GCETE: Graduate Certificate in Education (Tertiary Education): Refreshing your critical analysis skills

What is critical thinking?

Argumentation

Critical thinking in the academic context is all about the analysis and presentation of arguments; that is, the process of argumentation. But importantly it involves analysis/presentation of arguments that is carried out in an academically acceptable way.

What does this mean?

Arguing in an academically acceptable way is to be engaged in an intellectually beneficial dispute with others over the truth/falsity or relevance/application of some claim to scholarly knowledge—with the ultimate aim of arriving at a more accurate version about a matter of mutual interest.

Engaging in the analysis and presentation of academic argument is not meant to be a hostile or insensitive business. It is meant to be :

• a friendly/supportive process;
• stimulating for all parties to the dispute;
• useful for everyone regardless of educational level (even Professors do it!);
• helpful to your own research and the independent research of others;
• impersonal (it is the idea that is being debated, not the person that thought of it!)
• ongoing/endless (once you stop doing it, you become dogmatic!)

Novel arguments--and criticisms of long-held arguments--is welcomed and encouraged in scholarly settings. The challenge is to present your arguments, and offer your criticisms, using principals of good reasoning, and you need to know all the scholarly literature on a topic.

Academic Arguments: Part 1

Statements, Propositions, Evidence and Truth

The crucial step in answering this question is to be clear about the difference between statements and arguments.

We make a statement when we state something, or when say something is so, or not so. For example, we might state (assert or claim): The door is open. This might be true or false. A statement can be true or false, correct or incorrect. A statement is usually made by uttering a declarative sentence (i.e., a sentence which asserts a purported truth or fact). Declarative sentences are different from questions, commands, or exclamations. Compare:

• The door is open. (Statement/Assertion/Claim: can be true or false)

• Is the door open? (Question: neither true nor false)

• Open the door! (Command: neither true nor false)

• Open Sesame! (Exclamation: neither true nor false)

Statements are sometimes called assertions, claims or propositions.  Only propositions can be either asserted or denied: questions may be asked and commands given and exclamations uttered, but none of them can be affirmed or denied, or judged to be either true or false. We can't ask the meta-question: 'Is the question: Is the door open? true or false'? The question is absurd. We can, however, note the truth or falsity of the statement: The door is open (i.e., we can check the door and see). 

Propositions that are asserted at university in your tertiary studies depends on evidence and this can be obtained in a variety of ways (statistical, observational, experimental, and so on (depending on the discipline). For example, the proposition: Acid turns litmus paper blue can be assessed as being true by means of scientific experiment.

Statements, or propositions have a truth content usually established by means of evidence.

Academic Arguments: Part 2

Connected Premise

While academic arguments involve only the use of statements/propositions, an argument is different from statements/propositions. A statement such as The door is open is a singular claim. It states one fact (which may be true or false).

Arguments, by contrast, are concerned with the relationship between any number of singular claims and the connections between them. Arguments draw conclusions based on claims. Arguments also establish new claims by inference from stated claims. When in an argument, and not by themselves as singular statements, these claims are known as premises.

An argument is a series of connected premises.  These connected statements, moreover, are put together to establish another statement, namely a conclusion or contention. Put another way: In an argument, we present a conclusion being based on a number of statements that are premises or assumptions forming part of the argument. 

Arguments are composed of premises that purport to demonstrate a contention or conclusion.

The Monty Python team, in the famous Argument Sketch, defined argument (quite rightly) as: A connected series of statements intended to establish some proposition.

Monty Python. (2008, Nov). Argument Clinic - Monty Python's The Flying Circus. [video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/xpAvcGcEc0k

Returning to the 'door' example, while The door is shut is a singular statement, the following is an argument using The door is shut as one premise (statement) in an argument:

•     If the door is shut there will be no draft. The door is shut. Therefore there will be no draft.

We can plot the argument clearly using "P" to stand for the word "premise" and "C" to stand for the word "conclusion" as follows:

    P1: If the door is shut there will be no draft.

    P2: The door is shut.

    C: There will be no draft.

We call premises and conclusions joined together like this a syllogism.

In common language we would not say such a thing. We would not put it so formally. We are more likely to say: Don't worry, the door's shut so it won't be drafty. Or: It's not drafty because the door is shut. But concealed behind these apparent singular claims is an argument. It is being tacitly assumed that If the door is shut it won't be drafty. We shall return to tacit statements/premises (known as enthymematic arguments) later.

Arguments can be depicted in an argument "map".

