The Anatomy of an Argument — Critical Thinking 2 (C1)

CRITICAL THINKING · LESSON 2

The Anatomy of an Argument

C1 (B2–C2) · 90 minutes

Your argument, please

Task Tell your partner the argument you collected: where you found it and what it wanted you to believe. Your partner says, in one sentence, what its conclusion is. Then you each score it privately on the 1–5 scale.

1

strongly agree

2

mostly agree

3

on the fence

4

mostly disagree

5

strongly disagree

"This argument would survive a careful critic."

1. Did your partner find the same conclusion you did?

2. Did your argument actually give any reasons, or did it just tell you what to think?

READING

What counts as an argument

In everyday speech an argument is a quarrel. In logic it is something quieter: a set of statements in which some, the premises, are offered as reasons for accepting another, the conclusion. An argument is an attempt to persuade by giving reasons. Whether it succeeds is a separate question.

Writers often signal the structure with

indicator words. Therefore, so, hence and it follows that usually introduce a conclusion; because, since and given that usually introduce a premise. The signals help, but they are unreliable: many arguments have none, and the same word can do different jobs.

Because is the classic trap. "The bridge collapsed because the steel had corroded" is not an argument but an explanation. Nobody doubts that the bridge collapsed; the sentence tells us why.

READING · CONTINUED

What counts as an argument

An argument tries to show that something is true; an explanation takes it as true and accounts for why. The test is whether the conclusion is in dispute.

An assertion is a claim with no reasons offered at all: "Remote work is the future." Assertions may be true, and repeated often enough they may persuade, but they give a listener nothing to examine.

Most real arguments are also incomplete. "She's a doctor, so she'll

know what to do" works only if we also accept that doctors know what to do in this situation. A premise that the argument needs but never states is a hidden assumption. Textbooks often call an argument with an unstated premise an enthymeme, borrowing a term from Aristotle's rhetoric. Hidden assumptions are where many arguments are weakest, because nobody has been asked to defend them.

Argument, explanation or assertion?

A

The museum is closed today because the staff are on strike.

The museum is closed on Mondays and today is Monday, so let's go to the park instead.

B

C

Nuclear power is the only realistic answer to climate change.

Rents in the city centre have risen by a third, so younger workers are moving out to the suburbs.

D

E

The lights are on in Amira's flat, so she must be home.

F

Tomás failed the exam because he didn't revise.

Which line changed category when you imagined a different speaker?

Hidden-assumption hunt

Task Each argument below rests on one unstated assumption. Write it as a full sentence. Then mark it S (safe), D (doubtful) or F (false), and be ready to say why.

1. "This phone costs twice as much as that one, so it must be better."

5. "Most people in our online poll preferred the new logo, so our customers will like it."

2. "Kemal has never missed a deadline, so he'll finish this project on time."

6. "It's completely natural, so it can't do you any harm."

3. "The article appeared in a famous national newspaper, so it's accurate."

7. "Ingrid speaks four languages fluently. She'd make an excellent interpreter."

4. "Crime fell the year after the city put up more street cameras. The cameras work."

8. "We've always held the team meeting on Fridays, so we should keep it there."

READING

Drawing the argument

An argument map sets out the structure of an argument as a diagram: the main claim at the top, the reasons beneath it, and arrows showing what supports what. Reasons that only work together, called co-premises, share a single arrow; a reason that can stand alone gets an arrow of its own. Objections attach to the claim or to a reason, and rebuttals answer the objections.

Diagrams like this go back at least to the logician Richard Whately in 1826, and the American philosopher Monroe Beardsley made them a teaching

method in his textbook Practical Logic (1950). Supporters argue that mapping makes critical thinking teachable. One meta-analysis, written as a master's thesis at the University of Melbourne in 2007, found that courses with heavy mapping practice produced roughly twice the gains of standard critical-thinking courses. The evidence base is small and largely unpublished, so treat the claim as promising rather than proven.

Mapping forces honesty. Prose can hide a missing step; an empty box cannot.

Drawing the argument

The city should make its buses free.

Objection: the city cannot afford the lost fare income.

More people would leave their cars at home

Fares take a bigger share of poorer residents' income.

Fewer cars would mean cleaner air

Rebuttal: fares cover only part of the cost of running the buses.

Give Us Friday Back

Rosa Lindqvist, columnist, The Harbour Ledger

Governments should make the four-day week the legal standard for office work, with no cut in pay.

Start with productivity. Few office workers spend eight focused hours a day on their real work; much of the week disappears into meetings and email. When the week gets shorter, that waste is the first thing to go. At the design studio where I worked for six years, we tried a four-day week for six months and missed no more deadlines than before.

Then there is health. Burnout drives many people out of jobs they once enjoyed, and a third day of rest each week is a cheap way to prevent it. Healthier staff take fewer sick days, so the extra day off partly pays for itself.

Critics say a shorter week would ruin small businesses, which cannot afford extra staff to cover the missing day. But the change could be phased in over five years, with tax relief for small firms while they adjust. Others warn that customers expect service five days a week. Staggered rotas solve that: not everyone needs the same day off.

The five-day week is not a law of nature. It spread during the twentieth century through union campaigns and employers' decisions, not because anyone proved that forty hours was the right number. Each generation has worked less than the one before it. It is time for the next step.

Map the op-ed

Task Copy the empty map. Fill in Lindqvist's main claim, her reasons with the evidence for each, the objections she raises and her replies. Then add one objection she didn't answer and one hidden assumption she relies on.

