Chapter 10: Reasoning Flashcards
Affirmation of the consequent
Book definition: “The logical fallacy that one can reason from the affirmation of the consequent of a conditional statement to the affirmation of its antecedent: ‘If A, then B’ and ‘B is true’ together can be thought (falsely) to imply ‘A is true’. (p. 240)”
Antecedent
Book definition: “The condition of a conditional statement; that is, the A in ‘If A, then B’. (p. 239)”
Atmosphere hypothesis
Book definition: “The proposal by Woodworth and Sells that, when faced with a categorical syllogism, people tend to accept conclusions having the same quantifiers as those of the premises. (p. 248)”
Attribute identification
Book definition: “The problem of determining what attributes are relevant to the formation of a hypothesis. See also rule learning. (p. 253)”
Categorical syllogism
Book definition: “A syllogism consisting of statements that have logical quantifiers in which one premise relates A to B, another relates B to C, and the conclusion relates A to C. (p. 247)”
Conditional statement
Book definition: “An assertion that, if an antecedent is true, then a consequent must be true: a statement of the form ‘If A, then B’. (p. 239)”
Confirmation bias
Book definition: “The tendency to seek evidence that is consistent with one’s current hypothesis. (p. 255)”
Consequent
Book definition: “The result of a conditional statement; the B in ‘If A, then B’. (p. 239)”
Deductive reasoning
Book definition: “Reasoning in which the conclusions can be determined to follow with certainty from the premises. (p. 239)”.
Denial of the antecedent
Book definition: “The logical fallacy that one can reason from the denial of the antecedent of a conditional statement to the denial of its consequent: ‘If A, then B’ and ‘Not A’ together are thought (falsely) to imply ‘Not B’. (p. 241)”
Inductive reasoning
Book definition: “Reasoning in which the conclusions follow only probabilistically from the premises. (p. 239)”
Logical quantifiers
Book definition: “An element such as ‘all’, ‘no’, ‘some’ and ‘some not’ that appears in such statements as ‘All A are B’. (p. 246)”
Mental model theory
Book definition: “Johnson-Laird’s theory that participants judge a syllogism by imagining a world that satisfies the premises and seeing whether the conclusion is satisfied in that world. (p. 250)”
Modus tollens
Book definition: “The rule of logic stating that, if a conditional statement is true and its consequent is false, then its antecedent must be false: Given the proposition ‘If A, then B’ and the fact that ‘B is false’, we can infer that ‘A is false’. (p. 240)”
Modus ponens
Book definition: “The rule of logic stating that, if a conditional statement is true and its antecedent is true, then its consequent must be true: Given both the proposition ‘If A, then B’ and the proposition ‘A’, we can infer that ‘B is true’. (p. 239)”
