PHILOSOPHY 151 Introduction to LogicSpring 2015
Dr. Craig Vasey. Dept of Classics, Philosophy, and Religion. University of Mary Washington. . 654-1342. Office: Trinkle 238. Hours: M-Th, 1-2 PM.
Introduction to Logic is a course that every student should take during the first year of college. No other course will be as dedicated to the task of understanding and sharpening analytical abilities and skills in general; the benefits of studying this material will show up throughout your college career, and beyond college.
Logic is the field concerned with evaluating reasoning. To a great degree, this means the analysis of arguments, but argument analysis presupposes appreciation of numerous conceptual distinctions and analytical techniques. We will be covering thosebasic conceptual foundations of Logic, as well as Informal Fallacies, Categorical Logic, Sentential Logic, and offering an introductory look at Predicate Logic. Although it is a Philosophy course, Logic can be thought of as a “practical skills” course. Success in a practical skills course requires practice, regular practice. The ideas or concepts themselves are not difficult to grasp, but the mastery of them only comes through the practice of applying them. Students are often tempted to think that since the concepts can seem easy and obvious, little work is needed in the course. Daily homework is assigned and reviewed in class to provide the opportunity for practice; it is not collected. Doing well or not doing well in this course is very largely a matter of whether the student takes responsibility for reviewing the concepts and practicing their implementation.
The course content is delivered in class meetings and can be found at but there is no other required text for the course. The chapters at the website are arranged in the order of the syllabus, and contain Powerpoint reviews of material as well as homework exercises for daily and weekly practice. If you wish to have a hard copy textbook, the recommendation would be A Concise Introduction to Logic by Patrick Hurley, which you can purchase through Amazon. Perhaps more useful (and quite a bit less expensive) would be the cd-rom that accompanied the 11thedition of Hurley’s book, and is also available through Amazon, Learning Logic 6.0 CD-ROM for A Concise Introduction, 11th by Patrick J. Hurley and Joseph P. DeMarco.
Course Goals: Students will learn how to pay analytical attention to what is going on in language, to distinguish arguments from non-arguments, and inductive reasoning from deductive reasoning; how to identify fallacies of everyday reasoning; and how to interpret, represent, and determine consequences regarding arguments in three symbolic modes (categorical, propositional, predicate). This course satisfies a General Education requirement in the area of Quantitative Reasoning.
Schedule of assignments. Note bolded items: exams, quizzes, papers, TA’s.
Week 1
1. Jan 12CH 1. Introduction. CH 2. Arguments: premises and conclusions
2 .Jan 14 CH 3. Non-arguments. Use vs mention.
3. Jan 16In-class Quiz 1. (1. List, identify seven non-arguments; 2. Define “argument.” 3. Identify conclusions of two arguments. 4. The use/mention distinction. 5. Sense without reference, reference without sense.) Canvas quiz 1 due by Saturday midnight.
Week 2
Jan 21 MLK Keynote Speaker: Ernest Green (Little Rock Nine). Dodd Auditorium, 7 PM. Extra credit opportunity.
4. Jan 21CH 4. Deduction and induction: Valid/ invalid, Sound/ unsound; Strong/ weak, Cogent/ uncogent.
5. Jan 23 CH 5. Validity: Counter-examples. Canvas quiz 2 due by Saturday midnight. First TAdue by 5 PM Sunday Jan 25: King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. See end of syllabus for detailed directions.
Week 3
6. Jan 26 Finish Counterexamples.
7. Jan 28 In-class Quiz 2. (1. Define “argument” 2. List 11 inductive and deductive argument forms. 3. List seven non-arguments. 4. Identify four passages as inductive/ deductive, use evaluative terminology.) First short paper due by Noon.
Jan 29. Jefferson Lecture: Douglas Laycock, “Religious Freedom and the Culture Wars.” Dodd Auditorium, 7:30 PM. Extra credit opportunity
8. Jan 30CH 6. Informal Fallacies of relevance and induction. Canvas quiz 3 due by Saturday midnight
Week 4
9. Feb 2 Informal Fallacies of presumption and ambiguity
10. Feb 4CH 7. Categorical Logic: Propositions – Quantity, Quality, Distribution; AEIO
11. Feb 6CH 7.1 Practice on Standard Form for propositions. Canvas quiz 4 due by midnight Saturday. Second TA due by 5 PM Sunday Feb 8: King, Letter.