Academic Arguments: Part 3

Premise, Conclusions and Inferences

In an argument we draw a conclusion (or infer a conclusion) or a contention from statements or premises.  When we present the conclusion of an argument, we don't just state it, we also give reasons for stating it. There are thus three components of an argument:

1. the premises (or reasons);
2. the conclusion;
3. the inference from the premises to the conclusion (that is, the logical connection between the premises and   conclusion).

Importantly, both premises and conclusions are statements or propositions with a truth content. They are not questions, exclamations, or commands.

Definitions

• Premises can be defined as statements which are used to infer a certain conclusion. Statements you argue from to a conclusion.
• Conclusions can be defined as statements which are inferred from certain premises. Statements you argue to from premises.

Here’s an simple example of an academic argument:

•  If metals expands when heated, and iron is metal, then iron will expand when heated.

It is easy to see what is being concluded or contended here. The conclusion is: Iron will expand when heated. The assumptions that lead to this conclusion are as follows: (1) All metals expand when heated  and (2) Iron is a metal.

The inference being made is from the premises to the conclusion.  You can write this argument out like this to show the progress of the argument from premises to conclusion:

•  P1: All metals expand when heated (major premise)
•  P2: Iron is a metal (minor premise)
•  C: Iron will expand when heated (contention/conclusion)

'P1' and 'P2' stand for ‘premise’ 1 and 2—a premise is a statement/assumption in an argument which helps in arriving at a conclusion (they are called the ‘major’ and ‘minor’ premise in this example).  ‘C’ stands for ‘conclusion' or 'contention'. Together they form a syllogism.

This argument can be expressed as an argument map to clearly show the connections between the premise statements and the conclusion or contention.

Academic Arguments: Part 4

Conclusion and Premise Indicator Words

The first thing to recognise when trying to establish if a passage is an argument, is to look for the presence of conclusion indicator words or phrases. Here are a few rules that can be used to identify arguments:

Rule 1: Look Out for Conclusion Indicators

Conclusions are often signposted by the use of indicator words. The following words indicate that they are likely to be followed by the conclusion of an argument:

•  let us conclude that...; we conclude that...; we can conclude that...; concluding...; thus...; therefore...; so...; consequently...; hence...; then...;

Rule 2: Look Out for Premise Indicators

Once one has determined the conclusion one needs to establish the premises. There are also words which indicate that a premise of an argument is to follow. Here are a few such examples:

•  since...; as...; for...; because...; assuming that...; supposing that...; given that...; for the reason that...; if such and such....;

There are also indicators which signal that what goes before is a premise, and that what comes after is a conclusion.

Rule 3: Look Out for Argument Sequence Indicators

Argument sequence indicators (as the name suggests) show is when an argument is being constructed in order to demonstrate or make a point. This can be done from premise to conclusion (the usual order):

Or indicators can also signal a reverse sequence: that a conclusion which comes before has as its premises some statements which come after:

Academic Arguments: Part 5

Recognising and Assessing Arguments 

It is often not easy to recognise academic arguments.  Some statements look like arguments, but they are just assertions; some statements look like assertions and are really arguments in disguise. Some writing is so jumbled and difficult to read that the arguments get  lost in the process.  Some (very bad!) academics deliberately conceal their arguments so it is hard to criticise their work  because you don't know what the argument is (if there is one)! Here's an example:

• 'The move from a structuralist account in which capital is understood to structure social relations in relatively homologous ways to a view of hegemony in which power relations are subject to repetition, convergence, and rearticulation brought the question of temporality into the thinking of structure, and marked a shift from a form of Althusserian theory that takes structural totalities as theoretical objects to one in which the insights into the contingent possibility of structure inaugurate a renewed conception of hegemony as bound up with the contingent sites and strategies of the rearticulation of power.' Judith Butler, Professor of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at the University of California.  

Now maybe Butler is arguing something here, but it is certainly not clear. (NB: This passage won the 'Bad Academic Writing Contest' of 1997.)

It is your job as a student to make your arguments very clear. Your job is not to write muddled verbiage like this.

Recall our useful definitions from the previous page:

• Premises can be defined as statements which are used to infer a certain conclusion. Statements you argue from to a conclusion.  
• Conclusions can be defined as statements which are inferred from certain premises.  Statements you argue to from premises.

What are Butler's premises? What is her conclusion or conclusions? It is certainly not easy to tell. And if you can't find them you can't assess them for truth content with evidence!

Compare this with the following simple, clear argument:

• 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes. The woman down the street is a doctor, so she probably drives a Mercedes.

How can you tell what is the conclusion? If a passage is well written the conclusion or contention will be prefaced by a conclusion indicator word like 'therefore', 'thus', 'hence', or 'so'. CIRCLE this word if you are reading it on paper and there you will find the conclusion. In this example the indicator word is "so". The conclusion is:

• [The woman] probably drives a Mercedes.

