What I learned

Overall, this wasn't a difficult course with difficult material. The only things I found difficult was remembering the miniscule differences between different fallacies. It was also hard to remember how to identify the incorrectness of an argument, claims, and premises.

Aside from critical thinking, I gained a lot of positive information on the benefits of how group decision making can be applied towards future classes and group projects. Knowing how to conduct group decisions and how to facilitate a group project and discussion is going to be beneficial for me in my field, especially since I think group communication in the field of education. Knowing how group communication functions in society and the benefits it can bring is essential in any field; we all should know how to be a good leader in conversations, an active participant in conversations, and what makes an effective group that can deduce a proper argument.

Generalizations

The Epstein text describes sever kinds of generalizations as well as what makes a good generalization versus a bad one. I chose to look further into the various kinds of samples. The three main kinds of smapling the author examines are Representative Sampling, Random Sampling and Haphazard sampling. Representative Sampling is a sampling that accurately represents the population of the subgroup within proportion of the entire population. Random sampling is when a sample is chosen at complete random, like when names are chosen from a fishbowl. Haphazard sampling is when the sample is chosen with an intentional bias. Haphazard sampling can be representative but there is no good reason to believe it is representative because those chosen for the sample were selected for a specific reason. The book also explains that representative samplings are ones that are not intentionally biased.

Cause and Effect Exercises

In a way, I felt this method of learning was more effective than the book, or at least the material seemed more relevant, and less wordy which made it more simplistic. what was once foggy in the book, was made mroe clear from this website, but I didn't find the exercises as helpful as I thought they would be. I don't think it was the material, but mroeso the layout on the page, and how that was organized in comparrison to the beginning example of the truck driver and the cyclist.

In the example, it is obviously the trucks fault, because under no circumstance can you park in the bike lane. So, the reading helped me understand which claims were helpful and which ones were not. I understood the overall argument better after reading it a couple of times. For me, the material doesn't stick unless I read it more than once, and especially with this stuff that doesn't stick to begin with, I have to be able to take my time to understand it.

I didn't like how the exercises pages were structured because I would answer one question and I would scroll down to see all of the other answers as well.... If you ask me, the exercises might need to revamp the structure on their site, but the material works great.

Appeal to Emotion

Appeal to emotion is basically saying that you should believe something based on your emotions, or how you feel about the subject. By appealing to someone emotions, you are trying to convince them that the premises are true by getting to their emotions.

I personally enjoyed reading about appeal to fear, because its one that I notice more frequent.

I don't know how many Survivor fans there are in this class, but if any of you have watched any episodes of Survivor Heroes vs Villains, there is one villain who uses this appeal constantly to keep the people on his tribe in his alliance. Because this guy is such a strong power player, his tribe mates are afraid to against him because if they go against him, blindside him, or so anything that threatens his safety, then he votes them off and uses appeal to emotion to get what he wants.

Appeal to fear is seen everywhere, especially in advertisement for beauty products or health care products. For example, companies such as proactiv use this appeal in a sense they say "if you don't use our product, then you will have more acne and your skin wil not be beautiful." Its not very "in your face" fear, but in this context, fear is used as what you don't want to see/be.

precise generalities

The book discusses how there are several values between "one" and "all" and those values are the precise generalities. For example,

65% of students who take tap from Ms. Katie think she is the best teacher they have ever had. Sarah took Ms. Katie's tap class last year. So Sarah thinks Ms. Katie is the best teacher she has ever had.

This is not valid because there is 35% not accounted for. According to the example in the book, with this type of example, we can say that the 35% is the possibility that the premises can be true but the conclusion false, which makes it not a strong argument. If the percentages are low or high on the scale, not in the middle, than the argument becomes stronger. For example, if the percent was less than 10 or greater than 85 than I am assuming that it would be a stronger argument because there is a lesser chance that the conclusion could be false.

claims and contradictories

On page 161, the book gives examples of claims and their contradictories. Specific translations from a claim to its contradictory are good examples to have in our repetoire of knowledge because, especially for myself, after seeing examples, it helpes me create an answer and find it within other contexts.

The book explains how there are words such as "all", and "some" that can drastically change the meaning of a claim. If these words are not used correctly then it could end in a claim meaning the opposite of what it was meant to say.

