Why Your Arguments Suck - A Guide to Philosophical Logic

[0:00]Hey guys, welcome to my first video because I removed my other one, so this is now my first one. I kind of wanted to make a shift in my content and I thought what better way to do that than to not only start over with my content but to also give you guys essentially an introduction to Philosophical Logic. And the reason why I want to do this is because I have a lot of friends and mutuals and people who watch my content constantly telling me, "Raz, I would love to watch your videos more. I would love to engage with them more if I actually knew what you were talking about and I knew what terms you were using." And I also think it's really important for people to understand the fundamentals of logic which I'll get into the reason why later, but because of that, that's why I'm making my first video on this introduction to philosophical logic. It's gonna lay the foundations for you and by the end of this video, I hope you have a general understanding of what philosophy is and how it works. And hopefully I'm making this more accessible to people who don't have formal education or who are neurodivergent and struggle with reading and don't want to pick up a book. But anyways, let's get into it :) I want to start this video off by talking about how if you've been on TikTok, if you've seen Jubilee debates, if you've seen any debates online or on a stream, it often feels like you're watching a WWE match, except it's filled with a bunch of jargon and big words that you don't understand. And it's a common issue I see online today and I really, really hate the fact that philosophy has been misconstrued and weaponized because that's not what it's meant for. So before I get into teaching you what philosophical logic is and giving you an introduction to philosophy, I want to start today with a quote. And I got this from one of my textbooks from an elementary logic class I took. It's called "The Many worlds of Logic" and I'll put it up here on the screen. If you really want to learn philosophy in the formal way, I recommend you buy this book or any other introductory book, I'll put another one on the screen here. This video is intended to give you an in-depth understanding of an introduction to philosophy and philosophical logic, but of course it's going to be very general. You can learn a lot more from reading so I encourage you to read it in its entirety. But the quote I want to start us with today is, "Ideally when you consider an issue You ought to try and understand the main reasons for and against each of the different points of view on the matter." "Someone who tries to understand and evaluates all sides of an issue before drawing conclusions would be described as an intellectually fair individual." And this is what the heart of philosophy is supposed to be. It's not about who won the debate or who looked more confident or who got the most viral clip. The point of philosophy is to understand reality and each other as honestly as possible. I want you to take a look at our media and politics right now. Everything is entangled with rhetoric, branding, and performance. People aren't trained to think anymore. They're trained to pick a side and then go find whatever arguments make their side look good. And because philosophy and debate have become more accessible to people online, which in many ways is very, very beautiful, it's also created a dilemma. People will go out and learn enough rhetoric and enough logic to sound smart, but not enough humility to be good faith. So now the debate space has become an area where, we're not necessarily looking for truth. It's become a place to one up your opponent. That's why Jubilee debates are oftentimes so inflammatory because the goal here isn't to cultivate meaningful conversation. It's to flex, it's to farm views, it's to farm clips. Winning has become more important than understanding. We treat debates like they're battles or boxing matches, not like collaborative problem solving. And as I mentioned before, that is quite literally the heart of philosophy. And when we have these kinds of attitudes, that's how you cultivate a culture where people are essentially more concerned with sounding correct than actually being correct. They're not as concerned with truth as they should be, or sometimes even philosophical tools are used or weaponized to justify absurd positions. Like people seriously trying to defend things like bestiality or other intuitively harmful behavior, just to see how far they can push it. They want to see how far they can take their arguments before they can win and you can't refute them. So before I even teach you anything about formal logic, I need to clarify this. If you want to study philosophy, you should value and you should care about intellectual honesty. And you should care about it more than you care about winning, and you should care about it more than you care about sounding smart. And these sentiments have been echoed by the mouths of the greats for centuries. The greatest philosophers were obsessed with humility and it was the foundation of their character. Socrates himself said, "The only thing that I know is that I know nothing." And that's not just some aesthetic quote that he had to portray himself as someone who is humble. It's the posture that you're supposed to have as someone who's a philosopher. So essentially what I'm trying to communicate here is that philosophy is not a weapon to prove that you are right. It's a method for understanding reality, understanding each other, and communicating that understanding in the clearest way possible so that it can benefit society. This is kind of corny but it kind of relates to the quote, "with great power comes great responsibility" and knowledge and philosophy is that great power. Knowledge is a is a burden, it's not a flex, so that we can pass on knowledge to the later generations so that we can make things easier for other people to understand. Now let's talk about the power and danger of words. So I'm going to bring up a second quote because this one is also crucial for logic. Although we think we govern our words, certain it is that words as a tartar's bow do shoot back upon the understanding of the wisest and mightily entangle and pervert the judgment so that it is almost