Argumentation Test
1) This is an argument. The stated conclusion is that that her alarm didn’t go off.
The assumption is that she is still asleep, and the stated premise is that
Manuel doesn’t know where she is. This is not a good or strong argument
because there can be many other reasons why Maria is not here yet, such as
her being on the way to Manuel or just her spending time getting ready.
2) This is an argument. The unstated conclusion is that the Israeli army fought a
great fight. The premises are that 23 soldiers died for that warfare, and it
being one of the greatest warfare’s ever. The assumption is that the soldiers
managed to protect most of the civlians. This argument is weak because they
don’t provide enough information onto the the casulities of civilians.
3) This argument is valid, strong, and sound. Since all history teachers prefer
dogs to cat, and Mr. Martinez is a history teacher, he too should prefer dogs
to cats.
4) This argument is invalid but good. Not all valid arguments are good
arguments, but some invalid arguments are more useful than valid
arguments.
5) The assumption is that people in the top 1 percentile do not have the
memory capacity for things that don’t involve spatial layouts and which will
be below average. The text doesn’t clearly state where the top 1 percentile
fall in memory capacity, and it was assumed that they fall below average,
when they could be above average.
6) The flaw is that Amy could have been tall and fair but not from the
mainstream movie industry which kept her form getting that award.
7) The flaw in this argument is that the crimes that only involved one or two
victims received capital punishment even though the parliament stated that
crimes that deserve capital punishment can only threaten large amounts of
people.
8) The assumption that this conclusion relies on is that their making an effort to
reduce the pollution output from their product manufacturing process. The
monitor the pollution level, but that doesn’t mean that they’ll change
anything.
9) This argument is that teachers union are radical and that there are teaching
an anti-American views to children in schools.
10) If multiple people can be in a friend group respectfully then there
should be no reason why a marriage between multiple people cannot be
legal. Same with love, if a man and woman love each other and can get
married. The same thing should apply with a man and man or a woman to a
woman or whoever to whoever.