As far as a personal experience goes, this reminds me of in our math class we worked on truth tables, and the contradictory was, the negation. We would have to translate one sentence into another. I guess this could also occur in many other situations as well. This chapter puts heavy emphasis on how language should be looked at when writing a claim because it could change the meaning. By differentiating between these key words and phrases claims can become stronger and accurately mean what they say. In our common language, we use these words in our every day vinacular and often don't follow the strict rules of when and when not to use them.

usefulness of the course projects

I personally have enjoyed the projects and feel that this is what the last critical thinking course I was taking lacked; it did not teach me how to apply the concepts we learned to everything else. I didn't have to read articles and find fallacies, or claims or test whether or not something was true. The last class I was in basically was venn diagrams and how critical thinking is not meanto to be applied to anything outside the "deductive universe".

Honestly, thats in the past and I could care less about that class, now that I am taking a class I actually understand :)

I think both of these projects have been helpful in my understand of the topics and I enjoy how they force me to apply what we are learning form the text into material that we are going to have to use and that we use on a normal basis. I think the second project has been my favorite. Our group examined the ASPCA, which is an organization that is near and dear to my heart. For those that don't know, the ASPCA is the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty against Animals. I personally enjoyed the topic of choice and think that it is important to be able to identify what we learn in the book to outside sources. I think each of these projects is a stepping stone for the next, though. Like, I am glad we did the article project first before which is so broad in topic and then had to pick something with a more definite focus, like a social organization. With both projects I enjoyed that the topic of choice was up to the group, because it gave us more freedom in choosing what we did, and makes the concepts more relatable when its something we are already familiar with or have an interest in.

I think for me, project 2 was easier when it came to establishing the concepts from the reading, because it was an organization I was very familiar with and knew enough about to where I can combine the information.

Internet Advertisement

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0uJvhQkPCQ

Okay, so when looking for an advertisement, I remembered that we were the most vulnerable to advertisin when we were young, and our mind were maleable. I remember watching this commercial over and over when I was a little girl, and repeatedly asked my parents for this toy on my birthday, and when I finally did get it, it wasn't what I expected (so I used real scissors on Barbie and my own hair) Lets just say I wasn't allowed to be alone with scissors for a long time...

Anyway, even though this is an advertisement from 1995 and wasn't used on the internet for advertising purposes, it is still relevant because it was an influencial advertisement in its own way nonetheless. Especially as children, we learn from trial and error. Let's just say I learned a lot. In section B, there is discussion about how there is no specific criteria for accepting or rejecting a claim. The main two strategies for accepting and rejecting a claim are from personal experience and other credible sources. I had to use personal experience with this item to see whether or not it was what I expected. Apparently it wasn't. ince this was something that happened to me as a child, I was able to retaint hat information and use it when my own sister wanted a similar toy.

Comon Mistakes when Evaluating premises

After reading this chapter, I would notice myself making some of these common mistakes. I think that when we speak commonly or when we write casually, sometimes it is easy to bypass these mistakes especially when we are using a more conversational tone.

Here are the 5 common mistakes discussed in the chapter:

*Arguing backwards - this can happen when someone uses the conclusion before the premises. Its kind of like giving the punchline before saying the actual joke and it makes less sense.
*Confusing Possibility with Plausibility - Something that is possible is not necessarily plausible. There needs to be substantial evidence to prove a point.
*Bad appeal to authority - This one is tricky. If the claim is not coming from the authority, than it is less credible and can be misleading because there is an uncertainty for the crediblity of the source it is coming from.
*Mistaking the person for the claim - Just because someone says that a claim is true, doesn't mean it is true. Again, there is an uncertainty about the credibility of the person who is providing the information because you don't know if it is coming from a legitimate source or if it coming from backstage gossip.
*Mistaking the person for the argument - On the flip side, an argument should not be rejcted just because of the person who is saying it. For example, I should not disregeard the claim my friend might be making just because we had a squabble earlier and I refuse to be her friend.

Repairing Arguments

When given an argument that doesn't make sense, the book suggests adding premises or a conclusion if the already bad argument can meet the following three criterium...
*The argument becomes strnger or valid
*The premise is plausible and would seem plausible to the other person
*The premise is more plausible than the conclusion

Lets take a look at this example...

You shouldn't watch tv that much because then you won't get any homework done.

I think this conclusion is set and in order to be supported, needs to have a premise like "television can become distracting and can be a distraction from completeing homework." Then the conclusion should be rewritten as "Television is distracting and something distracting can keep you preoccupied from accomplishing a chore, homework, or any other kind of obligation." By adding this premise and changing the conclusion, the argument becomes stronger and can now be supported by other evidence such as maybe the subject has been distracted before by television and has not done their homework. Thw rewritten conclusion can now be supported by evidence compared t the previous conclusion.

