Critical Reasoning

Tamkeen Z Shah

Fall 2023
What is critical reasoning?
• The objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a
judgement

• To make sensible judgements about some piece of information

• To draw accurate conclusions from data during problem solving
• To evaluate a claim in light of the evidence available
• To question the hidden assumptions built into a text
• Presenting one’s position on a topic in a logical and convincing
manner
Critical Thinking – a complex
process
Involves…
• Identifying other people’s positions and arguments
• Evaluating the evidence for alternative points of view
• Weighing up opposing arguments and evidence fairly
• Being able to read between the lines
• Recognizing persuasive techniques employed to increase appeal
• Recognizing false logic
• Drawing conclusions about whether arguments are valid and justifiable
• Advancing a point of view in a structured, clear, well-reasoned way.
Barriers to critical thinking
• Personal biases, preconceptions, dislikes, beliefs which obscure
alternative points of view
• Whatever we take to be ‘common knowledge’, ‘common sense’, ‘the
norm’ without question
• Lacking awareness of our own knowledge gaps
• Trusting experts, statistics, ‘facts’ and figures
• Looking for easy explanations, short cuts
• Emotional (affective) reasons
• Lack of methods, strategies, or practice!
• The known known
• The known unknown
• The unknown unknown
Critical thinking means acquiring a
new learning behavior
• Student: I want you (the expert) to give me answers to the questions; I
want to know the right answer.

• Teacher: I want you to become critical thinkers, which means I want

you to challenge experts’ answers and pursue your own answers
through active questioning. This means lots of hard work.
Importance in academics
• Evidence from small or isolated projects is treated as absolute proof
of a general principle/theory. Findings from a small sample may not
be generalizable - theories can be questioned
• Methods used to establish a finding may be flawed/deficient
• Other types of faulty reasoning
• Solution: Work on strategies to critically evaluate the work of others
• Develop criteria for the level of doubt/ambiguity that is acceptable
when drawing a conclusion
Arguments
• Reasoning involves analyzing evidence and drawing logical
conclusions from it.
• This is the process of making an inference
• Whenever we work with reasons and conclusions, we are dealing with
the structure of an ARGUMENT.
• Therefore, in critical reasoning, the unit of study is an argument,
which we seek to evaluate for its validity.
Basic Structure of an Argument
• All logical reasoning uses the structure of an argument
[Premises] enable us to conclude that [Conclusion] because [Inference rule]

Premises Conclusion
Data Standpoint
Grounds Claim
Evidence Stance
Support Point of view
Inference
Warrant
Assumption
Inference rule
Definition
• An argument is a group of statements, one or more of which
(the premises) are claimed to provide support for, or reasons to believe, one of the
others (the conclusion).
• An argument may contain more than one premise, but has only one conclusion.
P1: COVID-19 is highly contagious in closed spaces and at a distance of
< 2 meters
P2: Classrooms are typically crowded
P3: Classrooms are closed spaces lacking proper ventilation
C: Therefore, academic institutions need to be shut down to
prevent the spread of COVID
• An argument is a group of statements.
• A statement is a sentence that is either true or false— typically a
declarative sentence (or a sentence component that could stand as a
declarative sentence)
• A statement is also called a proposition
• The following sentences
are statements:

Chocolate pastries are loaded with calories. (T)

Melatonin helps relieve jet lag. (T)
Political candidates always tell the complete truth. (F)
Tiger Woods plays golf and Maria Sharapova plays tennis (T, T)
• Truth and falsity are called the two possible truth values of a
statement/proposition

• Unlike statements, many sentences cannot be said to be either true or false.

Thus, not every sentence is a statement.
• Questions, proposals, suggestions, commands, and exclamations usually cannot
have a truth value, and so are not classified as statements. E.g.:

Where is the library? (question)

Let’s go for a walk. (proposal)
I suggest you get contact lenses. (suggestion)
Put away your phones right now. (command)
Fantastic! (exclamation)
• An argument is not to be confused with a verbal fight/dispute.
• Whenever a claim is put forth, along with reasons to believe in the
claim, we consider an argument to have been made in favor of the
claim.
• Example:
All film stars are celebrities. (Reason)
Bilal Ashraf is a film star now. (Reason)
Therefore, Bilal Ashraf is a celebrity. (Claim)
Good arguments
(valid/cogent/sound) vs. Bad
arguments
(invalid/uncogent/unsound)
All film stars are celebrities. (Reason)
Bilal Ashraf is a film star now. (Reason)
Therefore, Bilal Ashraf is not a celebrity. (Claim)

All film stars are celebrities. (Reason)

Bilal Ashraf is a film star now. (Reason)
Therefore, Bilal Ashraf is a better actor than his contemporaries.
(Claim)
Identifying the parts of an argument
• Premise(s) + (Inference Rule) + Conclusion
• The inference rule/warrant is often implicit (i.e. unstated)
• Conclusion indicators:
• Premise indicators
Identify the premises and the
conclusion

Premise indicator: for (because )

Identify the premises and the
conclusion
• P1: Wilderness provides essential habitat for wildlife
• P2: Wilderness is a natural retreat from the stress of daily life
• C: It is vitally important that wilderness areas be preserved.

• The warrant/inference rule is unstated.

( Wildlife is valuable; a natural retreat from stress is necessary for us).
PREMISES AND CONCLUSION

Conclusion Indicator: Thus

• P1: Mad cow disease is spread by feeding parts of infected animals to
cows
• P2: This practice has not been eradicated yet
• C: Mad cow disease continues to pose a threat to people who eat
beef

Unstated warrant/inference rule?

[Handling of raw beef during cooking can infect people] OR
[Cooking beef does not kill the disease-causing agent]
• No premise or conclusion indicator.
• P1: Genetic engineering can introduce unintended changes into the
DNA of the food-producing organism
• P2: DNA changes can be toxic to the consumer
• C: Genetic modification of food is risky business
• first premise: The current in an electrical circuit is directly
proportional to the voltage and inversely proportional to the
resistance (I=V/R).
• second premise: The resistance in a circuit is doubled.
• conclusion: Therefore, the current is cut in half.
Data Conclusion

The resistance in a circuit is

The current is cut in half
doubled
Warrant

The current in an
electrical circuit is
directly proportional to
V and inversely
proportional to R
How Well Do You Think (pg. 17)
Critical thinking involves a specific set of thinking skills, such as:
• Focusing attention so as to recognize the significance of fine details
• Using attention to fin detail in order to recognize patterns, such as
similarities and differences, absence and presence, order and sequence.
• Using recognition of pattern in order to compare and contrast items and
to predict possible outcomes
• Sorting and labelling items into groups, so that they form categories
• Using an understanding of categories to identify new phenomenon and
make judgments about them