Identify the Conclusion

I'm presenting here an argument from a quiz that I took (and just got back)
in my philosophy (critical reasoning) course. Needless to say, I scored
highest in the class by getting everything correct except for this one. I will
later explain what statement I underlined as the conclusion and why I
believed the other statements were premises in support of it. Before I do, I'd
like you to give it a shot and explain.


Identify the conclusion:

"As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to
float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float
along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve
down into the layers."




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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

Identify the conclusion:

"As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to
float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float
along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve
down into the layers."

.

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Is that what you got too?

"Thinking is a lot like swimming"..? The simile is then justified in the next two sentences.

That's what I underlined as well.
The professer argued that I was incorrect, that,

Quote:

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As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to
float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float
along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve
down into the layers.

---

was the conclusion.

My reasoning (for my answer) is as follows,

Swimming -> easy to float on the surface, hard to dive deep.
Thinking -> easy to think on the surface, hard to think critically (deep).
Therefor, Swimming and Thinking are similar.

Even though it's a simile I maintained that it's structured similarly to
hypothetical syllogism. The professer, on other hand, claimed that the
phrase "As you may know" is being used as a premise indicator. I refuted by
saying that 'as you may know' is not the equivalent of saying 'you do know'.

I'm still confused.
I still think I'm correct.



[EDIT] I should further explain his reasoning, which looks more like:

Premise: Thinking is like swimming.
Premise: In swimming it's easy to float but hard to dive deep.
Therefore in thinking it's easy to float but hard to think deep.

But I feel like there's a serious error occurring here. There's no relation of support between the two (in this case) premises that assert that the similarity is
built on this specific characteristic. There could be a number of other characteristics that thinking and swimming have in common that can create the
similarity. I think I'm going to use the term incorrectly because this is not an "If A then B" argument, but it looks a lot like he's making an affirming the consequent error, or something a lot like it. We haven't gotten into analogies yet, so I'm not familiar with what the appropriate term would be.

I'd say you are correct.

What you teacher has underlined is the explanation of the conclusion. Right?

Like the majority philosophy teachers, your philosophy teacher is a fucking idiot.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Xei

Like the majority philosophy teachers, your philosophy teacher is a fucking idiot.

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HERE HERE!

I've long maintained that the majority of philosophy is intellectual masturbation.

The second premise is just a flowery rehashed version of the first under the simile. If one of them is the conclusion, they both are.

Actually, I need to think about that for a second.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

But I feel like there's a serious error occurring here. There's no relation of support between the two (in this case) premises that assert that the similarity is
built on this specific characteristic.

---

As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming, one gets wet. Similarly, when thinking, one gets wet.

What's the name of the fallacy, though? Do you know?

Premise: Metal and stone are similar.
Premise: Metal is conductive.
Therefore stone is conductive.

The premises, though true, are not linked at all. He's going out of his way to interpret the original argument in such a ways as to make it invalid.

Also, what kind of word is "similarly" in an argumentation? It's certainly not a conclusion indicator (..right?), but appears to only relate two premises.

I'm not sure. I got my 'critical thinking' from math so I never took a class that covers that the 'liberal arts' names. I'd just call it a bad argument. For our examples, I'd call it an invalid premise. It's a valid premise in his case but only because what comes after it is true. It's circular. I can break any one of the three statements and at least one of the others break as well.

I'm at work so I'm feeling a little rushed but the specific structure of it is that breaking the statement breaks one of the hypothesis.

Sounds like he is nitpicking to me. Honestly though, it sounds more like an English question, than a critical reasoning question.

The point of the exercise was to determine what the intended conclusion was,
regardless of whether or not the argument was even valid. It's just a terrible
example.

Quote:

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It's a valid premise in his case but only because what comes after it is true.

