Week 10 - 3 of 3

The one concept I think could have further discussion is Appeal to Emotions. Not only being one of my favorite, I think it may be the most important. That is, we see it and use it in everyday life, and practically everyday. I do not think there is an ad outside or on T.V. that I do not have some type of emotional reaction to. We never think about it but things that we think are stupid, or silly make us feel something as well. This concept cannot only teach us how to overcome our emotions towards thinking about them but also how to use them to our advantage. Because our emotions are so strong, we usually go with them instead of taking the time to really think about things from every perspective and really choose the best way or idea. Appeal to Emotions are usually intended (obviously) aimed for our emotions. This class and the book teach us how to set aside our emotions and think logically. If we spent more time on this, I really think it could help us later on in life.

Week 10 - 2 of 3

I am a little confused about the first question for this post. It sounds almost like the first question of the first post. What I learned throughout this semester is procrastinating is unhealthy. Not only unhealthy, but inconvenient, stressful, and nonsense. I know this is something I should have learned back in grammar school but I thought I could do everything. Then again I believe I was thinking with emotions instead of logic. Which is what I learned throughout this semester in this class. My favorite part of this class, believe it or not, was reading what people commented on my posts. I was so excited when I received an email saying that someone commented on a post of mine. The least favorite part of this class was the reading, in my opinion. In the beginning of a semester, I am always excited and on top of everything. But as time goes on in a semester, I become lazy and begin to procrastinate. And in this class I have learned how the way I think and do things, is not always the best. Especially emotionally and physically. I am happy that I took this class!

Week 10 - 1 of 3

What have I learned from this class over summer? Well overall I have learned how to think more logically rather than emotionally. When reading the chapters and writing the blogs, I began to think in the way the book shows us to. It was weird at first because I would think to myself, "Woah. I learned from class to think this way for this thing. And to choose what I say wisely and carefully for this thing." It's kind of cool really. The real life examples really helped me to understand the concepts better from the book. I think reading other people's blogs and creating my own with these real world examples was my favorite part. Being able to actually transfer what you learn from a class into your own life is one of the most important and true things we can learn in my opinion. When I say my own life, I don't mean for work or school, but my own personal life. When that happens, I think that the teacher did a very good job teaching me something. Some concepts I still don't quite understand, but I think the new website: Mission Critical, will definitely help me and hopefully others clarify any confusions. Anyway, what I took from this class was tips that I can use for the rest of my life!

Week 9 - 3 of 3

I must admit I wasn't too thrilled about this post when I saw what we had to do. So I went around and decided who I wanted to get together to help me with this assignment. I chose my sister, mother, boyfriend, and roommate. So I told them why I had brought them together and why I needed their help. I explained to them what this class was about and that they needed to go over my second major assignment with me. I handed them each a copy of my groups essay for the second major assignment. Before they began reading, I told them what the assignment was about and what my group was supposed to do. They each read over the essay a couple of times and I got different feedback from them. Most of them said that the essay itself need work on. Not all the parts flowed together and there were mechanical errors throughout the essay. From what they know about the ASPCA (that is the organization my group picked to search) they thought that we did a good job with answering all the prompt questions. my mom thought that we did an excellent job; that's because she just loves me! I told them that there was a problem with one of our group members and they then could understand why the paper seemed rushed in some parts. My roommate thought that we could have explained some of the words and phrases that were bold since she has never taken a critical thinking class before. Overall, this was a good assignment and I am happy I did it. I got great feedback that will help me.

Week 9 - 2 of 3

The Mission Critical Website is a great tool for students who are taking Critical Thinking courses. That's because this website was specifically designed to help students and teachers with Critical Thinking. It has an index of everything you need to learn about arguments, claims, premises, etc. Each category has subcategories that have definitions, examples and exercises to help further your knowledge and better understand critical thinking. When looking over the website and its different pages, I see a lot of things that we learned over this semester. I think to myself, "Hey I learned about that, or I know what that is, and even I think I should take a look at this to see if this website can help me understand this concept in more detail." I also like that the website shows that there are new parts they are working on. Though you cannot see many of them, a few or on display. The one that I really like is the "Visual Models" one. On this page, there are diagrams drawn to help students see the examples visually. I think this is a great idea because not only can students imagine it they can actually see it. Not all of us learn the same. So incorporating visual aids is a great way to help enhance the learning process for all of us.

