Ct All Flashcards
What is cognitive bias?
The systemic ways in which people categorize and make sense of the world to make judgments and decisions.
What is alief?
The automatic belief-like attitude that can explain how our instinctual responses can conflict with our well-reasoned beliefs.
What is anchoring?
The human tendency to stick close to the first piece of information we have about a new domain even if it is not presented as a fact.
What are heuristics?
a rule of thumb, a ready strategy, or a shortcut.
What is the representativeness heuristic?
A cognitive bias in which an individual categorizes a new situation based on nearest prototype or represntative experience in their mind
What is the availability heuristic
A cognitive bias in which an individual takes available information while not seeking out or considering unknown information resulting in a person jumping to conclusion
Name four cognitive biases
Representativeness heuristic and the availability heuristic (also heuristics in general)
Anchoring
Alief
What is a proposition?
Statements that can be true or false
What is a simple proposition?
no internal logical structure. Whether they are true or false doesn’t depend on whether a part of them is true or false.
What is a complex proposition?
Have an internal logical structure. Composed of simple propositions. Whether they are true or false depends on whether their parts are true or false and how those parts are connected.
What are 5 key words that might indicate a complex proposition?
and
or
but
either…or
if…then
What is a premise?
a proposition lending support to a conclusion whether directly or indirectly.
What two ways can arguments go wrong
- bad inferential structure
- false premise
Name some conclusion indicators (10)
therefore
so
it follows that
hence
thus
entails that
implies that
wherefore
as a result
we may conclude that…
Name some premise indicators (7)
Because
for
given that
in that
as
since
as indicated by
What is a deductive argument?
meant to provide decisive support for their conclusions.
What are inductive argument?
meant to provide probable support for their conclusions
What kind of arguments are sound?
Deductive
What kind of arguments are valid?
Deductive
What kind of arguments are cogent?
Inductive
What kind of arguments are strong?
Inductive
What are ampliative arguments?
arguments that are not inductive which include both inductive and abductive arguments.
What is abduction?
drawing a conclusion based on the explanation that best explains a state of events, rather than from evidence provided by the premises.
What are formal fallacies
arguments with a flawed structure
what are informal fallacies?
flawed because of their content
what is the antecedent
is the if in an if…then statement
What is the consequent?
is the then in an if..then statement
What is affirming the consequent?
If X, then Y
Y
Therefore, X
What is denying the antecedent?
If X, then Y
Not X
Not Y
What is Modus Ponens?
Affirming the antecedent
What is Modus Tollens
Denying the consequent
What is equivocation?
All X are Y
What is W cannot be Z
Therefore no X are Z
What is the fallacy fallacy?
when someone uses the fact that a fallacy was committed to justify rejecting the conclusion of the fallacious argument.
What is begging the question
Occurs when one (either explicitly or implicitly) assumes the truth of the conclusion in one or more of the premises.
What is the principle of charity?
interpreting your opponents argument or position in the most defensible position possible.
What is confirmation bias?
the natural tendency to seek out evidence that supports personal beliefs and to ignore evidence that undermines those beliefs
What is cognitive bias?
Widespread tendencies to deviate from rational belief- forming practices
What is alief?
automatic belief-like attitudes that can explain how our instinctual responses can conflict with our reasoned beliefs
Define Heuristic
a rule of thumb, a ready strategy, a shortcut
What are representative heuristics?
When faced with a new situation, we find the nearest prototype to help us understand what’s going on.
What is the availability heuristic
a process where the mind generalizes based on what is available to it rather than what is objectively true
“Every ______ I can think of is ________, so it seems reasonable to me to think that alll __________s are ___________.
Availability Heuristic
What is Non-Response Bias?
The people who are most likely to complete a survey are systemically different form those who don’t
What is stratified random sampling?
Splits the population into groups of interest and randomly selects people from each of the “strats” so that each group in the overall sample is represented proportionally
What is cluster sampling?
creates clusters that are naturallly occurring and randomly selects a few clusters to survey instead of randomly selecting individuals.
What is snowball sampling?
When current respondents are asked to help recruit people they know from the population of interest.
What is system 1 thinking?
Fast, automatic and emotional thinking
What is system 2 thinking?
Deliberate, effortful, and calculating thinking
What is AD Hominem?
attacking the argues instead of the argument.
What is a straw man fallacy
someone misinterprets someone else’s argument or position, characterizing it uncharitably so as to make it appear ridiculous or indefensible.
What is a Red Herring
not staying on topic.
What is the appeal to force?
argues that some proposition is true but uses it as a justification to claim a threat on the listener.
What is Ad Populem?
Appeal to popularity to justify a practice, claim, or idea.
What is appeal to consequences?
trying to assess truth or reasonableness of an idea based on the (typically negative) consequences of accepting that idea
What is the appeal to ignorance?
We don’t know whether proposition X is true or false
Therefore it is true or false
What is slippery slope
When one event is said to lead to some other (usually disastrous) event via a chain of intermediary events
What is a Texas Sharpshooter
Could also be called the cherry-picking of evidence. Someone already knows what conclusion they’d like to prove and selects evidence which supports that conclusion.
Post Hoc ergo Propter Hoc
After something, therefore because of that thing.
X occurred before Y
Therefore X caused Y
What is a hasty generalization?
a generalization made about a group of people, events, etc made too quickly without proper evidence or with evidence containing too small of a sample size.
What is a false dilemma / black and white thinking?
assumed without good reason that there are fewer options (usually two) than there really are.
What is burden of proof shifting?
Deciding someone else must prove them wrong when they have the burden of proof. One should prove themselves right.
What are syllogisms?
simple arguments. 2 premises and 1 conclusion or 1 premise and 1 conclusion.
In an argument map, what do arrows imply?
inferential links or support.
- I know voodoo is real.
- my cousin saw someone take on the characteristics, personality, and voice of a spirit during a ceremony.
- My cousin told me they saw this last week.
What kind of support is 1. 2. and 3.
- conclusion
- premise.
- indirect support
What is independent support?
When each premise seems like an argument for its conclusion on its own
What is conjoint support
When a premise doesn’t seem to support the conclusion without the help of other premises.
How do you test for conjoint support/
By pretending one of the premises if false and seeing if it affects any of the other premises’ validity.
What is the general-specific pattern
when you see two premises where one premise is a general definition, generalization, or a hypothetical, conditional, or a general principle and the other is a specific claim about an individual under that generalization.
What is a level/layer of an argument
one horizontal row of a carefully drawn argument map
What is a main conclusion?
the final conclusion in an argument. Doesn’t serve as a premise or support for any other proposition.
What is a main premise?
One amount the set of premises directly supporting the main conclusion.
What is a sub-inference?
an inference from a premise to another premise. The conclusion of a sub-inference is never the bottom-most layer.
What is a sub-premise?
a premise of a sub-inference.
What is a sub-conclusion?
a conclusion of a sub-inference. A sub-conclusion is always a premise itself and it is usually one of the main premises unless the argument gets really complex
Define inference
a conclusion reached on the basis of evidence and reasoning
what is a hidden assumption?
assumptions that are part of an argument but are not explicitly stated.
what is normative principle?
a general rule which allows us to move from a simple statement of supposed fact to a prescription of what we should do.