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And that gives the premise the characteristic of a conclusion. Exactly. Circular
argument, as you said. The bright side to this is that blowing your professor out
of the water can be satisfying, but also damaging to one's faith in their
education system.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Invader

I'm presenting here an argument from a quiz that I took (and just got back)
in my philosophy (critical reasoning) course. Needless to say, I scored
highest in the class by getting everything correct except for this one. I will
later explain what statement I underlined as the conclusion and why I
believed the other statements were premises in support of it. Before I do, I'd
like you to give it a shot and explain.


Identify the conclusion:

"As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve down into the layers."




.

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The whole premise seems to encompass the ideology that thinking is a lot like swimming. Further in the paragraph they go on with examples and comparison, yet all circled around the main idea. So I would have to say the premise is the conclusion... just from my common sense. If the last sentence was correct (conclusion), it would run something like "Therefore, it's easy in thinking to float..." rather than "Similarly...". Similarly implies further clarification through comparison, rather than a "concluding" idea or message. Yet "As you may know" is a precursor for introducing your conclusion, not to sound ironic. For example "As you may know now "x" and "y" now we can posit "z" from inference.

I guess the way to look at this would be from the readers point of view and try to figure out how you would want to end and entire essay about the similarity of thinking and swimming. The sentence "As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming" would make the most sense as a conclusion if you looked at it like this:

Introductory Paragraph: Author Introduces thinking and swimming and the relationship they have with each other.

First Paragraph: Author goes on describing characteristics of swimming comparatively to thinking.

Second Paragraph: Author continues comparative ideology but this time describing characteristics of thinking with respect to swimming.

Conclusion Paragraph: "As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve down into the layers."

The first sentence concludes that thinking is a lot like swimming by essentially restating the thesis of the introduction. Second sentence illustrates first paragraph, whilst the third sentence illustrates the second paragraph.

Back to work XD.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming, one gets wet. Similarly, when thinking, one gets wet.

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True, depends what your thinking about XD.

The solution seems ambiguous at best.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

The point of the exercise was to determine what the intended conclusion was,
regardless of whether or not the argument was even valid. It's just a terrible
example.

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That changes the exercise completely. That possibility didn't even occur to me and if you mentioned it in your OP, I no doubt would have subconciously ignored it. Why do we care about bad arguments?

The argument that we drew from it was far stronger than the one the professor was intending.....

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

The bright side to this is that blowing your professor out
of the water can be satisfying, but also damaging to one's faith in their
education system.

---

My advice is to not take philosophy classes seriously. If you want to study critical thinking, take math out to the first abstract algebra course. Generally, you would need linear algebra as a prereq which comes after calc 2.

If you can take analysis (where one actually proves calculus) so much the better.

Those two courses will teach proof instead of a level of critical thinking which you seem to possess already.

I'm not saying that all philosophy is full of shit, just that most of the people that teach it are. I guess the point that I'm trying to make is that crap like that doesn't fly in math and science.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

What's the name of the fallacy, though? Do you know?

Premise: Metal and stone are similar.
Premise: Metal is conductive.
Therefore stone is conductive.

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Non sequitur (does not follow).

There Are Three Conclusionz Z. O. M. G!!!!!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Invader

That's what I underlined as well.
The professer argued that I was incorrect, that,
was the conclusion.

My reasoning (for my answer) is as follows,

Swimming -> easy to float on the surface, hard to dive deep.
Thinking -> easy to think on the surface, hard to think critically (deep).
Therefor, Swimming and Thinking are similar.

Even though it's a simile I maintained that it's structured similarly to
hypothetical syllogism. The professer, on other hand, claimed that the
phrase "As you may know" is being used as a premise indicator. I refuted by
saying that 'as you may know' is not the equivalent of saying 'you do know'.

I'm still confused.
I still think I'm correct.



[EDIT] I should further explain his reasoning, which looks more like:

Premise: Thinking is like swimming.
Premise: In swimming it's easy to float but hard to dive deep.
Therefore in thinking it's easy to float but hard to think deep.