Week 9 - 1 of 3

The Casual Arguments Website and Exercises was useful for a couple reasons. First and for most, is does a great job in explaining what a casual argument is through examples in my opinion. A casual argument carries out the implication that there is only one significant difference according to the Mission: Critical (Casual Arguments) Website. The example that they used, showed that one thing caused another thing to do something which caused another thing to do something which caused another thing to do something. Another example of a casual argument would be: The rain made the roads wet which made the tires wet which caused the tire to loose traction with the road which caused the car to hydroplane. This example shows that from one single thing something happened and from that another thing happened. The rain cause the roads to be wet. The wet roads caused the tires to be wet. The wet tires lost traction to the roads. No traction caused the car to hydroplane. Thought it may be challenging to find real world situations, I believe that this is one that happens a lot during the rainy season. The exercises confused me at first, but the work picnic was another great example of casual argument that helped me understand it better.

Week 8 - 3 of 3

Another concept I found interesting and useful from Chapter 13 was apples and oranges. This is a numerical comparison where it doesn't make sense to compare the items. I see people use such comparisons all the time. And I think to myself, "what the heck are you thinking?!" For example: Grace has the biggest crush on Josh. She has found out that his favorite color is blue. The dance is next week and she really wants to impress him. She thinks that by wearing blue all this week and next she will have a 52.67% chance of getting asked to the dance by Josh. This makes no sense to compare. Even though she might be wearing blue the entire time does not mean Josh will ask Grace to the dance (Even though I probably would have done something like that back in high school). Apples and oranges is used a lot of times to make something practically impossible sound reasonable. This is a great concept to know when arguing and when to tell whether a comparison with numbers, particularly percents, is true, valid, or just nonsense.

Week 8 - 2 of 3

Between Critical Thinking in News and Politics and Critical Thinking and Social Organizations I like the second one (CTSO) a lot better! Both of my groups were fun to work with and we got along great. Looking for the subject for both assignments was fun as well. I liked the second one better because the organization my group chose was the ASPCA. I enjoyed this project because I learned a lot about this organization and they are fighting for a just cause; saving and protecting animals. The way they use appeal to pity intrigues me and I loved digging further into the commercials and ads about that. I learned new and different things with this assignment as well. For instance, it was created all the way back in 1866. I must say I feel like this assignment was easier than the first. I think it was because I understood the concepts covered in this assignment better than the first. Overall I am happy and thankful I was able to do both assignments!

Week 8 - 1 of 3

In chapter 13, I found two times zero is still zero to be useful and interesting. This is when someone gives a numerical comparison that makes something look impressive but the base of the comparison is not stated. An example of this would be: Jill and Doug are talking about cats and dogs. Doug wants a dog but Jill wants a cat. Jill tells Doug, "cats have a 32% longer life expectancy than dogs". If this is true, Doug doesn't know it 100%. Jill does not state where she got this percentage from. She may have gotten it from Cosmo or from the discovery channel. Another example of two times zero is still zero is: Jackie protests that washing your hair every day will make it 50% stronger in just two weeks. Where did she get this percentage from? Maybe it has strengthen her hair or maybe not. Again maybe she got this information from Seventeen magazine or from a hair stylist. Either way, without some sort of source her argument is not a good one and certainly can be misleading. Examples like these show that when percentages are used for the sake of an argument, they can make matter worse if they are not used correctly or sited properly.

Week 7 - 3 of 3

For chapter 12, I found that reasoning by analogy was the most useful and interesting thing in this chapter. Reasoning by Analogy is a comparison when it is part of an argument: On one side of the comparison we draw a conclusion, so on the other side we should conclude the same. This definition is from Epstein. An example of this would be: "Jessica took the hottest guy to the school prom. Yet she is not the most popular. Lily, who is, was very jealous and wanted to do something about it. So at the prom, Lily decided to pull a prank on Jessica. When Jessica walked in Lily threw punch all over Jessica's dress. Jessica does not give in. So Jessica played it off and she came back with a pair of scissors and decided to cut holes into Lily dress." This example shows that Jessica's mentality is one of "an eye for an eye". Though she may get back at Lily this will get these two nowhere. Instead they will just become enemies, living life just to make the others a living hell. And it all started because of jealousy. That is usually why things like these happen.

