Lecture 4- Identifying Arguments and Distinguishing Fact and Feeling PDF

Lecture 4- Identifying Arguments and Distinguishing between Fact and Feeling Thursday, February 06, 2025 @ 12:07 PM Most of the Quiz 1 content is ON THIS LECTURE Usually the title of the quiz is a hint for what lecture topics it covers Best ways to argue: How do I react, when I'm engaged in...

Lecture 4- Identifying Arguments and Distinguishing between Fact and Feeling Thursday, February 06, 2025 @ 12:07 PM Most of the Quiz 1 content is ON THIS LECTURE Usually the title of the quiz is a hint for what lecture topics it covers Best ways to argue: How do I react, when I'm engaged in an argument with other people? 1st thing to do- listen to other people, "What is it that you mean by this?" Keep an open mind, don't only focus on your rebuttal 2. Ask for clarifying questions if needed Could even get a notepad out, and put it in philosophical notation Should try to be as "charitable" as possible, to avoid a straw man argument. But, don't go beyond what they say and misrepresent Is the logical flow sound? > Are their claims actually true? Side note: Alan Turing- imitation game- if you pass the Turing Test, then it's a sign of intelligence. But, sometimes on accident you can defend so many positions so well that the audience doesn't know what actual belief you hold. Both bad and good Can help preserve friendships, especially if you've a little different of beliefs Readings: Gimbel, both authors from the "light-hearted philosophers society", Prof want to grad school with Jen Learned about the structures of arguments. Where premises are in support of the conclusion  Argument- a set of sentences, such that a conclusion follows from the premises Turns an opinion into a conclusion. Sometimes there's sentences with truth value, or with no truth value Prof might replace "sentence" with a "proposition or claim", since these have to have a truth value (of either true or false) Philosophical arguments often have unique content Ex: It is wrong to set a roommate on fire for fun ? This is "a priori"- knowledge you have prior to experience You can determine if something is true or false just by imagining it, you don't need to go out into the world and start testing Does not solely rely on real-life experiences Sometimes we do not have the technology or tools to test in a lab, or it's EXTREMELY UNETHICAL. For example, Einstein engaged in a thought experiment to test E=mc^2. Tools did not exist yet Ex: Cannot do the trolley experiment in real life, extremely unethical Clip from the Good Place TV show: EXTREMELY UNETHICAL IN REAL LIFE WOULD KILL PEOPLE Ex: nazi unethical scientific testing on twins... This claim is a priori (DO NOT TEST), and "not vacuous" (meaning that it doesn't suck hahahaha dad joke-- vacuums take things out, vapid, empty) A conclusion "doesn't follow" if the premises do not lead there Arguments- must have claims or propositions (statements that can be either true or false, have truth value) TRUTH VALUE DOES NOT MEAN TRUE, MORE JUST LIKE IT'S A BOOLEAN VARIABLE TYPE IN PROGRAMMING; HAS THE ABILITY TO BE EITHER TRUE OR FALSE Proof surrogate- trying to prove that something's true, but just saying it's true. Ex: "It's Econ 101 that minimum wage hurts the economy!" Facts vs. Feelings. "hard-boiled eggs are disgusting!" Is this opinion a matter of fact? Devils live in hell > hell as sulfur > eggs smell like sulfur > derived eggs are truly devilish "incorrigible"- cannot be corrected or changed. Many people have incorrigible opinions! Is it wrong to hate the taste of pears? Or hard-boiled eggs? is it wrong to feel pain?  These are just opinions. You're not mistaken if you like the taste of hard-boiled eggs Axiology- branch of philosophy tied to ethics, and also value claims For example, all the philosophy behind whether Jackson Pollock is art Is originality relevant within aesthetic creation? Cold Stone Creamery example... Certain people are SMEs, experts- for example, with the hardboiled egg example, a professional chef could give you a specific educated opinion on the matter Conventional standards across certain fields We can judge matters of taste, but should use informed opinions (ex: deferring to SMEs), rather than a poor or non-factual opinion SAME GOES FOR ETHICS There are essential, conventional criteria amongst SMEs Is it an informed opinion? Are reasons given? Are sources cited? How is it justified? How can we establish if something is factual? If it has truth value? For example, 2017 Trump press secretary Sean Spicer probably lied about inauguration audience size. Just made stuff up Is this opinion? No, because it's easy to quantify the number of people. Can estimate from photos, also how many people watched TV There are ways to determine if true or false Side-note on deepfake photos, huge trend going forward. What is the truth? Does it matter after a deepfake has been shared already? If there are established methods for determining the truth value of a statement, and two people are arguing saying contradictory things and only one can be right, then you know you've got a matter of fact- the truth value EXISTS for the claim, and will be either true or false KEEP IN MIND: Just because there is disagreement, that doesn't immediately make that issue a matter of pure opinion!!!! It does not make that issue totally relative If that were the case, then everything would be relative, because most people disagree on most things Ex: It is my opinion, that Santa Barbara has some of the highest rent on the entire globe. Are there ways to tell if this is true or false? Yes, google global rents. So, just because somebody calls something an "opinion"--- be cautious. It doesn't mean that it's PURE opinion Ex: Physics, ask a physics professor: "Everything doubled in size last night. Could you disprove that, or justify that it is true?"  Well, no way to determine this because there's no way to measure everything. Also no objective coordinate axis in real life. No criteria to determine if this is true or false Seems to be "a priori". Either it's true or false. Someone must be mistaken From a philosophy paper in 1964, Grumbaum, Schlessenger Ex: CNN, "the most trusted name in news"- Clinton in 2012, "many feminist believe that women are underrepresented on capitol hill, will only be 16 out of 100 female representatives after Clinton leaves" The phrasing make this sound like the option of feminists, but the number is factual in this example Do not use rhetorical questions in our premise. Is it a claim or not? True adding true or false after the sentence, if it sounds weird grammatically, then it's not a claim Indicator words- can signal that there is a claim **also in the reading "because"- is an indication that there's a premise; a claim supporting another claim "since", "as", "because", "from", "that being the case"... Also indicator words signaling that there's a CONCLUSION: "hence", "consequently", "ergo", "therefore", "since" Sometimes when there aren't indicator words, we can try fitting in an indicator word, to help find a claim or a conclusion. For example, try plugging in "therefore" Ex: Her breath smells like feet, therefore I know she stole my cheese ! But, sometimes we have indicator words without an argument Ex: We haven't ate since lunch (this isn't an argument) Ex: They trashed the place because they hated the movie (not an argument either; this is an explanation) What do we do when there's not an indicator word?  All the other claims will support the conclusion