Here is the rewritten argument.

Television can be a distraction from other priorities such as homework. It is advised not to watch television at the same time as doing homework because doing both at the same time can prolong getting obligations done.

This argument is stronger than the original, and is more valid because it can be substantiated.

Exercise #2

I decided to look at exercise #2 for this activity because I think it is easily relatable to my lifestyle (because not only am I notorious for running 5 minutes late, but like to stop for food along the way) So, I am still kind of sketchy on this concept but I am going to give it a shot so…here it goes!

Exercise #2 says…

I’m on my way to school. (1) I left five minute late. (2) Traffic is heavy; therefore, I’ll be late for class. (3) So I might as well stop and get breakfast. (4)

Argument? = I would say this is an argument.

Conclusion? = #4 “So I might as well stop and get breakfast.”

Additional premises needed? = This is where I began to be confused…I know that all of these fallacies tie into the central idea of the argument, and I think any extra premises might make the argument less relevant. If anything, maybe more details to the existing premises. The only premises that I see as valuable in this argument are the 3^rd and 4^th.

Identify any sub arguments? = #1, and #2 support #3, which makes them the sub arguments.

Good argument? = I am not sure if this is a good argument, because if the conclusion is about going to get breakfast, then I don’t see how relatable it is to the first three arguments.

I think this argument did help me a bit but I do still not completely understand the concept. I still get confused on identifying the different parts of the argument, but I think that this exercise did help me for the moment to help me understand. I think the exercise was hard for me because I couldn’t relate it back to the sample question. I had difficulty on certain parts but I think I gave it the best shot I had and hopefully it made some sense.

Bad Apple to Common Belief

I enjoyed looking at this fallacy the most and I think this is the one that made the most sense to me. Fallacies are commonly used and we often don't know that we use them until after the fact. The Bad Apploe to Common Belief fallacy is when a group of people believe something to be true then it must be true. I think this is the most common fallacy that I see on a regular basis because it is easy to fall into the trap that if someone says something that it must be true.

For example, when I started working, I had many of my new coworkers telling me not to let the parents control my decisions, and to send kids outside if they weren't behaving, etc. I believed most of what they said, but came to learn that not everything was 100% true. I believed it was true because I didn't know any better, and you never know until you try. For me, it was a matter of trial and error until I became comfortable with who I was as an instructor. Now, I know not to fall into this fallacy because it doesn't matter what anyone else says because I know I am a good instructor. How do I know? My kids are always smiling, and they have a blast! :)

It is easy to believe what other people say when they are in the same group as you, or have similar beliefs. If you have someone you know say that something is true, you might be inclined to believe it because they have similar beliefs as you.

Technology!

The topic I chose to look at is in Chapter 4 of the Essential Guide to Communication, and examines all of the different forms of technology we have at our fingertips! There are several types of technology that book specifies are pagers, telephones, teleconferencing, e-mail, and internet. Technology is an essential form of communication when a face to face connection is unavailable. It is important to keep up with the rapidly expanding use of technology because there become more opportunities for the business to expand when communication restrictions are lifted. The book specifies 2 problems with advancing technology and communication, although I would argue that understanding the advancement of technology is essential to any type of profession and makes an individual more marketable. The book states that the 2 challenges are understanding the “advancement and implementation” of the technologies within an organization, and learning to “use the available technology to enhance communication skills.

I think that technology opens up so many opportunities for the working individual whether they are computer science, nursing, teaching or even performance. I think that at least the basic knowledge of skills such as telephones, internet and e-mail; which are three of the most common tools used by virtually any and everyone. The only negative I see is the lack of personal face to face communication, but in these difficult times where schedules are insane to manage, and several commitments take us in directions other than communicating with one another via personal contact, I think that using technology to communicate is a pleasant alternative.

*Pagers – Pagers used to just beep to let the person know that they needed to call someone, or to inform them that they were trying to be reached. Both of my parents used to carry pagers, but no longer find the need for them (since they have cell phones and would prefer to not carry around a lot of technology) The pager alerts the owner with a message, or a telephone number on its display screen. It is compact and can be kept on a belt loop or in a pocket for safe keeping.

*Telephones – This is pretty self-explanatory. I mean, we have all used this before and know what the phone does. Telephones allow us to communicate with someone , but it also has growing features that makes communication extremely easy and within the palm of our hand.

*Teleconferencing – allows people to create a meeting over the phone with more than just one party.

