Reasoning and Argumentation

CAS PH 160

  • Critical Thinking
  • Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings

A systematic study of the principles of both deductive and informal reasoning, calculated to enhance students' actual reasoning skills, with an emphasis on reasoning and argumentation in ordinary discourse. We will emphasize argumentation and criticism in ordinary life and also present formal models of reasoning designed to elicit underlying patterns and structures of reasoning and argumentation that are widely applicable. Simultaneous training in skills of argument analysis, argument pattern recognition, argument construction, and argument interpretation and creation. Effective Fall 2018, this course fulfills a single unit in the following BU Hub areas: Philosophical Inquiry and Life's Meanings, Critical Thinking.