Go ahead, you pick the
subject. I’ll even let you pick either
side of the issue. I’ll take the other
side. But, should warn
you. I’m loaded for bear. You will be engaging a lean mean fighting
machine in this battle. I’m mentally
riff. Why, I’d reject your ad hominen attacks, expose your begging the question, tear
down your straw men, meet your generalizations head on with counter-instances,
make fun of your terminological obfuscations and rebuff all your ipsedixitisms. In
short, argue with me now and I’ll eat you up and spit you out in little
pieces. You are probably wondering how I
became such a well-honed arguing machine.
It’s because I finally read a book by Jerry Cederblom
and David Paulsen, Critical Reasoning. (Belmont California,
Wadsworth/Thomas learning. 2001). Now
I’m equipped to win any side of any argument.
I can even argue with myself now and always win. I don‘t even need to believe something
to win an argument any more, so watch out if you tangle with me! But just to make this a fair fight I’ll even
share my arsenal of definitions I’ve simplified from the book. So to make this more even, here are my
simplified definitions of some terms to prepare you for the first round. Learn these well if you want to spar with me! (Of course I’m just kidding here—I don’t want
to argue at all, I just read the book in an afternoon and these are my rough
notes in case anyone is interested.)
Critical Thinking Terms