*E-mail – we know what e-mail does. We can send documents to more than just one person, have a conversation, and extend a conversation to more than just one person at a time.

*Internet – Well, without the internet, this class wouldn’t be happening! J Internet allows us to have virtually almost any information at the tips of our fingers just by typing o the keyboard, and looking through the world wide web.

Testing an Argument...

Well, the book specifies 3 tests to make an argument good which consist of the following:

*The premises are plausible
*The premises are more plausible that the conclusion
*The arguments is valid or strong.

Each of these tets are "independent" which means that they don't all rely on each other. One can be right and the others don't necessarily have to be right as well. So when first examining an argument, it is important to see which on of these questions is the easiest to answer first.

Here is my example...

In order to ride the bus, you have to have a valid pass.
Mark has a valid pass
Mark can ride the bus

Now to answer the questions...

The premises are valid because you can't ride the bus without a pass (unless you want to get arrested) and Mark clearly has a valid pass for the day which means he can ride the bus. The premises are true, which means that they are plausible.
In this case, I think the premises are more plausible than the conclusion. The premises have more credibility than the conclusion, even though the conclusion is credible.
The argument is also strong because both premises are true. The argument is also valid because it is not possible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false.

Strong and Valid Arguments

A Valid Argument is true and a Strong Argument doesn't necessarily have to be true, but has to have substantiated evidence to convince the audience. The book specifies how important it is to have a strong argument versus one that is valid because having s atrong argument can persuade an audience because it is less doubtful. A strong argument displays confidence in a subject and is key to reassure the audience on your topic. A valid argument may be true but not necessarily convincing. Types of syntax and use of language can lessen the strength in an argument. A valid argument may be true, but if I use casual language than the agument loses its strength, or simple words like "maybe", "most-likely", "sort of", etc can lessen the strength of an argument.

Valid Argument: The news said that there are delays on BART so I might be late to my appointment today if I take BART into the city.

**This is valid because the information provided is correct.

Strong Argument: The news said that there are delays on BART so I will be late to my appointment today if I take BART into the city.

**The difference between these 2 arguments is the use of the words "I will" and "might". The second argument is more convincing whereas the first gives some doubt. It doesn't matter whether I am late, but it is more important to look at the more convincing argument.

Types of Arguments

The book Essential Guide to Group Communication identifies 4 different types of arguments:

*Authoritarian
*Consultative
*Participative
*Laissez - Faire

Authoritarian leadership is when there is one leader that designates themself or is designated by others, and assumes all control of the group. The leader usually makes most decisions without permission or with the assistance of the other members of the group. This type of leadership takes away from the idea of working in a group. Its like one actor trying to stand in the spotlight and forgetting that there is an ensemble of players to work with. I am sure we have all experienced this kind of leadership and it usually means that work gets done, but the group is unsatisfied. I have worked in a few groups before where someone designates themself as a leader and divides the work, giving most to the other members and less to themself. Our group wasn't very happy with our final project.

Consultative leadership is one of the most common. Consultative leadership is when the decisions of the group are based on the opinions and decisions of the group as a whole. Leaders will usually rely on the opinion of the group when they are lacking the information to make an informative decision on their own. I personally like this style of leadership, as a leader I like to know where my group stands and what their opinions are because I am indecisive and I prefer to know what they think. I like hearing what other have to say but it is ultimately the decision of the leader.

Participative leadership involves the leader working with the group members to achieve a goal. For example, if your goal was to clean the closet, the leader designating work would be more useful to the group by getting down on their hands and knees and scrubbing the floor or cleaning like everybody else. The most efficient way to get things done would be for the leader to participate instead of sit on the sidelines.

Laissez-Faire in french means "hands off". Laissez Faire leadership is when the leader is not involved or has little direct leadership. This is the worst kind of leadership ever, because when the leader is not involved, there is little direction, and the group members have to rely more on each other to accomplish a goal while the leader is just along for the ride.

Indepedence in Groups

This chapter from the book "Essential Guide to Group Communication" was interesting to me becaise it really made me think about how I work in groups and habits that I need to change.

According to the reading, it is important for every person to have their own role and work together as a team. If there is one person who is not on the same page, the entire group can suffer from lack of teamwork. The common saying "There is no 'I' in TEAM" comes into play, because its important for the group members to work together and focus less on the individual and more ont he success of the ensemble. For me, I think of this as an ensemble. In theatre, one individual actor cannot hog the spotlight during a scene, or no one person is meant to steal the show away from the entire production, bcause not only does it take away from the aesthetic of the production, but it is distracting to the audience and disrespectful to your other cast members. When the ensemble works cohesively together, then it makes the production process easier.

