Found in this Section:

1. Brief Table of Contents

2. Full Table of Contents

1. BRIEF TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

Acknowledgments

Part I Connections

Chapter 1 Why be a Critical Thinker?

Chapter 2 Language

Chapter 3 Knowledge and Certainty

Chapter 4 Arguments and Explanations

Part II Deductive Reasoning

Chapter 5 Deductive Links

Chapter 6 Deductive Argument Forms

Part III Inductive Reasoning

Chapter 7 Supporting Our Claims

Chapter 8 Standards of Inductive Reasoning

Chapter 9 Fallacies

Chapter 10 Scientific Reasoning

Chapter 11 Pseudoscience

Part IV Reasoning About Values

Chapter 12 The Nature of Morality

Chapter 13 Reasoning about Good and Bad

Chapter 14 Moral Dialogue

Chapter 15 Reason and Commitment

Index

2. FULL TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface

Acknowledgments

Part I Connections

Chapter 1: Why be a Critical Thinker?

Critical Thinking and the Importance of Open Dialogue

What Is Critical Thinking?

Euthyphro

Plato

Study Questions

Reason and Culture

Why the Geese Shrieked

Isaac Bashevis Singer

The Shaman and the Dying Scientist: A Brazilian Tale

Alan Riding

Study Questions

The Limits of Reason

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 2: Language

The Priority of Language

Language and the World

The Corner of the Eye

Lewis Thomas

Eight Little Piggies

Stephen Jay Gould

Study Questions

Words, Statements, and Beliefs

Warranted Statements

Making of Americans

Gertrude Stein

Study Questions

Factual Statements

Web of Belief

9/11 Rumors That Harden into Conventional Wisdom

Michael Slackman

Cookies

Douglas Adams

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 3: Knowledge and Certainty

Belief and Knowledge

Knowledge and Certainty

Meditations on First Philosophy in Which the Existence of God and the Distinction of the Soul from the Body Are Demonstrated

René Descartes

A Brief History of Time

Stephen Hawking

Study Questions

Consensus and the Web of Belief

Ideas & Trends; For Air Crash Detectives, Seeing Isn’t Believing

Matthew L. Wald

President Tom’s Cabin

Jill Lepore

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 4: Arguments and Explanations

Arguments: Premises and Conclusions

Implicit Premises and Conclusions

Arguments: Standard Form

Logical Warranting

Deductive Reasoning

Inductive Reasoning

Factual Warranting

The Decameron: Michele Scalza

Giovanni Boccaccio

The Decameron: Melchizedek

Giovanni Boccaccio

Study Questions

Explanations

The Day-Care Deaths: A Mystery

Linda Herskowitz

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Part II Deductive Reasoning

Chapter 5: Deductive Links

Reasoning with Necessity

Dissenting Opinion in Gregg v. Georgia

Thurgood Marshall

Study Questions

Analyzing a Deductive Argument

Validity and Logical Implication

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 6: Deductive Argument Forms

Logic

Some Common Valid Argument Forms

Anselm’s Ontological Argument

Norman Malcolm

Study Questions

Anselm’s Ontological Argument

Summary

Exercises

Part III Inductive Reasoning

Chapter 7: Supporting Our Claims

Evidence: Traces and Patterns

Report on Yale Murder Outlines Suspicions

James Barron And Alison Leigh Cowan

Trial By Fire: Did Texas Execute an Innocent Man?

David Grann

Study Questions

Confirmation and Proof: Webs of Belief

The William Bradfield Case: Murder on the Main Line

Mike Mallowe

Coded Bradfield Note: ‘My Danger Conspiracy’

Emilie Lounsberry

The Jury: Convinced or Confused?

Emilie Lounsberry and Henry Goldman

Bradfield, on Stand, Denies Any Role

Emilie Lounsberry

Bradfield and Women

Henry Goldman

Study Questions

Summary Exercises

Chapter 8: Standards of Inductive Reasoning

Three Basic Forms

Generalizations

The Literary Digest Predicts Victory by Landon, 1936

“Digest” Poll Machinery Speeding Up

Landon 1,293,669; Roosevelt, 972,897

What Went Wrong with the Polls?

Study Questions

Analogies

Troublemakers: What Pitt Bulls Can Teach Us about Profiling

Malcolm Gladwell

Study Questions

Causal Claims

So, Smoking Causes Cancer: This Is News?

Denise Grady

Renewing Philosophy

Hilary Putnam

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 9: Fallacies

The Nature of Fallacies

Fallacies of Irrelevance

Lost Genius

Russell Baker

Study Questions

Fallacies of Faulty Generalization

Fallacies of Emotional Manipulation

Bachmann Finds an Issue With HPV Debate

Trip Gabriel

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 10: Scientific Reasoning

Science and Good Reasoning

Copernicus and Kepler

The Sex Life of the Whiptail Lizard

Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch

Study Questions

Hypothetical-Deductive Reasoning

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 11: Pseudoscience

Distinguishing Science from Pseudoscience

Fliess, Freud, and Biorhythm

Martin Gardner

Study Questions

Summary

Exercises

Part IV Reasoning About Values

Chapter 12: The Nature of Morality

Supporting Moral Claims

Chapter I: Of the Principle of Utility

Jeremy Bentham

Study Questions

Objectivism and Subjectivism

The Brothers Karamazov

Fyodor Dostoevsky

Study Questions

Morality and Reasoning

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 13: Reasoning about Good and Bad

Making Moral Decisions

Reasonable Objectivism and Reasonable Subjectivism

Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals

Immanuel Kant

Existentialism is a Humanism

Jean-Paul Sartre

Study Questions

Kant

Sartre

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 14: Moral Dialogue

Dogmatism and Relativism

Euthyphro as Dogmatist

Plato

Classroom Scene

Study Questions

Moderation as Key

Summary

Exercises

Chapter 15: Reason and Commitment

Open Rational Dialogue

Keynote Speech May 18 at Simpson College’s 1996 Commencement

Jane Smiley

Study Questions

Index

Thinking Socratically, 3rd edition

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