necessary in all controversies and disputations to imitate the wisdom of the mathematicians in setting down in the very beginning the definitions of our words and terms, that others may know how we accept and understand them and whether they concur with us or know. For it's cometh to pass for want of this that we are sure to end where we ought to have begun which is in questions and differences about words. This is a really, really convoluted way of saying if we don't define our terms, words will mess us up. You see this all the time. People will argue about what it means to be free, what it means to be racist, what it means to have rights, what it means to harm someone, whether or not someone is a woman, how is gender defined, what is God, who is God, how do we define God, and so forth. And at the end of the debate sometimes people realize they didn't even agree on what that word meant. They were emotionally fighting over different concepts using these same words and that's why defining your terms, your framework, your criteria at the start is not pedantic or too academic, it's necessary. Some people will think it's excessive, they'll ask why is it necessary for us to define our terms. But if you two don't agree on what the question is and what the terms are, you're not actually talking to each other. So when we do philosophy, real philosophy, we have to define our terms, clarify our framework, and make explicit what we mean and that's where formal logic comes in. Otherwise if you're debating you end up finishing where you were meant to start, which is defining your terms and arguing about words. I know I know I know I'm tangenting but before we dive into the mechanics of philosophical logic I need to give one more piece of advice. Be a modest skeptic. And what I mean by that is question things. Don't be quick to attach yourself to an ideology just because it makes you feel seen or righteous. Don't brand yourself with a label and then spend the rest of your life defending it at all costs when you're not even sure if it's true, it's just what you grew up with or what you've always known. And also, avoid becoming an ideologue. That's just something I personally believe can become harmful. In my opinion I don't think that you should call yourself an "x-ist" or a "y-ist" and then twist reality to fit that framework. Only subscribe to a framework and only make strong claims when you actually understand what they entail and you have sufficient knowledge to say, "yeah I stand by this." And that's what it means to be good faith, that's what it means to have integrity, that's what it means to not be disingenuous, that's what it means to be humble. And when you maintain all of these values or at least you try to, because we're human beings we're going to fall short, we have our biases, we're emotional, whatever it may be. Admittedly, I've fallen victim to some of these things but when you maintain all of these values or at least you try to, philosophy is incredibly powerful. And one more thing about philosophy is I like to describe it as a steep learning hill. That's not to say that essentially if you're at the bottom of the learning hill that you're dumb, it's just that you haven't studied philosophy enough. The higher up on the hill someone is, that is the more reading that they've done, the more history they've studied, the more quote unquote logic they studied, the more quote unquote insane they can sound to people who haven't climbed that hill yet, so layman's. Philosophical logic almost has its own language, new terms, strict definitions, weird distinctions that seem unnecessary until you see why they matter. So sometimes if you hear someone further on that learning hill talking about something pertaining to flaws of your morality, whatever it may be, sometimes it genuinely sounds like they're speaking another language and it's almost because they are. And so what happens in situations like this? Someone well read talks about a sensitive topic in a very cold and logical way. And to the layperson this can sound monstrous or unfeeling or insensitive. And on the other end of the spectrum, some people weaponize jargon to shut down laymen, essentially saying "you don't know the term, therefore your point is weak and invalid." And then it turns into this thing where the layman is like, oh you're just using big words to sound smart and blah, blah, blah, we're not actually arguing, we're not actually communicating. Both sides end up frustrated. But now that I've went on that crazy tangent and I've yapped your ear off, let's summarize everything I just said. What actually matters is that you be good faith, that you don't assume your opponent is evil just because they use precise language, that we don't always attach individuals opinions to their character. Right? Someone's not intrinsically evil because they have a different political position than you. Tolerance--to a certain degree of course--is essential to cultivating meaningful conversation. You have to allow the space for people to be wrong sometimes, to hold different opinions, to hold fringe opinions. And obviously this is in the case that they're not, you know, causing harm to others. But also don't assume someone is stupid because they don't use precise language yet. Be good faith. If someone doesn't understand philosophy or these convoluted terms that you have studied and you understand, try to fill in the gaps for them. Try to understand what they're trying to argue and try to help them articulate their own point. Or maybe even try to steel man their argument. This is basically where you try to present the strongest version of an opponent's argument. It's the complete opposite of straw manning, which we'll get into later. And that leads into my last point which is try to understand what the other person means, not just the words that they picked. If we can cultivate this kind of environment online, a culture of intellectual fairness, definitional clarity, and modest skepticism, the philosophical space wouldn't feel as repulsive and toxic as it often does now. Alright now that I've lectured you like a disappointed amo, let's get into it. Okay I just realized how close I was to the camera so backing the f*** up. But anyways, let's get into an introduction to philosophical logic. Philosophical