What about the premise statements? Well, these can be easily determined once the conclusion has been found. The MAJOR PREMISE is very general; more general than the dependent (MINOR) premise. In this example it is:

• 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes.

This MAJOR PREMISE is necessary to support the MINOR PREMISE. In this example it is:

• The woman is a doctor.

Putting it all together we get the argument:

• P1: 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes (major premise).
• P2: This woman is a doctor
• C: [The woman] probably drives a Mercedes (conclusion)

Armed with a clear analysis of the argument, we can assess it premise by premise for truth. Do 97% of doctors drive Mercedes? On what evidence is this based? How do we know the woman is a doctor? On what evidence is this based? And so on.

We are starting to do critical thinking!

Academic Arguments: Part 6

Co-Premises

We have just looked at the argument:

• P1: 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes (major premise).
• P2: This woman is a doctor
• C: [The woman] probably drives a Mercedes (conclusion)

This example is extremely simple. Academic language is much more complicated than this. But it is best to start with simple examples and build your skills in Critical Thinking.

Expressed as an argument map our example looks like this:

However, something is wrong here. The argument is not making two quite separate unrelated points: 1) 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes; and 2) This woman is a doctor. In fact, it is being claimed that the woman probably drives a Mercedes because she is a doctor and 97% of doctors drive a Mercedes. Both premises are necessary for the conclusion. When premises are necessary for each other they are known as  co-premises. A co-premise is not the main supporting reason for a contention but is logically necessary to ensure the validity of an argument. Co-premises are represented as follows in an argument map.

 

Notice below how the co-premises are placed under an "umbrella". This indicates that both are necessary for the conclusion. It is important to identify co-premises in arguments. Sometimes they are tacit (undisclosed or unstated). Sometimes they are flawed or debatable.  Exposing flaws in an argument is part of the job of critical thinking. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Academic Arguments: Part 7

Flawed Premises

Making tacit premises explicit was important. It is important to do this as often tacit premises can be flawed.

Take this example:

• Tobacco is made from plants so it must be good for you.

The first thing to note is that is more than a singular statement. It is inferring something. It drawing a conclusion from premises. But clearly this is a flawed argument--why is it flawed? The argument is flawed because it conceals a flawed premise. But what's the hidden premise?

First of all, try to establish the conclusion. In this example it is: Tobacco must be good for you. The premise is Tobacco is made from plants. The concealed co-premise is something like: Everything made from plants is good for you. The full argument can be expressed as follows.

Once laid out like this it is obvious that the argument contains a false premise: Everything made from plants is good for you. There are plenty of plants that are not "good for you" at all, tobacco being one of them. And, if an argument does not have true premises, it cannot have a true conclusion. BTW: An argument that has an unstated co-premise is called an enthymematic argument (sometimes called a "truncated" syllogism).

So far we have identified some key elements of critical thinking:

•     Statements and arguments
•     Premises and conclusions
•     Premise and conclusion indicator words
•     Syllogisms
•     Co-premises
•     Enthymematic arguments

Now let's look at an example and a strategy for identifying arguments.

Academic Arguments: Part 8

A Strategy for Making Sense of Arguments

Let's put all this into practice with an example:

• Since dogs fetch balls and cats don’t, you can play with dogs. I mean, who’d disagree with that? It’s obvious isn’t it? By contrast, you can’t play with cats of course. They are too stuck up. So, dogs clearly make better pets.

Here we have an example of a text that clearly contains statements leading to a conclusion (an argument), but which also has non-statements (in this case, questions) very typical of ordinary language. How do we assess this as an argument? If we can't assess the argument, we can't assess it for critical thinking. Below I propose a strategy for analysing arguments.

Step 1: Circle the conclusion connector word and write the conclusion down

In a passage of text it is a good idea to circle conclusion connector word. In this case it is the word "So". Now you can write down the contention or conclusion in the form of a contention box for an argument map.

Step 2: Omit redundancy

Notice two things: Omitted is the conclusion indicator word "So" and the word "clearly". Why is this? Well, as we are mapping an argument we don't need a conclusion connector word. We have established the contention. Adding "so" is redundant. Similarly, "clearly" is a rhetorical flourish and adds nothing to the contention. In representing an argument in an argument map we should aim for as few words as possible so we get the argument clear.

Step 3: List the possible premises

Now let's assess the argument for its premises. What are they? It's a good idea to list them and then assess them for connection with the conclusion. The possibilities are:

• Since dogs fetch balls and cats don't you can play with dogs
• I mean, who'd disagree with that?
• It's obvious isn't it?
• By contrast, you can't play with cats of course
• They [cats] are too stuck up.