Week 7 - 2 of 3

I have chosen to do objective #6. An example of appeal to spite that I have found is in an ad for a governor campaign. It is a recent ad aimed against Jerry Brown by Meg Whitman. Here are two links to youtube clips:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qXKZf30Vio

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NaRGWsbkKs

These to clips show that Meg Whitman believes that Jerry Brown will be a bad governor because of his previous mishaps. When he was governor, secretary of state, and even mayor, according to her, he failed. Not only did he fail but he also admitted to not having a plan when he was governor the first time around. Jerry Brown had put out one or two ads against Meg Whitman, so now she has done the same thing. Like Epstein states that some people believe "two wrongs make a right", which they do not in her case. Instead of helping her, Whitman's ads have been taking a wrong turn for her campaign. They make her look less credible and mature. I think that her ads are bad ways of arguing against her opponent.

Week 7 - 1 of 3

Chapter 10 discusses a type of reasoning, that is, appeals to emotion. An appeal to emotion according to Epstein, is just a premise that says, roughly, you should believe or do something because you feel a certain way. There are three different kinds of appeals to emotion: appeal to pity, appeal to fear, and appeal to spite. Appeal to pity is a method of reasoning where a person uses usually sad things to get another person to do something. For example: Jack and Jill just saw a commercial about women and children being abused. The ad was created by an organization who is helping victims of abused relationships. They want the public's support. Jill looks at Jack and says, "We have to donate something, they need our help. It isn't right what is happening to those women and children. We should do something about it." Appeal to fear is a method used to manipulate people. An example of this would be: "Vote for Jackson because he will keep you safe. If you don't you will die." Appeal to spite is a method that usually does not use moral because it seeks revenge. An example of this appeal would be: If your boyfriend cheated on you, you cheat on him. The appeal that I find most interesting out of the three is the appeal to spite. Though I am guilty to all three, I have recently dealt with spite. Sometimes in difficult situations I let my emotions get the best of me instead of thinking rationally. The example of cheating has happened to my friend and he is still with the "love of his life". Revenge and spite are very strong words as well as actions that are not the best choices in life.

Week 6 - 3 of 3

Another thing that I found useful and interesting in this week's readings was the section about "Categorical Claims". A categorical claim as stated in Epstein is one that can be rewritten as an equivalent claim that has one of the following standard forms: All S are P; Some S is P; No S is P; Some S is not P. An everyday example of each of these would be: All cellphones are wireless; No paper is a pencil; Some gymnasts are divers; Some cabinets are not brown. Though each of these are true, we don't usually reason in such ways everyday. To rewrite as categorical all you need to add is the word "thing", for instance: No paper is a pencil = No paper is a thing that is a pencil; or, Some cabinets are not brown = Some cabinet is a thing that is not brown, and so on. Categorical claims are fairly easy in the beginning but get a bit more complicated when studying further into them.

Week 6 - 2 of 3

I decided to due my second blog on Truth Tables. I am going to focus on "The Classical Abstraction". According to Epstein, the classical abstraction focuses on whether the claim is true or false, and how it is compounded from other claims. When looking at an "and" argument the claim is known as a conjunction. A conjunction is only true if both parts of it are true. For example: Bananas are yellow and oranges are orange. This is true because both parts are true. An example of it being false is: Tomatoes are red and pickles are pink. This is false because pickles are not pink, so this entire conjunction is false. Another type of classical abstraction is a negation. This is a claim that uses the word "not". This one is a bit confusing. A negation is true if its part is false; it is false if its part is true. For example: Jesse is not a girl. This is true if "Jesse is a girl" is false, and false if "Jesse is a girl" is true.

Week 6 - 1 of 3

The one thing that I found most useful in chapter 8 section B "Some Valid and Invalid Forms". I am going to focus on direct reasoning and arguing backwards with "all". When reasoning directly, the arguments are true. For instance, All humans have belly buttons. Sarah has a belly button. So Sarah is human. This example shows that if All S are P; a is S; So a is P. Which is valid. When arguing backwards with "all" the argument is usually weak. Here is an example: All gymnasts are left handed. Jill is left handed. So Jill is a gymnast. This argument is weak because it does not include all the possibilities. Jill can be a swimmer, a soccer player, and/or not do gymnastics at all. So this example shows that All S are P; a is P; so a is S. These two example show the difference between a valid argument and a weak one. Using the direct way of reasoning is more accurate and easier to come across a valid argument than to argue backwards.

