Two Important Concepts

One of the most important concepts I learned was about cause and effect. I think the website and the book does a good job of breaking down these types of claims. They state when this happens, then that happens. It is a simple concept yet when you think about it you realize that it is critical in everyday life. Everything you do is cause and effect. Also it is important for me because I want to become a lawyer and learning how things happen and how to break down those things is crucial in being a successful lawyer. I also think appeal to emotion is important because a lot of people try and play on emotions and it’s good to know what exactly they are doing and how to counteract this. For example the media feeds itself on people’s emotions. It is hard to get a subjective point of view on things when the media is shoving gospel down your throat on an emotional subject. So I found these two concepts to be the most important things I’ve learned this summer.

What Ive Learned Throughout the Class

I have learned a lot throughout this class. I have learned much about communication and how to break claims down so I can view it from an analytical perspective. I have also learned how to communicate in small groups online which was tough. While it is a communications class, I think that I could have gotten a better grade alone, yet still it was an interesting learning experience. My favorite thing about the class is the blogging. I enjoyed sharing my perspective with others and having them comment on me and also me commenting on them. My least favorite thing was probably the online group assignments. They consisted of a large portion of our grade and all it took was one person being lazy to screw up that grade. This class can be improved by giving us extra credit questions on the tests so that we can get a better grade because the scoring is kind of harsh. Just one question wrong can make your test go from a A to a B. So in all I enjoyed this class and learned many skills that I will use in the future.

What I learned this Summer

For this class I learned many things. I learned how to schedule my time wisely in order to post on my blog 12 hours apart and get my work in on time. I also learned how to communicate with an online group in order to do an assignment. This was tough as there were different personalities I had to coordinate with. Some were good people to work with, while others weren’t so good. Also I learned on how to create a blog and post things online. I thought the blog was very interesting as you got to express your ideas to your class mates while also conveying what you learned in the reading. I like the idea of a blog because you can say anything you want and there’s a good chance someone will stumble upon it and read it. I think I will do more blogging after I am finished with this class. For our book readings I found the book was good in some parts and difficult to understand in others. I liked the website readings we read towards the end of the class because they helped clarify some ideas presented in the book. So in all I got a lot out of this class and enjoyed taking it this summer.

Cause and Effect

This time I read the cause and effect website and the cause and effect chapter. I got a lot out of these two readings. First I saw how causal claims were used. Causes are claims in a sentence that have an effect on the end result. Also there must be a strong correlation between cause and effect. Thus in cause and effect every time this happens, that happens. The website uses an example of a traffic accident to show cause and effect: A bicyclist moves into the traffic lane in order to pass a truck illegally parked in the bike lane. The driver of a car approaching from the rear slams on her brakes in order to avoid hitting the bicycle. A following car fails to stop in time, and smashes into the back of the first. The insurance companies disagree about who should be held responsible, and they go to court to decide who caused the accident. Additionally they break down the accident into three factors to determine the strength of the casual argument.

1. how acceptable or demonstrable the implied comparison is (for example, do we think that there is a basic similarlity in most respects between the circumstances of this accident and those of the many other times bicycles and cars have traveled on this street safely;
2. how likely the case for causation seems to be (for example, do we think that a bicycle swerving into an car's lane can cause an accident?);
3. how credible the "only significant difference" or "only significant commonality" claim is (for example, do we believe that the illegally parked truck is the only significant difference between this case and the many other times bicycles and cars went down that street without an accident?).

So by breaking down this one case for the entire website I found that I learned a lot from this website and it cleared up my understanding of the book a little bit.

Mission Critical Website

Today I reviewed the mission critical website. I liked this website because it went over a lot of the stuff we read in the book. Also I believed this website simplified key concepts that were in the book. Sometimes I found myself to be a little fuzzy on what the author was talking about in the book. For example you really don't get a general overview of the subject. You instead get a short statement and examples. The examples are not explained properly enough for me to fully understand. However this website breaks down the examples. For instance in the vagueness and ambiguity part it breaks down the example piece by piece and also gives you two distinct examples of vagueness and ambiguity so that you get a clear idea of what they are talking about. I also like the quiz section a lot better than in the book. It is more simple and strait forward with a multiple choice option. So in all I found this website to be more useful for the book as it clarified many subjects for me.

