SDCAR2010【逻辑入门】(一)Arguments
What is an argument?
An argument in logic is a set of one or more meaningful declarative sentences (or "propositions") known as the premises with another sentence known as theconclusion. Therefore, each argument has at least two components: 1) a piece of evidence or proposition, officially called a “premise,” and 2) a conclusion.
Consider the following two statements:
1)Ming Li is smart.
2)Ming Li went to Peking University.
Each statement by itself is simply a claim or an assertion. Can you combine them together to form an argument?
One answer might be:
Ming Li is smart because he went to Peking University.
The red part of the answer is the conclusion; the blue part of the answer is the premise. These color codes will be the convention I use to label premise andconclusion through out the series.
A premise supports a conclusion. Most argument are not bullet-proof. That is: the evidence provided does not PROVE the conclusion reached beyond a shadow of a doubt. A premise is just an evidence, one reason to shed some positive light on the conclusion, one piece of information which makes the conclusion more likely. In CR, all premises given in the stimulus are considered true. In the above example, we should not doubt whether Ming went to Peking University or not. However, we can analyze the argument by focusing on the logic which connects the premise and the conclusion in an argument.