Week 4 - 3 of 3

The one concept that I find most interesting based on the assigned readings is Refuting an Argument. You can refute an argument directly or indirectly. I am going to focus on direct. There are three fundamentals: show that at least one of the premises is dubious, show that the argument isn't valid or strong, and/or show that the conclusion is false. An example of refuting an argument directly would be: Josh claims that if he orders all the Olay foam face wash bottles that he will be set for life with face wash. JJ says that eventually one day Josh will run out of his face wash and then he won't be set forever. And when that days comes his Olay may not be caring his face wash anymore and he will have to find something new to wash his face with. This example shows a claim being made and another one refuting it. This type of rebuttle towards an argument is quite common, mainly people use it in everyday life.

Week 4 - 2 of 3

For chapter 7, the topic that I find most interesting and useful is the section on raising objections. I found this helpful because it is the most common way to determine if an argument is bad. In order to do so, another argument must be made to question the premises, show that a premise is dubious, or show why the argument is weak. An example of raising objections with an argument would be: Ally wants to get another credit card. She says that by getting another one she can pay off the first credit that she maxed out. Ally says that by paying off her old credit card with another one she will build her credit score back up. Billy says thats not a good idea. He says that while Ally is paying off her old credit card that she will get behind on payments with the new one and will be in debt all over again. And also he brings up the fact that she was in debt to begin with because of her addiction to shopping and a new credit card will not help the addiction. This example shows an argument being argued by a counterargument. Ally wants a new credit card but Billy says that getting a credit card is not a good idea because of multiple reasons.

Week 4 - 1 of 3

In chapter 6, I think the most useful information is the explanaition of conditionals and what they are. A conditional claim is one that can be rewritten as an "if...then..." claim that must have the same truth-value. "If A, then B", the claim A is the antecedent, and the claim B is the consequent. An example of a conditional claim would be: If you pay for me then I'll go with you to the movies. the antecedent is " You pay for me" and the consequent is "I'll go to the movies with you". A conditional claim can also be done in a reversed way. For example: I'll go to the club, if I can drink before we go. The antecedent is "Drink before we go" and the consequent is "I'll go to the club". Yes a conditional is only a claim, but it defines a specific type of claim. When in an argument or even a conversation, being able to pick out the conditional claims can be very useful. For instance, in example 1 you can try to reason or come up with another way to get she or he to go to the movies if they don't want to pay. Watch a movie at home.

Week 3 - 3 of 3

What I found useful and interesting from this weeks reading assignments were in Chapter 9. In section C. subsections 1 and 2. I realized that when I argue I usually exaggerate words, phrases, and meaning to make them sound more extreme or less to win an argument. Euphemisms, for instance, are words or phrases that make things sound better that a neutral description (182). Dysphemisms, on the other hand, are words or phrases that make things sound worse than a neutral description (182). As for exaggerating, down playing a claim means minimizing the importance of it (183). And up playing a claims means exaggerating the importance of it (183). These different types of cheating styles to manipulate an argument one way rather than it should be is unjust and not fair. I am beginning to process my thoughts more carefully and over think what I will say to justify an argument before I say it. Not only to argue correctly but for myself as well.

Week 3 - 2 of 3

I decided to pick an Internet ad on smoking. Here is the link: http://gal.darkervision.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/tipalet-cigarette-ad.jpg

This ad claims that if a man is to smoke this cigarette and blow the smoke into a woman's face, she will come running after him anywhere. For this claim, I chose to reject it. I believe that it is false. Just because I don't believe this ad does not necessarily make it false. But in this case it does. I am a woman and I do not follow men if they blow smoke in my face, nor do my other female friends. This knowledge and observations come from my own personal experience. Since this is an older ad, possibly earlier they did not know that cigarettes cause cancer, or if they did they did not release that information. But even earlier on women did not run to men when the blew smoke in their faces. I have asked a dozen women, in their sixties and seventies and they said that they did not do such a thing.