Week 5
12. Feb 9 In-class Quiz 3. (1. List 21 informal fallacies. 2. Provide one example from memory from each family of fallacies. 3. List seven non-arguments. 4. Provide a refutation by counter-example.)
13. Feb 11CH 7.2 Immediate Inferences, diagrams, and the Square of Opposition.
14. Feb 13 CH 7.3 Categorical Logic: Syllogisms – Major, Minor & Middle Terms; Mood, Figure, Form. Canvas quiz 5 due by midnight Saturday.
Week 6
15. Feb 16 Standard form for syllogisms.
16. Feb 18 Two tests for validity: Venn Diagrams and Syllogism Rules. Second short paper due by Noon.
17. Feb 20 Exam 1
Week 7
18. Feb 23 CH 8. Propositional Logic: symbols, translations.
19. Feb 25 CH 8. Propositional Logic: symbols, translations.
20. Feb 27 Truth table definitions of operators, calculating truth-values. CH 8.1 Canvas quiz 6 due by midnight Saturday. Third TA due by 5 PM Sunday, March 8: Plato, Phaedo.
Week 8
21. March 9Propositional Logic: Truth tables for classifying and comparing propositions CH 8.2
22. March 11 Truth tables for arguments.CH 8.3
23. March 13CH 9. Propositional Logic: Natural Deduction: Rules of Inference:MP, DS, HS, MT Canvas quiz 7due by midnight Saturday.
Week 9
24. March 16 CH 9.1 SM, CN, AD, CD
25. March 18 CH 9.2In-class quiz 4
26. March 20 CH 9.3 Canvas quiz 8 due by midnight Saturday. Fourth TA due by 5 PM Sunday March 22:Descartes, Letter to the faculty of sacred theology
Week 10
27. March 23CH 9.4 Rules of Equivalence or Replacement: DM, DN, CM, AS, IMP Third short paper due by Noon.
28. March 25 CH 9.4 Rules of Replacement: EQ, DIST, TAUT, EXP, TRAN.
29. March 27 CH 9. 5 Conditional Proof Canvas quiz 9due by midnight Saturday.
Week 11
30. March 30 In-class quiz 5 CH 9. 5 Conditional Proof
31. April 1CH 9.5 Indirect Proof
32. April 3 CH 9.5 Indirect Proof Canvas quiz 10due by midnight Saturday.
Week 12
33. April 6Exam 2
34. April 8CH 10. Predicate Logic: quantifiers for A, E, I, O; translation
35. April 10CH 10 Continue quantifiers.Canvas quiz 11due by midnight Saturday. Fifth TA due by 5 PM Sunday April 12:de Beauvoir, Second Sex
Week 13
36. April 13 CH 10.1 Proofs in predicate logic: UI, EI, UG, EG Fourth short paper due by Noon.
37. April 15In-class quiz 6 Continue with proofs.
38. April 17Continue with proofs. Canvas quiz 12due by midnight Saturday.
Week 14
39. April 20 CH 10.2 Quantifier Negation rule
40. April 22 Using QN in proofs
41. April 24 Review for final exam. Canvas quiz 13due by midnight Saturday.
Final Exam May 1 Noon-2:30pm
Work for the Course:
100 points Final exam (cumulative)
50 pointsExam 1
50 pointsExam 2
60 points Twelve on-line quizzes (completed by Saturday midnight weekly) (5 pts each)
60 points Six in-class quizzes (10 pts each)
30 points Three 1-page papers
50 points Fivetext analysis exercises
400 points possible
Course grades: A 360-400B 320-359C 280-319 D 240-279
Comments/ details on course work:
Extra credit opportunities: Twice in January you can earn yourself 5 points of extra credit for attending a talk by a visiting speaker. Submit a paragraph via email within 48 hours commenting on the talk. You also have the option of turning in a fourth short paper, and doing a 13th Canvas quiz.
Each short paper is worth 10 points, and 30 points of the final grade comes from papers. To be turned in via email attachment by deadline (to ). Save your file as “name Paper 1,” etc. DO NOT SEND ME A FILE THAT DOES NOT CONTAIN YOUR NAME.
