PHL 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Begging The Question
Document Summary
Argument may be shown to be valid by the repeated use of the argument forms. Yet some arguments are obviously valid, even tho they aren"t in any of the argument forms described above. Procedure for deciding whether an argument is valid: Regard argument as innocent until proven guilty-accept argument as valid until we think of counterex to prove it invalid. Ask ourselves if argument is at all possible to be shown invalid by counterargument. Stretch imagination across possible worlds if, after careful reflection, conclude that no such ex are found, tentatively accept the argument as valid question-beginning arguments. Some features of an argument might have lead us to reject an argument even tho we consider it valid. Ex: might know that the premises of the argument are false. Reject argument if we can see that the argument begs the question. When the premise of the argument is simply a restatement of the conclusion.