Chapter 13 Graphs

In chapter 13 we read about mislead claims with numbers. Now an important part of that reading was based on viewing graphs and how they can be misleading. It is important to note that many graphs hide concealed claims, are misleading, or wrong. It is vital to use graphs with a baseline of zero in order to get an accurate view of what information you are reading, less you be mislead with a graph distorting the information with a different baseline. It is also good to compare your personal experiences with the information shown on the graph in order to get a more accurate viewpoint. It is important to note that graphs can create misleading comparison by how the measuring points on the axes are spaced. Finally the mean, median, and mode are vital for reasoning with numbers as they give you a scientific reference in which to view the information presented.

Social Organizations Paper

I thought the second assignment we did was very helpful to me. It was a difficult assignment as we all had to communicate online. However this helped me in learning how to effectively communicate with group members throughout the assignment. We did revisions to the paper, critiques... etc. I also liked how we got to chose a paper based on something we felt strongly about, and how we got to bring an important issue to the forefront. Also going back and using specific terms that we learned out of the book was refreshing in the sense that we reviewed everything we learned in class and helping me prepare for future tests. Now I feel that I have a stronger grasp on the book as we went through and applied these definitions towards the real world. So in all it was a good assignment in helping me work together with people who are in another city or out of the country as I probably will take further online classes and would need this knowledge to communicate with future group members.

Misleading Claims with Numbers

In chapter 13 we read about misleading claims with numbers. Now this is described as vague, meaningless, or mistaken comparison. The book uses the example a town getting more violent because there were 12% more murders this year. What this number doesn't take into account is the fact that the town and tourist population may be growing which accounts for more murders. It could mean that murders are going down per 100,000 people even though it has gone up the past year. For example there could be 20 murders in a town of a million in comparison to 6 murders in a town of 25,000.


For a real life example I am going to talk about discounts you find in the mall. Some of them say 50% off clearance sale. Now they mislead you because when you go and look at the items, only a small fraction is 50% off. Usually these are bad clothes too that no one wants.

Reasoning by Analogy

In chapter 12 we read about reasoning by analogy. Reasoning by analogy happens when you are drawing a comparison in an argument. That is one side of the comparison drawing a conclusion, thus making the other side of the comparison have the same conclusion. An example used in the book is as follows: Rats are like humans. So if rats get cancer from DDT, so will humans. This shows how one side of the argument concludes the same about the other side.
Now in real life we hear this kind of reasoning all the time. An example is Joe is a human and has to eat and drink to survive. Bill is a human. Bill has to eat and drink to survive. Now this shows how one side of the argument (Joe is a human and has to eat and drink to survive) concludes the other part of the argument (Bill has to eat and drink to survive because he is a human).

Page 195 Excercise 4

For the excises on page 195 I chose number 4 which is to make up an appeal to some emotion for the next time a traffic officer stops you. I chose the emotion of empathy and pity. I would say “I am so sorry officer I was in a hurry because I am late for work. If I’m late for work I’ll be fired. So could you please let me off with a warning this one time”. So in this sentence I am trying to evoke pity and maybe some empathy from the officer. The sentence “If I’m late for work I’ll be fired” is a common thing for people to empathize with as they’ve probably been late for work before and they know the boss won’t be pleased. Also the officer may pity you because you basically state your livelihood is on the line if you are late this one time.

Appeal To Emotion

In chapter 10 we see that appealing to emotion is described as a premise in argument that compels you to believe or do, just because you feel a certain way. I hear these kinds of arguments all the time in the news or in person. The book uses the example of politicians using fear to manipulate and control people. The example is a hypothetical video of a gun being pointed at the viewer stating that unless you vote for Cobb all sorts of crimes will happen in your neighborhood. They use a list of crimes to instill fear into the viewer. For a real life example my mom tells me "you should drive slower or you will certainly get in a car crash". Now I usually drive at the speed limit. She is implying that if I do not go slower than the speed limit I will get in a car crash, playing on my fears of getting into one, thus making me drive slower on the road.

