really cause B. Lastly, the website and exercises really helped me understand that in casual arguments, there is only one significant difference or significant commodity. What this means is that there is only one cause to the effect. We could go back and find other causes and differences, but that would be too difficult. So we try to find in the casual argument, if there is a strong likelihood of the causation, by identifying one significant commodity or difference. :)

Analogies in the Law

3). Pick one concept or idea from the assigned reading, that we have not already discussed, that you found useful or interesting, and discuss it.

For my topic of choice, I chose to select Analogies in the law.  When I first started reading this section I was nervous that I wasn’t going to understand it or want to understand it because anything involving laws and government isn’t something that necessarily interests me.  However, I felt with that reason in mind, I should really try to make myself pay attention. By doing so, I was able to discover that Analogies in the law are analyzed arguments “with important similarities pointed out and a general principle stated” (Epstein).  What this means is that in the courtroom, judges will use analogies to solve a case.  They take existing laws, and will find their similarities and differences in order to call for justice in the courtroom. Sometimes by doing so, they will be able to make new laws or overthrow old ones.

For example:

Sometimes there are courtroom cases that by law should be enacted. Let’s say that dancing in the streets has been against the law after 11 pm for ten years now because dancing leads to unwanted pregnancies for teenagers. A girl has been brought to the judge because she was caught dancing after eleven.  The judge has seen that in the past only one or two teenage girls have gotten pregnant in that town, but he doesn’t believe it was ever a result from dancing after hours. He then tries to look at past cases and “tweak” the general principles in that law, by drawing on the similarities and differences to make new ones, “but doesn’t include the one’s he is deciding” (Epstein).  By doing so, he can make new general principles in the law, or in this case, overthrow an old one.