Philosophy 6: Logic in Practice   

Pierce College

Department of History, Philosophy, & Sociology

Group Exercise for Chapter 1, § 9 of Van Cleave's 2016 Introduction to Logic and Critical Thinking https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/BookDetail.aspx?bookId=457

(Notes on the importance of group exercises.) 

Group Work Summary: Each group will answer three of the questions from "Exercise 6" by supplying "the missing premise or premises needed in order to make [your group's] arguments valid. Try to make the premises as plausible as possible while making the argument valid (which is to apply the principle of charity)." 

Step 1 (ten minutes): Individually, read your group's arguments so that when you are in groups you will already have a grasp of the problem. 

Step 2 (ten minutes):  In groups, "[s]upply the missing premise or premises needed in order to make [your group's] arguments valid. Try to make the premises as plausible as possible while making the argument valid (which is to apply the principle of charity)." 

Step 3 (ten minutes):  In groups, prepare an explanation of the most difficult argument, and prepare a presentation on how you solved that problem.   

Step 4 (ten minutes):  Each group presents their most difficult argument, and how they solved it.