How to Reason and Argue (Reconstruct an Argument)

Standards for evaluating an argument

• Vices
• Virtues

Vices in an argument

• One or more premises is/are FALSE
• Premises do not provide a good Reason for the Conclusion
• Relation between premises and conclusion

Virtues in an argument

• Validity
• Use the clause IF .... ONLY IF ...

          IF the clause is valid and ONLY IF the conclusion is valid

          EVERY argument with true premises and  a false conclusion is invalid.

• Soundness

         A sound argument, all the premises are true and the conclusion is true.

         If a deductive argument is not sound, then it is not a good argument

Deductive Arguments

• The conclusion should follow from the premises
• Validity
• A deductive argument is supposed is valid
• An inductive argument is supposed not to be valid 

Argument Reconstruction 

1. Stage 1: Close Analysis
• Do a close analysis
2. Stage 2: Get down to the basics
• Remove all excess verbiage
• List all explicit premises and conclusions in standard form.
3. Stage 3: Sharpen edges
• Clarify where needed
• Break up where possible without distortion
4. Stage 4: Organize parts
• Divide the arguments into sub-arguments and arrange them in order
5. Stage 5: Fill in gaps
• Assess whether each argument is valid
• Add suppressed premises where needed
• Check each premise for truth
• Qualify premises to make them true where needed if possible
6. Stage 6: Assess the argument
• Conclude

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Organize Parts

1. Identify and number and premises and conclusion.
2. When premises work together, put a plus sign between them and draw a line under them
3. Draw arrows from reasons to claims that they are reasons for.
4. Rearrange as necessary

How to Reason and Argue (Arguments)

Problem of the Skeptical Regress

Solutions to the problem

• Start with a premise that is unjustified
• Use an argument with a circular structure
• Use an infinite chain of arguments

Trick for dealing with the problem

• Assure the audience
• Discount objections
• Guard your claim

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Argumentative Moves

• Assuring 
• Guarding
• Discounting 

Assuring

• If a reason is not actually given, then that reason cannot be questioned
• Benefits
• Save time
• Help you avoid the skeptical regress

Types

• Authoritative 
• It cites an authority that the audience shares as an authority
• Reflexive
• Talk about yourself 
• Ex: I believe that ....
• I assure that ...
• I feel sure ...
• I held this opinion for years ...
• I've thought about it year after year
• Abusive
• Basically abuse you and call it nonsense
• Ex: Nobody but a fool would think that ...
• Everybody know this.
• It's just common sense.

Tricks

• Citation of untrustworthy authorities
• That's obvious
• It's certain
• I'm sure
• Distractions
• Dropping assurances
• Repeat a lie thousand of times until be true

Guarding

Involves making your premises weaker so that it is harder to object to them.

When you weaken a premise beyond what would otherwise be expected in the context.p

Responses

• Why did you put in the guard?
• Have you weakened the premises so much that the conclusion no longer follows?

Types

• Extent
• 
  
• Generalize a problem.
• Example:
• We need a new alcohol officer because ALL students drink too much
• Probability
• Example
• It is absolutely certain that ...
• Mental
• Example
• I believe that the President is 50 years old.
• I tend to believe that the President is 50 years old.

Discounting

1. They assert two claims
2. They contrast the two claims
3. They emphasize one of the claims

Key Words

• But
• Although
• Even if
• Even though
• Whereas
• Nevertheless
• Nonetheless
• Still

Trick of discounting Straw People

Consist in make them not see the problems with your position.

• One case would be say: 
• "I have 5 objections to respond." 
• "You might say this .... but .... "
• "You might say that .... but .... "
• "How ever you would say that"
• "You might still say that"
• "Although ..."

Another Trick

• Misuses of guarding and assuring

Another Trick named "Evaluation"

Levels of Evaluation

• General

This evaluations imply that achieve a standard that is unknown

• Good / Bad - Ex. Your vote is good for me
• Ought to - Ex. You ought to use this product
• Should / shouldn´t
• Right / Wrong

• Specifics
• Beautiful / Ugly
• Cruel / Kind
• Brave / Cowardly

Happiness

Conceptual Domain

1. Well-being "Overall my life is going well"
2. Traits "I am an enthusiastic person"
3. Emotions "I feel reverence and gratitude"
4. Sensation "This sun feels good on my skin"

Happiness does not mean

• Having all your personal needs met
• Always feeling satisfied with life
• Feeling pleasure all the time
• Never feeling negative emotions
• There´s a uniform prescription for happiness - one size does not fit all

4 Ways happiness can hurt you

• Too much happiness can makes you less creative and less safe
• Happiness is not suited to every situation
• Not all types of Happiness are good for you
• Pursuing happiness may actually makes you unhappy

Differences between happy life and a Meaningful one

• Happy people satisfied their wants and needs, but that seems largely irrelevant to a meaningful life
• Happiness involves being focus on the present, whereas meaningful involves thinking more about the past, present and future -  and the relationship between them
• Meaningfulness is derived from giving to other people; happiness comes from what they give to you
• Meaningfulness lives involves stress and challenges
• Self-expression is important to meaning but not happiness

Philosophy

• Seeking happiness without meaning would probably be a stressful, aggravating, and annoying proposition

Basic Factors in Hapiness

• Exercise -  Establish a goal
• Sleep - Sleep well
• Achievement

How to Reason and Argue (Basics)

Argment

• It is a connected series of statements  intended to establish a definite proposition.

