Instructor Wrap Up - Epstein Chapter 3

Hello Folks,

As you know, on occasion I post to my blog about the content of what we are covering for the week.  This week we are reading Chapter 3 in the Epstein text, and Chapter 3 in the Small Group Communication text.  I will discuss a bit about the Epstein text in this post.  I will leave you to read Chapter 3 in the Small Group Communication text, as that is a brief chapter.

Chapter 3 covers: Good Reason to Believe (Plausible claims and Begging the question), The Conclusion Follows From the Premises (Valid Argument, Strong and Weak Arguments), The Tests for an Argument to Be Good, and Strong vs. Valid Arguments.

Good Reason to Believe:
*A good argument is one in which the premises give good reason to believe the conclusion is true.  In other words, you need to have a good reason to believe that the premises are true, and in turn believe the conclusion to be true.

*Plausible claims: A claim is plausible if we have good reason to believe it is true.  It is less plausible the less reason we have to believe it is true.  It is implausible or dubious if we have no reason to believe it is true.

*Begging the Question: An argument begs the question if one of its premises is no more plausible than the conclusion.  You can read a bit more about the fallacy Begging the Question HERE.

The Conclusion Follows From the Premises
The book gives this description:
"Even if an argument has plausible premises, that's not enough.  Consider:

Dr. E teaches critical thinking.
So Dr. E is bald

There's no connection: The conclusion does not follow from the premises.  The premises do not lead to, support, establish the conclusion."

*Valid Argument: An argument is valid if there is no possible way for its premises to be true and its conclusion to be false (at the same time).

*Strong and weak arguments: An argument is strong if there is some way, some possibility, for its premises to be true and its conclusion false (at the same time), but every such possibility is extremely unlikely.  An argument is weak if it is possible and not unlikely for its premises to be true and its conclusion false (at the same time).

*The conclusion follows from the premises: "The conclusion follows from the premises" means that the argument is valid or strong.

The Tests for an Argument to Be Good
1). The premises are plausible.
2). The premises are more plausible than the conclusion.
3). The argument is valid or strong.

See the examples of pages 42 - 46.

Strong vs. Valid Arguments
*A strong argument with true premises is sometimes better than a valid one with the same conclusion.
Read more about this on page 48.  The author gives some good examples.