Week 3 - 1 of 3

I decided to talk about Section D, Violating the Principle of Rational Discussion. This concept of fallacy has to do with an argument that is taken the wrong way or intentionally misleading. There are several different types of these violations:

~ Begging the question: The premises have to be taken more seriously and questioned more carefully than the conclusion. That is, they have to be reasonable and credible.

~ Strawman: Instead of owning up to loosing an argument, a person can put down someone else's argument and put words into his or her mouth.

~ Shifting the burden of proof: Giving someone else the responsibility of your argument instead of taking it upon yourself to back up.

~ Relevance: An opinion that premises are not important for the argument that makes the argument very weak and not fixable.

A real world example that I have heard is an argument that I had with my firend. We were talking about God existance. He claims that God does not exist. I said, "Prove that God doesn't exist". I am putting the responsibility of proof onto my friends hands.

Week 2 - Post 3 of 3

I am new to Critical Thinking and Reasoning, so almost everything I read is something new to me. What I found the most interesting in the readings this week was the section on Content Fallacies (Epstein, 201). In this section, I learned that even though an argument may need some work upon, making the premises stronger and/or the conclusion clearer that it is not necessarily a bad argument. In order to find fallacies, I must look to the supporting statements for the conclusion. Some fallacies are based off of these kind of premises:
~ Mistaking the person or group for the claim.
~ A bad appeal to authority.
~ A bad appeal to a common belief or practice.
~ A false dilemma.
These are just a few premises that are mistaken for and considered fallacies when put into an argument.
I also found interesting that at the end of the chapter, the book speaks about wisdom. I agree with the book that people should try to step away from being the best, being right, and join together; have discussions not fights. Arguments are a part of human nature, but we can be civil and arguments can actually helps advance humans not just break them apart.

Week 2- Post 2 of 3

A valid argument is an argument that its premise and conclusion are both true at the same time. As for a strong argument, both the premise and conclusion aren't true or false at the same time. I was talking with my mom on the phone and the subject of bike riding. I told her that the faster you ride a bike, the easier it is to stay on a line. The reason being, the more speed you have the more control you can have of the bike to keep it on a straight line. (This is an example of a valid argument) "In order to be an elite gymnast, one must be in the gym every single day for at least seven hours". Yes some gymnasts around the world train seven hours every single day, but that does not make them an elite gymnast. Vice versa, some elite gymnasts only work out 3-4 hours a day only 4-5 days a week. And of course there are those elite gymnasts who do train seven hours a day seven days a week. There are more ways than just one to become an elite gymnast and other reasons to train seven hours a day than just being an elite gymnast. (This is an example of a strong argument)

Week 2- Post 1 of 3

Subjective claims are based off of a person's personal beliefs or standards. Objective claims on the other hand, are not based off of one person's beliefs or standards, instead it is impersonal. I was talking with my uncle the other day and we came across the subject of education and college. Though he thinks people need to go to college, he thinks it is the most stupid idea ever. He says that once people graduate they will be more stupid and have less common sense than before they even went to college. The reason being is he believes that in college they only teach people to become greedy, unthoughtful people. My uncles thoughts on "greedy" and "unthoughtful" people is all personal and can be different for other people. (This is my example of a subjective claim) One day, my boyfriend and I were conversing about almost everything. We began to talk about religion. My boyfriend claimed that religion is geographically based. His examples to back up his claim were: it depends on where a person was born, and what kind of culture a person was raised in. If we look at the world, the Middle Easts main religion is Islam, Europes main religion is Christianity, and China's main religion is Buddhism. Not only does my boyfriend believe this but so do numerous people. Even I do now. (This is an example of an objective claim)

Self Portrait (A little about myself)

Hello everyone! My name is Sonia Wymiarkiewicz. I am a native San Franciscan! I am fluent in Polish. I've done gymnastics for 16 years, and competed for 10. I chose SJSU for a couple of reasons: they have a gymnastics team, and a great communications program. (Unfortunately I am not on the gym team) My experience with communications is quite small, but I intend to expand my knowledge as well as experience with it. I have traveled to numerous places such as Poland and Greece making friends and memories that will last a life time. I love interacting with people and so I thought Communications, specifically PR would be a good choice for me. I love eating, sleeping, swimming, dancing, talking, the color green, and frogs! I would like to be an events coordinator and keep coaching gymnastics as a side job. Most of all, I want to be with someone, be somewhere, and do something that makes me happy!