logic is huge. I'm not going to pretend like I could cover everything in one video, but my goal here is to give you enough of a foundation to be more objective, to actually analyze arguments instead of reacting, and then honestly just to help you debate without just sounding confident and calling it logic. I want you guys to be able to debate and not operate on rhetoric. And I also want you guys to be able to engage with my own arguments without being rhetorical. If someone's going to refute me, I want them to be logical because I get really annoyed when people aren't. That's another value you should have. You should try to be patient and that is something I'm working on. But yeah a lot of harm online and offline comes from people not understanding what being logical actually means. They confuse rhetoric with reasoning. Rhetoric is persuasive language. It's about convincing people. It has its place in politics, speeches, sales, fundraising, marketing. Rhetoric sounds like for example, "you shouldn't eat meat because animals are cute and you should feel bad for them as well." I might have made a persuasive and convincing case as to why you shouldn't eat meat, but it doesn't necessarily make it true that it's morally wrong to eat meat. Rhetoric doesn't belong in the center of conversations about truth and objectivity, and that's what philosophical logic focuses on. Truth is not about who convinces who and objectivity is not about who sounds smarter. Objectivity is about uncovering what is actually true independent of who believes it or how charismatic they are. So what is logic? Logic is going to be the systematic study of reason. Its goal is to help us separate good arguments, which are ones that actually support their conclusions, from bad arguments, which are ones that are invalid, manipulative, poorly constructed, or even logically fallacious. Logic essentially gives us the tools to check if a conclusion really follows from its premises, to identify fallacies and emotional manipulation, and to build arguments in a way that's structured and clear. And also a side note that I forgot to mention prior. The reason why I really don't like rhetoric is because oftentimes the reason why it's so convincing is because they are using logical fallacies. It's very, very emotionally persuasive, and we see it a lot in politics, we see it in a lot of lazy debates, and that's why I'm so against it. I think it's the root of all problems when it comes to disinformation and most things harmful. But anyways, now the question is, given those things, how do we reason or justify a belief? We do this by giving arguments. So what is an argument? In philosophy, an argument is simply reasons offered in support of a claim. The reasons you give are called premises, and the claim they are meant to support is the conclusion. So every argument has three key elements. One is that it has one or more premises. Number two is that it has one conclusion, and number three is an explicit or implicit claim that the premises give you a good reason to accept the conclusion. But this is one important thing I want to note, I want to make clear, is that not everything people say is an argument. Like don't be obnoxious, okay? Not everything is to be argued with. Some things are just opinions, like I don't like this song. Some things are commands, like close the door. Some things are questions, like what time is it? Some things are warnings, like don't touch that, it's hot. And some things are explanations or reports, like it rained yesterday. These are not arguments. An argument, strictly speaking, has to be something that can be evaluated as true or false, and that offers reasons. If a sentence cannot be true or false, like close the door, it isn't even the kind of thing that we judge for truth. So when you're listening to someone, when you're engaging in dialectic, ask yourself, are they giving premises? Are they trying to support a conclusion, or are they just expressing a feeling, giving a command, or telling a story? Not everything needs to be debunked, not everything needs to be argued with. If it's not an argument, it doesn't need a counter argument. Don't be obnoxious. So let's give a simple example of what clean logical arguments look like, and this is what we like to call syllogistic form. An example of syllogism would be premise 1: All Vulcans are logical and control their emotions. Premise 2: Spock is a Vulcan. Conclusion: Therefore, Spock is logical and controls his emotions. So if you're watching and not just listening, lines one and two on the screen are the premises, and line three is the conclusion. The idea essentially is if one and two are true, then three must be true. And that quote unquote must follow relationship is what logic is analyzing. Now we can get into the two different types of arguments, or the two branches of philosophy, which are deductive and inductive arguments. These are literally everywhere. They're in math, science, social sciences, everyday reasoning, etc. So let's start with deductive arguments. Deductive arguments claims that if the premises are true, it is impossible for the conclusions to be false. What deduction is looking to do is aim at certainty. So let's give a classic example of a deductive syllogism. Premise one, all men are mortal. Premise two, Socrates is a man. Conclusion, therefore Socrates is mortal. So here essentially if one and two are true, there is no possible world in which three is false. That's deduction. Now whether or not the premises are actually true in real life is a separate question. The point here is that the form of the argument guarantees the conclusion given the premises. Now what is an "Inductive Argument?" Inductive arguments make softer claims. It doesn't promise certainty, but it promises probability. So an inductive argument is one in which it claims that if the premises are true, it is unlikely, but not impossible that the conclusion is false. So what induction is aiming at is likelihood, not certainty. So just to kind of put this in perspective for you, because some people struggle with understanding the distinction between induction and deduction in the beginning, is I want you to imagine that if a deductive argument is true, what it's saying is that we have 100% certainty. Think of it statistically. On the other