Main claim

Objection 1

Objection 2

Reason 1

Reason 2

Reason 3

Her reply

Her reply

Evidence

Evidence

An objection she didn't answer

A hidden assumption

1. Which sentence in the column is an explanation rather than a reason?

2. Which reason would collapse first under a careful critic?

READING

Toulmin's six parts

In The Uses of Argument (1958), the British philosopher Stephen Toulmin argued that the logic of his day, built around the syllogism and modelled on mathematics, described almost no argument that people actually make. He proposed looking instead to the law court, where claims are made, challenged and defended. His layout has six parts, which he illustrated with a man called Harry.

The claim is the conclusion being argued for: Harry is a British subject. The data are the facts appealed to in its support: Harry was born in Bermuda. A later textbook that Toulmin co-wrote calls these the grounds. They answer the question "What have you got to go on?"

The warrant answers a different question:

"How do you get there?" It is the general rule that licenses the step from data to claim: a man born in Bermuda will generally be a British subject. Toulmin observed that data are usually stated openly and warrants only implicitly.

The backing gives the warrant its authority: here, the laws on British nationality. The qualifier shows how strongly the claim follows: presumably, probably, certainly. The rebuttal names the conditions under which it would not follow: unless both his parents were foreigners, say, or he has since become a naturalised American.

The model builds doubt into the very shape of an argument. Its critics point out that, in practice, data and warrant can be hard to tell apart.

Toulmin's six parts

Data: Harry was born in Bermuda.

Qualifier: presumably

Claim: Harry is a British subject.

Warrant: a man born in Bermuda will generally be a British subject.

Rebuttal: unless both his parents were foreigners, or he has become a naturalised American.

Backing: the laws on British nationality.

Bring your own

Task Copy the template. Map Student A's collected argument into the six boxes, then Student B's. If the original leaves a box empty, write what it would need and mark it added. Then decide which box is the weakest in each argument.

Data / grounds

Qualifier

Claim

Warrant

Rebuttal

Backing

Which box did the original argument leave out, and was that by accident or by design?

Talking it over

Task Choose three or four questions. Spend most of your time on the one your group disagrees about.

1. Is a good argument one that persuades, or one that should persuade?

2. Where you live, do people state their conclusions openly or leave them for the listener?

3. Can an argument built on a false premise still be worth hearing?

4. Toulmin took the law court as his model. Is that a good model for everyday disagreement?

5. Should schoolchildren learn to map arguments? From what age?

6. Are some beliefs too important to argue about?

Private reflection

Task Choose one prompt and write privately. Nobody will read what you write. Sharing afterwards is optional.

Prompt 1

Think of a belief you hold firmly. What is its warrant, and when did you last examine it?

Prompt 2 (lighter)

Think of a slogan, advert or saying you grew up with. What hidden assumption does it rest on?

Back to your argument

Task Score the argument you collected again.

1

strongly agree

2

mostly agree

3

on the fence

4

mostly disagree

5

strongly disagree

"This argument would survive a careful critic."

Has your score moved? Which of Toulmin's six boxes moved it?

Before Lesson 3

This week, find one argument that claims to be certain and one that claims only to be probable.

D

For each, write down the conclusion and the word or phrase that told you how strong it was meant to be.

I

Next lesson: Deduction, Induction and the Best Explanation. Three ways of getting from evidence to a conclusion, and what each one can promise.

A

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · SKIP OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key (1)

ARGUMENT, EXPLANATION OR ASSERTION? suggested; D and F are there to be argued over

• A. Explanation. Nobody disputes that the museum is closed; the sentence says why.

• B. Argument. Two premises, a conclusion signalled by so.

• C. Assertion. A claim with no reason given.

• D. Either. If everyone can see young workers moving out, it explains why. If someone infers the move from the rents, it is an argument, and a weak one without evidence of the move itself.

• E. Argument. The premise (the lights are on) is offered as a reason for the conclusion (she is home).

• F. Usually an explanation of an accepted fact. It becomes an argument if someone is using it to prove that Tomás didn't revise, or to argue that the result was his own fault.

HIDDEN-ASSUMPTION HUNT suggested wordings; others are possible

1 A higher price means higher quality. D.

2 This project is like the ones Kemal finished on time, and past performance predicts future performance. D, or S if the projects really are similar.

3 Famous national newspapers don't publish inaccurate articles. F.

4 The cameras, not something else, caused the fall in crime. D. Other changes in that year may explain it.

5 The people who answered the online poll are representative of our customers. D.

6 Natural things are harmless. F. Many natural substances are poisonous.

7 Speaking several languages fluently is enough to interpret well. D. Interpreting is a separate skill.

TEACHER'S REFERENCE · SKIP OR DELETE BEFORE CLASS

Answer key (2)

8 Tradition is a good reason in itself, or nothing relevant has changed. D.

MAP THE OP-ED a suggested map

• Main claim: Governments should make the four-day week the legal standard for office work, with no cut in pay.

• Reason 1: Productivity would not fall, because a shorter week cuts wasted time. Evidence: the author's own studio trial, six months, no extra missed deadlines.

• Reason 2: It would protect health. Evidence: burnout drives people out of jobs; a co-premise is that healthier staff take fewer sick days, so the cost is partly recovered.

• Reason 3: The five-day week is a historical convention, not a proven ideal, and working hours have fallen before. This is mostly an explanation of how the five-day week arose; it shows the current week could change, not that it should. "Each generation has worked less than the one before it" is an unsupported assertion.

• Objection 1: It would ruin small businesses. Reply: phase it in over five years, with tax relief.

• Objection 2: Customers expect service five days a week. Reply: staggered rotas.

• Unanswered objections (examples): many jobs (shift work, care, retail) are not office jobs and the law would treat them differently; tax relief costs public money; some workers prefer the pay or flexibility of a five-day week.

• Hidden assumptions (examples): one studio's six-month trial generalises to all office work; the time saved is waste rather than necessary work; a legal standard works better than letting firms choose.

• Weakest reason: usually Reason 3, or the single-workplace evidence for Reason 1.