• A series of sentences, statements or propositions
• -> where some are the premises 
• -> and one is the conclusion
• -> where the premises are intended to give a reason for the conclusion

Purpose

• Persuading is making people believe or do something that they would not otherwise believe or do.
• Justifying is showing someone a reason to believe the conclusion.
• Tries to give good reasons

Uses of an argument

• Explaining is give a reason why something happened or is true
• The purpose is help people to understand something true
• Attempt to fit a particular phenomenon into a general pattern in order to increase understanding
• Types
• Casual - Why something happened
• Formal - Help to understand
• Teological - To explain the purpose of something
• Material - Explains of what something is made of

Explanation as an argument

1. General principle or law
2. Initial condition
3. Phenomenon to be explained

Notes

• You can get an explanation without prediction
• Viceversa you can get a prediction without an explanation
• Example: Bode's Law explains th distances between planets without explain why the planets take that distance among them

Meaning

There are three levels

• Linguistic
• Meaningful utterance

Examples:  The old man the ship

This phrase is meaningful.

If you read “the old man” as a noun phrase, then you will look for a verb and not find one. That makes this garden path sentence seem meaningless. However, “the old” can be a noun by itself referring to old people, and “man” can be a verb referring to managing the ship, and then the sentence means “The old people manage the ship.”

• Speech
• Advising in which you not persuade
• Conversational
• Persuade a person
• Inform a person

Conversational Act is the bringing about of the intended effect, which is the standard effect for the kind of speech act that the speaker is performing.

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Conversational Maxims (Paul Grice)

• Quantity
• Don't say too much or too little
• Quality
• Don't say what you don't believe or what you have no reason to believe.
• Relevance
• Be relevant
• Manner
• Be brief
• Be orderly
• Avoid obscurity
• Avoid ambiguity

Argument Markers

There are two types:

1. Conclusion marker
• After the reason introduce the conclusion
2. Reason marker
• After the conclusion introduce the reason

The following words are Argument markers:

• so
• therefore
• thus
• accordingly
• hence

You can replace each argument marker in the following sentences without affect the meaning

I am tall, so I am good at sports

I am tall. Therefore, I am good at sports

The following words are Reason markers:

• because
• for 
• as
• so
• since
• due to
• for the reason that
• and the reason why
• ....

Finance ( Exercises III)

1. Calculate the PV for month 3th and 4th
• =PV(.05/12,4,0,300)
• =PV(.05/12,12,0,300)
2. Add the PVs
3. Substrat 500 minus point 2) = $80.45

Other solution is

1. Use NPV formula =NPV(.05/12,0,0,0,300,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,300)
2. Substrat 500 minus point 1)

Y0 = 10,000
Y1 = 1,300
....
Y7 = 5,000

1. Use the IRR formula =IRR(A1:A7)
2. IRR = 9.12%

Answer is 5

Payback Period = Initial Investment / Cash Inflow per Period

1. Calculate the initial investment = 12,000 - 7,500 = $4,500
2. Calculate the PV of each year
• =PV(0.06,4,1200)
3. Add 1) + 2) = 341.87
4. Calculate the PV of 5th year for $1,200 
• =PV(0.06,4,0,1200) = 896.71
5. Divide 1) between 4)
• 342 / 897 = 3.8 % of 12 months
6. Multiply per 12 months to get the annual average
• 3.8% * 12 = 4.6

E26 = 2,800
B26 = 10% interest rate

1. Calculate the monthly gain = 10K - 7,200
2. Calculate the NPV = NPV(E26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26,B26)
• Other way is calculate the =PV(E26,20,B26)
3. Subtract the step 2) minus the equipment = $13,837.98 

A33 =  $240,000.00

A40 =  $4,5000

H35= step 2)

A39 = 0.055 new rate
H33 = ($1,556.64) monthly payment

1. Calculate the payment =PAYMENT(0.0675/12,30*12, 240000)
2. How much do I owe for next 25 years  =FV(0.0675/12, 5*12,H33,A33)
• H33 = ($1,556.64) This become for step 1)
• This part was difficult for me but as I understand, the formula works as first estimate how mush are the first 5 years of payments and then subtract the initial payment of $240,000.00 after 5 years
3. Add how much you owe plus the pay closing cost =-H35+A40
4. Calculate how much you will pay with the new rate (5.5%) =PV(A39/12, 25*12,H33)
• To be honest I don't know why i use the same amount of payment of step 1). My guess is that you use the same payment because that amount is going to cover the initial credit of 240K, and you are re-financing the gain for the bank (interest rate)
5. Subtract point 3) minus point 4) and this is the answer $23,685.86 

A50 = 25,000 per year
A51 = 10% rate

1. Use the NPV formula 
• =NPV(A51,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50,A50)
2. Subtract point 1) minus costs of 50,000 (lot) - 60,000 parking lot minus = 

   $43,614.18

1. Use the formula of PV for Annuity growing at rate g, using this values:  3% growth rate, n = 20 years, r = 7.5%

• Multiply by $200,000
• Substract $1,000,000 minus the PV annuity =  $1,554,745.19 

Answer = 127,072

1. Use the formula of PV for Annuity, using this values:  n = 20 years, r = 10%
2. Multiply by $72,000
3. Subtract from point 2) the building and renovation = 42,976.59
4. NPV = 42,976.59
   

A135 = 0.09/12
A134 = 15 years because has passed 6 years
A133 = $8,000

1. Calculate the PV =>    =PV(A135,A134*12,A133)