Valid General Claims

To check the validity of a claim one uses a direct way of reasoning with all or arguing backwards with all. The direct way of reasoning (valid reasoning) is as follows: All S are P, a is S, so a is P, All S are P + a is S, therefore a is P. Now an example of this is given as: All dogs bark, everything that barks is a mammal, So all dogs are mammals. We would draw a diagram to see if this is valid. the "dogs" would be inside the "things that bark" category and "the things that bark" would be inside the "mammals" category. So everything overlaps showing that all premises are true, therefore the conclusion must be true.

Now for a real life example I will talk about my cell phone. All cell phones need to be charged. All things that need to be charged is electronic. So my cell phone is electronic. This is a direct way of reasoning that is valid.

Aristotelian Logic

Aristotelian logic refers to the method Aristotle developed in determining whether a claim was valid, this logic was based on an inspection of its form. His example of this logic was as follows: All S are P ---- No S is (are) P. Some S is (are) P. Some S is (are) not P. Now looking at an example from the book we see that this logic is used as follows: No police officers are thieves. Some thieves are sent to prison. So no police officers are sent to prison. We see that this is a method for informal reasoning.
Now I will use an example from my life to show how this informal reasoning. So my family had a small get together. I can say that: no one drank alcohol at the get together. Sometimes alcohol makes you behave differently. So no one acted or behaved differently at the family get together. So using this example you can see the informal way of reasoning.

General Claims Contradictories

So in order to "reason using general claims we must assert something in a general way about all or a party of a collection." One example used in the book is "All teachers give fair exams. Professor Zzzyzzx gives fair exams. So professor Zzzyzzx is a good teacher." However this is not valid. The premise may be true, the Professor gives good exams, but he could be a bad teacher who gives fair exams. Now you want to look at all, every single one, or some, which is at least one. To get the contradictory of this you would flip all to some, or some to all in your claim/contradictory.

For example in my life I heard a claim from my parents regarding my college classes here at at De Anza. They stated that no courses at De Anza transfer over for my major at San Jose State. We have already checked and they don't offer anything in the articulation program. The contradictory is that some courses transfer over from De Anza to San Jose State because they were reading a out of date articulation program. The claim is no courses transfer over, with the contradictory being some courses transfer over.

Refuting an Argument

For chapter 7 I choose “refuting an argument” as my topic. Now there are three direct ways of refuting an argument. First you have to show that at least one of the premises is dubious. Next you have to show that the argument isn’t valid or strong. Finally you have to show that the conclusion is false.

For this I am choosing a scenario that recently occurred in my life. A few days ago someone’s condo was broken into and an ipod was taken. So they called me into the office and showed me a video tape of a person who looked like my roommate going into someone’s condo. Keep in mind I recently lost my condo key card. So they figured since a key card was missing from our condo (to cover up the crime…they figure), the theft occurred in our building, and the guy looked like my roommate, it must have been him. Now I refuted this by saying that the keycard was lost at a concert making it literally impossible for a random stranger an hour away to know where we live and break into the condo (it’s an unmarked card). Also I stated that while the person looked like my roommate he was at least 40 pounds larger and had longer hair. These two make the premise very dubious and not valid or strong. Also there conclusion was false because after a day or so they found out that the person who had the ipod had a friend in the same condo e-mail him and tell him he was taking it, he didn’t read it, and thought the worst. These statements by me clearly refute the argument given to us by the owners of the condo.

Conditional claim and contradictory of a conditional

A conditional claim is broken up into two parts, a conditional (ie. if or then, the antecedent) and a promise (the consequent). The book states that "a claim is conditional if it can be rewritten as an "if....then....."claim that must have the same truth-value.

One example of a conditional claim that I heard recently was from my father. He said "If you graduate this Summer, I will buy you a new T.V." The antecedent of this statement is "graduate this Summer". The consequent of this statement is "I will buy you a new T.V".

Another example of a conditional claim I used was when I was talking with my friend. I told him "I'll go to the hockey game with you, if you pay your own way". The antecedent of this statement is "pay your own way". The consequent of this statement is "I'll go to the hockey game with you".

