ARGUMENTS

*Determine which of the following passages contain arguments. For any that do, identify the argument’s
conclusion. Remember that an argument occurs when one or more claims (the premises) are offered as a
reason for believing that another claim (the conclusion) is true. There aren’t many hard-and-fast rules for
identifying arguments, so you’ll have to read closely and think carefully about some of these.

1. The Directory of Intentional Communities lists more than two hundred groups across the country
organized around a variety of purposes, including environmentally aware living.
2. Carl would like to help out, but he won’t be in town. We’ll have to find someone else who owns a
truck.
3. Carl would like to help out, but he won’t be in town. We’ll have to find someone else who owns a
truck.
4. In 1976, Washington, D.C., passed an ordinance prohibiting private ownership of firearms. Since
then, Washington’s murder rate has shot up 121 percent. Bans on firearms are clearly
counterproductive.
5. Computers will never be able to converse intelligently through speech. A simple example proves
this. The sentences “How do you recognize speech?” and “How do you wreck a nice beach?” have
different meanings, but they sound similar enough that a computer could not distinguish between
the two.
6. Recent surveys for the National Science Foundation report that two of three adult Americans believe
that alien spaceships account for UFO reports. It therefore seems likely that several million Americans
may have been predisposed to accept the report on NBC’s Unsolved Mysteries that the U.S. military
recovered a UFO with alien markings.
7. “Like short-term memory, long-term memory retains information that is encoded in terms of sense
modality and in terms of links with information that was learned earlier (that is, meaning ).” — Neil
R. Carlson
8. Fears that chemicals in teething rings and soft plastic toys may cause cancer may be justified. Last
week, the Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a report confirming that low amounts of
DEHP, known to cause liver cancer in lab animals, may be absorbed from certain infant products.
9. “It may be true that people, not guns, kill people. But people with guns kill more people than people
without guns. As long as the number of lethal weapons in the hands of the American people
continues to grow, so will the murder rate.” Susan Mish’alani.
10. June 1970: A Miami man gets thirty days in the stockade for wearing a flag patch on the seat of his
trousers. March 2008: Miami department stores sell boxer trunks made up to look like an American
flag. Times have changed. 10. Levi’s Dockers are still in style, but pleats are out. 11. There is
trouble in the Middle East, there is a recession under way at home, and all the economic indicators
have turned downward. It seems likely, then, that the only way the stock market can go is down.
11. Lucy is too short to reach the bottom of the sign.
12. “Can it be established that genetic humanity is sufficient for moral humanity? I think that there are
very good reasons for not defining the moral community in this way.” Mary Anne Warren
13. Pornography often depicts women as servants or slaves or as otherwise inferior to men. In light of
that, it seems reasonable to expect to find more women than men who are upset by pornography.
14. “My folks, who were Russian immigrants, loved the chance to vote. That’s probably why I decided
that I was going to vote whenever I got the chance. I’m not sure [whom I’ll vote for], but I am going
to vote. And I don’t understand people who don’t.” Mike Wallace
VALIDITY & SOUNDNESS. Decide if the arguments are valid/invalid and sound or unsound. Justify your choice.

V/I S/U
1. Michael Jackson was assassinated or was killed in an
accident.
Michael Jackson was not killed in an accident.
Therefore, Michael Jackson was assassinated.
2. Princess Diana was assassinated or was killed in an accident.
Princess Diana was not assassinated.
Therefore, Princess Diana was killed in an accident.
3. Princess Diana was assassinated or was killed in an accident.
Princess Diana was killed in an accident.
Therefore, Princess Diana was assassinated.
4. Michael Jackson was not shot by a lunatic.
Princess Diana was not shot by a lunatic.
Therefore, John Lennon was shot by a lunatic.

BASIC ARGUMENT ANALYSIS

*In this exercise, you will be given a short argument to read, followed by one or more statements in
bold. Your task is to identify what role the statement in bold plays in the argument.
After each statement, indicate:
Premise; if it is a premise of the argument;
Conclusion; if it is the conclusion of the argument;
Intermediate; if it is an intermediate conclusion; or
Assumed; if it is an assumed premise.

a- (1) It isn't good for children to watch too much television, because (2) watching TV can breed
passivity.
1) Watching TV can breed passivity
b- (1) Maxwell is probably going to become an investment banker. (2) He spends most of his free
time reading balance sheets.
1) Maxwell spends most of his free time reading balance sheets.
c- (1) Written work in college is an essential part of the learning process. (2) Students who cheat
are thus, to a certain degree, depriving themselves of an education.
1) Written work in college is an essential part of the learning process
d- 1) Since I am going to play in the national checkers tournament next weekend, (2) I'll be out of
town. And since I'll be out of town, (3) I can't come to your party.
1) I'll be out of town next weekend
e- (1) The U.S. should not devote more money to space exploration. (2) The benefits we derive from
it are minuscule, and (3) the money could be better spent solving problems on earth.
1) The benefits from space exploration are minuscule
2) The U.S. should not devote more money to space exploration.
Identify the role statement 2) plays in the argument.
 Reconstruct the following arguments in the form of an argument map

1. I have done a great deal of work; as much as a man, but did not get so much pay. I used to work in
the field and bind grain, keeping up with the cradler; but men doing no more, got twice as much pay;
so with the German women. They work in the field and do as much work, but do not got the pay. We
do as much, we eat as much, we want as much. I suppose I am about the only colored woman that
goes about to speak for the rights of the colored women. I want to keep the thing stirring, now that
the ice is cracked. What we want is a little money. You men know that you get as much again as
women when you write, or for what you do. When we get our rights we shall not have to come to
you for money, for then we shall have money enough in our own pockets; and may be you will ask us
for money.
2. I may here express a general remark, which the history of slavery seems to justify, that it is not
founded solely on the avarice of the planter. We sometimes say, the planter does not want slaves,
he only wants the immunities and the luxuries which the slaves yield him; give him money, give him
a machine that will yield him as much money as the slaves, and he will thankfully let them go. He has
no love of slavery, he wants luxury, and he will pay even this price of crime and danger for it. But I
think experience does not warrant this favorable distinction, but shows the existence, beside the
covetousness, of a bitterer element, the love of power, the voluptuousness of holding a human being
in his absolute control. We sometimes observe that spoiled children contract a habit of annoying
quite wantonly those who have charge of them, and seem to measure their own sense of well-being,
not by what they do, but by the degree of reaction they can cause. It is vain to get rid of them by not
minding them: if purring and humming is not noticed, they squeal and screech; then if you chide and
console them, they find the experiment succeeds, and they begin again. The child will sit in your arms
contented, provided you do nothing. If you take a book and read, he commences hostile operations.
The planter is the spoiled child of his unnatural habits, and has contracted in his indolent and
luxurious climate the need of excitement by irritating and tormenting his slave.
 Read the chapters on Assumptions and on Flaws and fallacies. Then create a chart with key concepts
from each chapter where you include clear definitions and examples.