But I feel like there's a serious error occurring here. There's no relation of support between the two (in this case) premises that assert that the similarity is
built on this specific characteristic. There could be a number of other characteristics that thinking and swimming have in common that can create the
similarity. I think I'm going to use the term incorrectly because this is not an "If A then B" argument, but it looks a lot like he's making an affirming the consequent error, or something a lot like it. We haven't gotten into analogies yet, so I'm not familiar with what the appropriate term would be.

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With no drawn-out logical process ( not to say that I didn't think about it at all, but I didn't go through a process ), I got the same answer. Keep in mind, I don't know a lot of the college-level reasoning or terms, but this is my less educated answer:

It seems to me that the point that is trying to be made is that it's easier to float on top of the information rather than use your strength to delve down (paraphrase), and, in the statement, using the simile that swimming is like thinking in order to find an easy way to back up the argument.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Invader

I'm presenting here an argument from a quiz that I took (and just got back)
in my philosophy (critical reasoning) course. Needless to say, I scored
highest in the class by getting everything correct except for this one. I will
later explain what statement I underlined as the conclusion and why I
believed the other statements were premises in support of it. Before I do, I'd
like you to give it a shot and explain.


Identify the conclusion:

"As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming. In swimming it's easy to
float on the top but hard to dive deep. Similarly, it's easy in thinking to float
along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve
down into the layers."




.

---

I believe the reason that "it's easy in thinking to float
along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve
down into the layers" is underlined is because of the word "similarly."

The conclusion is defining what is similar about it. If you already know that thinking is a lot like swimming, and the thing which we are comparing is not being able to easily delve to the deepest parts of problems, then that which is similar to swimming of thinking is "conclusion."

Sort of like "based on these premises what about thinking is similar to swimming?" Assuming you know what about swimming and thinking are like, which by the way, the prompt says you might.

However, if my reasoning is correct it would seem like you could have skipped the description of swimming. Actually, no, I don't think you could because then you couldn't slip in the word similarly.

I guess the whole reasoning for me would be that "as you might know" assumes you have knowledge of the characteristics of both swimming and thinking, at that point it provides a description of swimming, then it provides you with the second premise about what swimming is like. Assuming you know about swimming and thinking, if swimming is like this, then similarly this.

Based on what you know about the similarities of thinking and swimming, if swimming is like this, what is most likely similar about thinking to swimming?

Even though I had to really work to try to get it to seem like this to me. I would have underlined the same thing you underlined.

"thinking is a lot like swimming" is the conclusion. As others have pointed out, the rest is justification and explanation, and therefore cannot be the conclusion.

Observation: "it's easy in thinking...."
Conclusion: "thinking is like swimming"

This works because the observation supports the conclusion; it follows the chain of reasoning.


Let's try reversing it:

Observation "thinking is like swimming"
Conclusion: "it's easy in thinking..."

It doesn't work at all. It doesn't follow any reasoning because there's no premise on which the observation stands. It's an assertion on no basis.

Okay yes, you could say it is the conclusion, but anyone rational would be staring at you saying "how the hell did you get to that?"; it's a non sequitur as pointed out elsewhere. If they think that, then their reasoning skills are shit.


I seem to have a sense of deja vu regarding this. I'm sure someone's posted this before.

How can there be a conclusion if there is no line of reasoning? The only thing he does is make an anology. Thinking is like swiming. Swimming is like this, similary, thinking is like this. Conclusion? Thinking is like swimming... wait, wasn't that the statement we started with? This guy is giving a description of how thinking is like swimming, if you give a description of the mechanics of something you can't possibly expect there to be a conclusion. There is no conclusion to a description.

How can you identify the conclusion, if a conclusion must be a whole paragraph long and there is only one paragraph? Yup.. your teacher is pretty retarded indeed. He could as well have asked you to identify the paragraph.. the level of retardation is pretty close to asking to identify a paragraph when there is only one paragraph.

""As you may know, thinking is a lot like swimming because in swimming it's easy to float on the top but hard to dive deep and similarly, it's easy in thinking to float along on the surface of an issue but difficult to use your intellect to delve down into the layers.""

You can rewrite the paragraph into one single sentene, what is the point in trying to identify the conclusion in one single sentence?