You must write at least three short papers, and may write a fourth for extra credit. These may not exceed one page (double-spaced, TNR 12 pt). Points are lost for misspellings, incorrect punctuation, faulty sentence structure, but of course the main issue is clarity and accuracy with respect to Logic. Here are the topics and due dates:
1) In your own words, explain what a counterexample is, when it is appropriate to construct one, what it shows (if successful), and how it shows it (how you know if it is successful). Provide an example to illustrate: an example that you make up yourself, not one you find in another source. Due by January 28, noon.
2) In Categorical Logic, what is distribution? Explicate this concept, adhering carefully to the use/mention distinction, and provide two examples that show the relevance of distribution to validity. Due by February 18, noon.
3) What is a truth table? These tables are used in logic for five distinguishable purposes; explicate at least four of these, and provide your own examples of each. (This “five purposes” reference is not a reference to the five operators; that is one purpose.) Due by March 23, noon.
4) In your own words, how are rules of inference different from rules of replacement? How does one know when to use one of the latter rather than one of the former? Provide an example to make the distinction clear by writing up your own set of (at least three) justified steps, beginning from ~ (D ~C). Due by April 13, noon.
Each TA (Text Analysis) exercise is worth 10 points, and 50 points of the final grade comes from them. Your task is to read and analyze four 1-2 page passages from texts provided, for arguments and non-arguments:
- You must identify at least two arguments in each text, and
- a total of 5 distinct “things done with words.” Identify them with highlighting.
- In identifying arguments, you must give a reason why it is inductive or deductive (preferably identifying it by type). Make sure your claim of what a passage is really matches the definition, and that you can defend it; every misidentification costs a point.
- For the arguments, explanations, conditionals, explications, and illustrations, you must create a footnote(in “References” on the toolbar) in which you spell out the details or provide your paraphrase:[1]
- for the Arguments, present them as a numbered series of premises followed by a conclusion;
- for the Explanations, identify the explanans and the explanandum;
- for the Conditionals, identify the antecedent and consequent;
- for the Explications, identify the explicated point and the meaning of it;
- for the Illustrations, identify the claim and the example(s).
- Reports, Opinions and Warnings: the footnote need only say it is what it is.
Copy the text from the website to a Word document, add your highlighting and footnotes; save it with your name and “TA 1” or “TA2,’ etc., in the filename. DO NOT SEND ME A FILE THAT DOES NOT CONTAIN YOUR NAME. To be turned in via email attachment by Jan 23, Feb 6, March 8, March 20 and April 10 no later than 5 PM .
No late assignments will be accepted. You always have the option of not waiting until the last minute, and even turning something in ahead of the due date.
No quiz or exam can be made up unless a letter/ note from a medical or other professional explaining the inevitability of the absence is provided promptly to, and accepted by, Dr. Vasey. “Leaving early for spring break” is an explanation, but not a justification, for absence.
We have two Philosophy majors serving as tutors for this section. They will each be available three times weekly for an hour at a time (times and locations will be announced). These sessions are for your benefit. Tutors will answer questions about homework exercises, quizzes, concepts discussed in class, etc.; they will provide practice problems and practice quizzes.
Quizzes. The on-line quizzes (Canvas) will be made available on Fridays and must be completed by Saturday midnight. These are passive, multiple-choice and true/false quizzes. A second quiz on the same material will be available on the following Tuesday; your grade will be the higher of the two. The in-class quizzes will not be passive exercises, but will show to what degree you are mastering the material (listing distinctions, defining terms, solving problems, etc.)
Honor Code
Mary Washington’s Honor Code governs all work in this course. Students’ signatures on any and all coursework convey a pledge of neither giving nor receiving aid on work. Students having questions regarding the application of the Honor Code to a particular assignment should consult with me. Cheating can cost you your reputation as well as expulsion.
Students with Disabilities
The Office of Disability Resources (ODR) has been designated by the University as the primary office to assist students with disabilities. If you receive services through ODR and require accommodations for this class, please come see me as soon as possible. Any information you share is strictly confidential. If you have not made contact with ODR and have reasonable accommodation needs (note-taking assistance, extended time for exams) I will be happy to refer you. The ODR will require appropriate documentation of disability.
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[1] Take note: You insert the footnote number after the relevant passage or sentence.