Step 4: Omit non-propositions and other redundancy

Is everything here a proposition or statement with a truth content? Well, no. There are two questions (non-propositions) which are not relevant to the argument and merely act as rhetorical flourishes. They can omitted. That leaves us with:

• Since dogs fetch balls and cats don't you can play with dogs
• By contrast, you can't play with cats of course
• They [cats] are too stuck up.

Step 5: Isolate premises and combine them if appropriate (for simplicity)

One sentence begins with a premise connector "since" so that is promising. We can see too how it might support the contention that Dogs make better pets. But what about the other sentences?

The sentence drawing a contrast seems to be made against the claim You can play with dogs. The contrary point is that You can't play with cats. Getting rid of the unnecessary words,  "By contrast" and "of course", and stripping these back to one simple claim, we get:

You can play with dogs but not cats.

The sentence about cats being stuck up adds nothing extra to the premise or the argument so we can leave that out. This leaves:

• Dogs fetch balls and cats don't
• You can play with dogs but not cats

Step 6: Assign the premises in relation to the conclusion and any other premises. Where do they fit?

But how do we assign these as premises in an argument?

You can probably see that the second arrangement makes the inference (connection) between the premises and the conclusion very clear. The premise that Dogs fetch balls and cats don't is offered as reason for the premise that You can play with dogs but not cats. So this argument has two tiers of reasons: one supporting the other. Together, they support the contention Dogs make better pets.

Step 8: Assess whether the premises are true (or at least believable)

Laid out in this clear was you can now assess whether the premises are sound. It's no doubt true that dogs are more likely to fetch balls, and cats are much less likely to do so (although cats are known to play with balls of wool they don't, in general, return them!) So that premise is OK. 

What about the other one? It might fairly be said that one can play with cats too--although not in a way that involves ball fetching. Cats are good for cuddly-play. So this premise is dubious. The premise assumes there is only one kind of "play"! 

What about the enthymematic (assumed) premise? It might be argued that this is questionable. There are many other criteria for what might constitute a "better" pet (whatever that means exactly). For example, a pet that is a good security animal might be considered as more desirable.

Guess what? You are now doing critical thinking!

Academic Arguments: Part 9

Validity and Soundness

We sometimes speak of arguments as not being "valid". Strictly speaking this is nonsense. For a logician, the words "valid" and "sound" have particular meanings.

Put simply: "Validity" applies to arguments; "soundness" applies to premises. 

• An argument is said to be "valid" if the conclusion follows logically from the premises. 
• A premise is said to be "sound" if it is true (or at least believable).

Let's look at some examples.

• All pets are like their owners. Everyone owns a pet. Therefore, everyone is like a pet.

Mapped out, we get:

As absurd as this argument is, it is valid: the conclusion follows from the premises. We can see this by testing to see that there are no new terms introduced in the conclusion that were not in the premises.

 

Checking for new terms in the conclusion is sometimes known to argument mappers as the "rabbit" rule: we are ensuring that there are no rabbits jumping out of hats! (i.e., there is nothing surprising emerging from the stated premises). In this case, there isn't. The argument is valid. 

However, are the premises "sound" (true or believable)? Clearly, not. Both premises are flawed. All pets are NOT like their owners, and everyone does NOT own a pet. While the argument is valid, the premises are not sound. They are not just unbelievable, they are also empirically false (we can confirm this by doing a survey to establish that many people do not own pets). Doubt can be cast on the argument.

What about this example?

• Radioactive matter decays in a finite time and some of the matter found today is radioactive. Therefore, the matter in the universe must have been created a finite time ago.

A rabbit has jumped out of the hat! "The universe" was not mentioned in the premises but it does appear in the conclusion. This is not a valid inference from the stated premises. The premises are both true, but the argument is not valid. Doubt can be cast on the argument.

Sometimes we use the word "good" to apply to arguments. But this word is vague. There are really two questions involved when we ask: "Is this a good argument?"

• The first question concerns the basis of the reasoning, that is, it asks whether the premises are true.
• The second question is concerned with how rational or logical the inference is, that is, it is concerned with whether the conclusion follows logically from the premises, or is at least sufficiently supported by the premises.

Both questions need to be asked when doing critical thinking. We need to check for validity as well as soundness.

Having now refreshed your memory of the process of critically analysis, it is now time to use these skills to critically analyse the articles or books you have collated around your learning and teaching issue.

Extension

• Critical thinking, reading and note taking​ - Deakin University