Compound Claims

A compound claim is a claim that is made up of other claims, but in itself is just one one claim. In the text they use the example of "either a democrat will win the election or a republican will win". The major claim is someone will win the presidential election. Te compound is either the democrat or the republican will win. I for example here these type of claims all the time, talking with people or in the media, you can see that these type of claims can be found anywhere in society.

Now a compound claim that I heard recently was when my mom was talking about how she wants to buy a new couch. She said she saw the most beautiful couch in the store the other day and wants to buy one but isn't sure which color she will pick. The compound claim is that she is going to buy a couch either a black couch or a white couch. We can break this sentence down into two parts. First the major claim is she wants to buy a new couch. The other part is that she will either pick a black couch or a white couch. As we see this is a claim composed of other claims, but in itself is just one claim.

Concealed Claims

So in Chapter 9 I read about Concealed Claims which is where one uses slanter in order to convince someone of their claim without using any argument whatsoever. Slater is defined by "any literary device that attempts to convince by using words that conceal a dubious claim". There are two types of slanter; loader questions and "making it sound nasty or nice". Now this is very interesting to read because Ive read slanter all the time, especially in news articles, but I could never clearly understand the what exactly was "wrong" with what I was reading. For example in the newspaper I read articles by Tim Kawakami, a journalist, who is always skewing the article to reflect his personal opinion without really giving any credence or argument for that opinion. All the time he asks loaded questions (why aren't you winning? etc...) to sports teams and then proceeds to shift the article towards that loaded questions response, which more often than not results in a negative article.

Internet Advertising

For internet advertising I picked a HDTV Samsung (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E_FmTH5OWY&feature=related). It states that the TV has a crystal finish, it supports HD technology, and is beautiful like a piece of art. Now the beauty of the television is a subjective claim, however the rest is objective as it is a specification of the TV. Now looking at this television I will accept the claim of its beauty from personal experience. I am getting a new HDTV and have looked at many products in the store. By far the Samsung has the best picture of any LCD in the store. I believe it is because of better technology and production put into the television set. Now reading up on this claim I found a website that does nothing but analyze T.V’s and you literally have thousands of owner’s reviewing/analyzing/discussing high definition televisions. The site is AVSforum.com. The overall consensus of the forum is that you go with a Samsung if you want a LCD as their technology outperforms any other television in that class. I believe this forum is a reputable source as there are many experts from high profile television companies their discussing what is the best possible television. People there are not trying to sell you a television they are simply talking about the technologies and specifications that make up a great television. You are not simply getting simple answers like “this is the best”… with no explanation. You are getting in-depth reviews such as contrast ratios, black levels, etc… So by using the criteria listed in the book I would judge that this advertisement is reliable and I accept the claim from this advertisement.

Fallacies

Fallacies are negative parts of an argument that make the argument unsound, un-repairable, and weak. Now there are three types of fallacies; structural fallacies, content fallacies, and fallacies that violate the principle of rational discussion. For this discussion I will focus my real life example on a content fallacy I heard in the past. I often hear people talk about the war in Iraq. I go back and forth with my uncle on why the war is justifiable or not and we disagree. He gets upset and says “I served in the military I know what is justifiable and what isn’t, you or anyone else who didn’t serve does not”. Basically what he is saying is that because he served in the military it makes him an expert on military matters and you have to serve in the military in order to know what is right and what is wrong. This is obviously a content fallacy as his premise (I served in the military I know what is justifiable and what isn’t) is dubious and no other premises will support his conclusion (you or anyone else who didn’t serve does not). More specifically it falls under the category of mistaking the person for the argument. That is anything that group says about _____ is either false or true.

A Good Argument

So in Chapter 3 it is explained that a good argument must have a premise that is plausible, the premise must be more plausible than the conclusion, and the argument must be valid or strong. An example of a good argument I am using is from a court case I watched in court the other day. The defendant is a criminal because she broke the law by impersonating a lawyer. She never went to law school or took her bar exam. She gave false counsel to a family and took their money. She probably will go to jail for theft and false counsel, or at least receive a hefty fine or community service. Now this is a good argument. The premise is plausible given the evidence, the premise is more plausible than the conclusion because there is a possibility for her to walk free, and it is a strong argument given the strong argument definition/explanation I gave in my previous blog.