Som translating that back into critical thinkers lingo, in a group project/presentation, there can't be just one person who takes over and does more or less than the others. We all need to work together to achieve one goal, and if someone does not do their adequate share than the entire group suffers. If everyone stays on task and does their share of work, then a sucessful outcome is more obtainable.

Objective vs Subjective

So, these can be easily compatible, so I will try not to get them confused...(It makes sense in my head, but explaining it is not as easy).

In my every day life, as a performer, it is important to be more objective with ourselves. For example, going into an audition, I have to be able to give an objective opinion about myself. If a casting director says to me "We are only looking for women who can do a triple pirouette" and I don't have my triple, then in order to be onjective, I have to say that I don't have my triple, and maybe I'm still only working on a single. I can't say to the casting director "Triple pirouette? Hah! How about a quadruple!" because I would be giving false information, and I would be thinking too much of myself, when I am not ready for that kind of challenge.

Objective is factual versus Subjective is more opinionated and based off of what we think.

A subjective analysis of myself as a performer would be "I can do my triple pirouette just like that ballerina in the front row, because I am just as driven and motivated." This is subjective because I am jumping the gun and trying to do a higher skill before I mastered a lower skill, and my claim is opinionated. I don't know if I can do my turn like that ballerina, but I "believe" I can, which means I can.

An objective claim about myself would be "If I practice and master my single, then I can eventually nail my triple like that ballerina in the front row." This is an objective claim because practicing a lower skill will lead to eventual mastery of a higher skill, and my aspirations are more realistic.

I hope all of this dance talk made some kind of sense :) Let me know if anyone would like some clarification.

~Theresa

Being Vague and Ambiguous...

Now, I commit these two "critical thinking sins" constantly in my papers (or at least my high school English teacher used to always say that).

As far as being ambiguous goes, I look at ambiguous as trying to examine a certain topic that doesn't necessarily have one appropriate answer or solution. In my high school honors English class 2 years ago, we would often discuss in our socratic seminars about how some of our readings were often ambiguous and didn't have one specific answer. I recall reading this one short story in an anthology by author Bessie Head, and there was an entire class debate over a characters motivation for wanting to murder her husband. There were several ideas that all correlated with one another but none of them pointed specifically to one definite answer. We at one point had about 5 different opinions and 5 different scenarios, and all of them were equally possible. I personally enjoy the use of ambiguity because it gives a certain level of freedom to the reader/critical thinker for interpretation. In certain circumstances ambiguity is not good, because if you are searching for a specific answer, its not as easy to decipher.

I think in casual conversation we can all be vague. Being vague is like trying to act out a contentless scene; there is nothing to work with! In acting, we use contenless scenes to help build some improvisational skills as well as to introduce the new actor to the stage. A contentless scene contains lines that are very vague and the actors can build whatever scenes they wish based on the lines given, and each can be completely different and it is based completely on interpretation.

Using this blog for Class Purposes...

Okay, well I haven't logged onto this account in over 2 years and almost forgot I had one til I tried logging in today and it said my email address was already in the system...oh well :)

Well, Hello fellow Comm 41 classmates. I'm Theresa. Nice to meet you all. Hopefully this will be an enjoyable class, and we will all survive another semester here at SJSU (despite all of the crazy maddness in the first week, and furloughs, and wacky changes).

I'm not very good at these kind of intros...but I will go over the basics.

Year: 2nd year
Major: Special Major Musical Theatre
Minor: Elementary Education/Photography
Why are you taking this class: Well, it satisfies GE requirements and because of my limited schedule with rehearsals for performances and working as a stage manager for an on campus group, and work...I thought this would be a nice alternative that would help me work at my own pace, and on certain days would hopefully give me the opportunity to sleep a bit more in the mornings (key word being hopefully)

I'm hoping this will be a good semester for all, and I'm looking forward to working with you guys.


All the Best!

~Theresa


**PS**
If you are interested in a good afternoon/evening of theatre, please come see TRFT Independents production of 6 CHARACTERS IN SEARCH OF AN AUTHOR directed by Amy Ryan. Its an interesting show. We play Jan 29th - 7pm
Jan 30th - 2pm and 7pm
Feb 3, 4, 5 - 7pm
Feb 6 - 2pm and 7pm

Prices are $10 for students, $20 for general admission
*Saturday matinees are 2 for the price of one. So bring a friend to a saturday matinee and get 2 tickets for the price of one*