hand, if we have an inductive argument, and that that one is also true, what induction is saying is that there's a 1 to 99% likelihood of it being true. But induction will never reach 100% in the same way that deduction would. So again, induction is looking for probability, deduction is looking for certainty. So here's an example of an inductive argument: Premise 1: "I saw 7 swans last week and all of them were white." Premise 2: "I saw 5 swans today and all of them were white." Conclusion: Therefore, most swans are white. So what we're saying here is we're not saying all swans are white, because we haven't checked every swan on earth. It's not possible. And we can't check every swan to ever exist, at least currently. So what we're doing is we're inferring a likely general rule from limited data. And in reality, there are black swans. The fact that the conclusion could be wrong, even though the premises are true, is exactly what makes it inductive. So essentially, there's always going to be an exception to the rule that perhaps we're not considering. And so again, just to give you some perspective and how it applies to real life, this is very roughly, of course, with exceptions here and there, I'm generalizing here. But mathematics, for example, is mostly deductive. Given certain axioms, for example, 2 plus 2 equals 4 is always true in that system. Or take scientific laws. These can behave deductively, sometimes with a model, although they're inferred upon inductively. But scientific laws essentially say, given these conditions, this always happens. Whereas take scientific theories, for example, they tend to be more inductive. They're built from data, experiments, statistics, and they aim at very high probability, not absolute certainty. So take, for example, the theory of evolution is not proved like a math theorem. It's supported by massive converging evidence and is overwhelmingly likely to be true. For example, we can use Bayesian statistics or Bayes' model to calculate the likelihood of something being true. And in the case of evolution, which is essentially the foundational theory of biology, evolution has a greater than 99% likelihood of being true. And different fields have different levels of "purity." For example, we have a hierarchy. At the top, we have mathematics which is most deductive, and then we have physics which is essentially applied mathematics, and then we have chemistry which is essentially applied physics, and then we have psychology which is essentially applied biology, and then we have sociology which is essentially applied psychology. So all of these fields are interconnected in some ways, and they're contingent upon each other, but this is a generalization of the hierarchy of purity. Now this is not to say that math is better than sociology or that any other field that is less pure is less relevant. It just means that they use different blends of deduction and induction to answer different kinds of questions. So in some cases mathematics is going to be more preferable and more objective, and in some cases psychology can be more relevant and more preferable. Another thing I want to note and make a distinction of is that induction isn't necessarily worse than deduction and deduction isn't necessarily better than induction. They each have their respective applications and when applied appropriately one can be better than the other and sometimes even induction is better than deduction. So now how do we evaluate arguments for truth? How do we evaluate them for validity, soundness, strength, and cogency? How do we evaluate what makes an argument good? It differs for deductive and inductive arguments. For deductive arguments we ask one is it valid and two is it sound. A deductive argument is valid if it's impossible for all of the premises to be true and the conclusion to be false. So you want to ask if I grant you your premises does the conclusion have to follow. And if that is the case if we grant the premises then that argument is valid. So validity is about structure of the actual argument. It's not necessarily about truth. Now if we're evaluating specifically for truth of the premises and the argument and things of that nature, we would look at whether or not a deductive argument is sound. So a deductive argument is sound if and only if it is valid and all of its premises are actually true. So what soundness means is that the argument has good form, good logical structure, and it also has true premises. So take for example the deductive syllogism that I provided earlier of Socrates, all men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal. This is valid and the premises are true, so it's sound. Now how we evaluate premises for truth is a little bit more complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example, we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white. Therefore most swans are white. That's a strong inductive argument with true premises, so it's cogent. Now as I mentioned earlier how premises get their truth is a little bit complicated but one example and one generalization is if a premise has or is universally accepted as true. So for example we universally accept the claim that all men are mortal, right? Even though I can't go and check that every single man is actually mortal, we agree upon that. Now this is relevant because compare this to a lot of the arguments for or against the existence of God. Many of them are valid in structure that is if you accept the premises the conclusion follows, but a lot of people strongly disagree about whether the premises are true for a lot of arguments for or against God's existence. That is essentially why we don't have universal agreement about God's existence. The soundness of these arguments is contested. Now for inductive arguments we use slightly different language. So a strong inductive argument is one where the premises make the conclusion highly probable and a cogent inductive argument is strong and has premises that are actually true or well supported. So strongness in induction is what validity is to deduction, and cogency is what soundness is to deduction, but we use different terms for deduction and induction. So take the example of the swan inductive argument. I saw seven swans last week, all white. I saw five swans today, all white.