Strong Vs Valid Arguments

So for a strong argument I am using an example from my dad. Ever since he moved into a new condo he has gotten a bad rash. Other than this new condo, every place he has ever lived at he has not gotten a rash. Therefore he believes that some chemical or fibers in the condo are making him break out in a rash. Now I believe this is a strong argument because the premise is very true because ever since he moved into the condo he has gotten a red rash all over his body, something that he has never gotten before. However the conclusion may be false. There are many possibilities why he has gotten a rash living at this specific area. He may be alergic to the large tree's pollen that is outside of his window that is open all the time. There could be a fungus left over from the previous tenants that he was exposed to. So there are many possibilities why this conclusion may be false, therefore making it an invalid argument.

For a valid argument I am going to use an example from my life. The law school I want to apply to requires one to take the LSAT exam. Every student at this law school has taken the LSAT. Therefore I have to take the LSAT to get into this law school. This is a valid argument because the premise is true and the conclusion is true at the same time. An invalid argument would have a true premise but a false conclusion.

So we see that the main difference between the two is the conclusion. The premise must be true and so does the conclusion in order for it to be a valid argument. On the other hand the premise is true for a strong argument but its conclusion may be false. Also you can reword the same argument to make it either valid or strong.

Discuss Subjective and Objective Claims

Subjective Claim

I recently overheard my sister talk about the city of Sausalito here in the Bay Area and how she wants to move there. She explained to me how it was the most beautiful & best place to live in the Bay Area. Her reasons were that it looked beautiful because it was on an Ocean front, it is quiet and secluded, and the residents would be better neighbors because they can afford to live in such a nice area. Now in my opinion this is a subjective claim because it is all based on her interpretations of "beautiful" and "best". Perhaps another person doesn't like being near the Ocean and therefore they believe it is not a beautiful city or certainly not the "most" beautiful. Another might dislike being secluded away from a major city and its conveniences. Finally we see her reasoning that "richer" neighbors would make better neighbors may not apply towards someone elses view points as they may think richer neighbors are snobby and hard to be around. So as we can see her claim that Sausalito is the most beautiful and best place to live is a subjective claim as whether its true or false is entirely up to that persons personal standards.

Objective Claim

For my objective claim I am going to use my friend as an example. He just purchased a new black Volkswagon. He called me and told me he just bought a black Volkswagon. I went and saw the car right after he got back from the dealer. I recognized it was brand new as it is this years model, it had no mileage, it was black, and it had the dealers tag on the licenses plate. So whether this claim is true or false does not depend on what anyone thinks or believes, it is an impersonal claim. Furthermore I made this conclusion based on the fact that this was a brand new black Volkswagon through carefull observation.

Introduction

Hi I'm Michael Reynolds. I'm a senior at San Jose State who is graduating this summer. This is my first communications class and I am looking forward to it as it is a new subject for me to learn about. I'm looking to get many things out of this class. I have never had a blog before so it is interesting for me to share myself and experiences with other people. I am very much looking forward to viewing other peoples blogs and learning about my fellow students at SJSU. I also am looking forward to increasing my communication skills with this class as I am sure it will teach me a lot about interacting with (online) groups of people. Also I believe this will help with my English skills at it is all online work and a lot of writing is involved. I have taken a few online class's, some were better than others, but overall I prefer taking an online course as I can learn while also having some free time to myself. A few things about myself are that I love sports. I follow football, basketball, and hockey religiously. My favorite teams are the Raiders, Lakers, and Sharks. One thing I am looking forward to getting this Summer is a giant plasma t.v so I can really enjoy the theater esq. atmosphere while watching my favorite teams this fall. After college I am planning to enroll in law school. This Wednesday I am starting work at a law firm so I can get a first hand experiences on what it takes to be a lawyer and how a firm operates. So I hope you enjoyed reading a little about myself and I look forward to blogging more this Summer.

-Mike