DCSZ TOK Class Blog

A logical fallacy is basically an error in reasoning. One example of logical fallacy is ‘argumentum ad hominem’ which means attacking the person. It means that the argument is made against the opponent instead of against the opponent’s argument.

For example, A says that watching TV is bad, then B say that you always [...]

We are discussing reasoning recently as one of the ways of knowing. I learned that there are two ways of reasoning, inductive and deductive. I found this very interesting because I can immediately relate to all of my lessons in school.

For example, some of the theories we learned in biology are inductive, because [...]

The genetic logical fallacy is judging something good or bad on the basis of where it comes from, or from whom it comes.

You can judge people on the basis of where they come from, and that is a failure in reasoning. As people say, don’t judge a book by its cover.  I have [...]

So, in TOK we have been looking at ways in which you can reason things, the way of reasoning. In summary, you need two premises to make a conclusion, and that becomes a valid argument but isn’t necessarily true. Something I found interesting was that there is a cycle:

general rules –> (deductive reasoning) –> specific [...]

In last TOK class, we had a sheet of different fallacies in our life. It is quite funny that these fallacies are commonly used not only by politicians and ad, but also by our parents or ourselves.

Fallacy=wrong reasoning, it might be an appropriate formula to define ‘Fallacy’. People use invalid reasons to support [...]

In last T.O.K class, we discussed about the topic ‘fallacy’. And i felt very sympathy when we told about logical fallacy because there are many logical fallacy when people communicate each other. among the types of logical fallacy, the interesting part is ‘hasty generalization’. It occurs when people judge rashly. For example, we heard [...]

In T.O.K class, we discussed about reasoning. During discussing, the interesting point is difference of everyone’s reasons.  and the reason of this difference is because of  we have different ways to thinking like emotion and perception. when we decide something, we often do reasoning because it help us think more big. For example, if someone [...]

On November 21st, 2012, we looked through different types of logical fallacy. The term logical fallacy is an error in reasoning. Fallacious reasoning keeps us from knowing the truth, which makes us unable to manipulate in the art of rhetoric.

We often speak a lot of logical fallacies in our conversations. For example, a [...]

This is essentially disagreeing though the evidence is obvious and is contrary to what you’re saying. I think this is a quite common fallacy that we see a lot in everyday life. The thing is that humans have quite a lot of pride in the themselves and it doesn’t come very easy to some [...]

For the last TOK class, we looked through many types of logical fallacy such as black or white theory, gambler fallacy and straw man, etc.  There are lots of logical fallacies that I had never recognized before the lesson. Actually, there are some logical fallacies which I often use in my conversations with others. [...]

There are many logical fallacies that people make when they communicate. From those, I am going to explain about the logical fallacy called “appeal to emotion”. This logical fallacy is usually used for manipulating by an emotion, not by valid argument.

For example, if a student says to a teacher that, “Please give me [...]

Last Wednesday, we learnt about logical fallacies in TOK class. There are 24 logical fallacies such as slippery slope, false cause and ad hominem. The most interesting one is ‘the gambler’s fallacy’. The gambler’s fallacy is when an individual believes that the onset of a certain random event is less likely to happen following [...]

In TOK class, we talked about reasoning which is one of the ways of knowing. Until now, we learnt about perceptions and languages. But I think ‘reasoning’ is the most interesting one. There are statements and conclusion and we need to find out that the statements and conclusion are valid or invalid and true [...]

last week, we talked about reasoning, it was quite interesting because we had to figure out it is right or not. slippery slope was very interesting because a lot of people always make this mistake. for example, parent always think that computer game will make children hard to study and that will cause students [...]

Few lessons ago, we learnt new way of knowing, reasoning. It was very different from language and perception. Reasoning is like a puzzle. We need to think logically to get the answer. It was very interesting and exciting to learn about reasoning even though it made my brain hurt.

Overall, I think reasoning is [...]

During our last TOK class we discussed about ways of reasoning things. Everyone reasons everything differently, due to our different ways of thinking which are emotion and perception. For the same situation people reason it differently and have different opinions on it due to different perspective of things. For example: some people reason things, tend to [...]

On Wednesday we talked about different types of logical fallacies and we were suppose to give one example, where we discuss what type of logical fallacy is occurring. On the sheet with the 17 different examples, I chose number 8. ‘Air bags in cars do not really increase safety, and besides, most cars with [...]

Few weeks ago, we changed our focus in to reasoning. I think reasoning is quite different from other three ways of knowing which are perception, language and emotion(we didn’t cover it yet). Simply, reasoning is more difficult than the three actually and more complicated. Some how, it is like puzzle or quiz. This made [...]

The definition of reasoning is the process by which you reach a conclusion after thinking all the facts. A syllogism a three-step argument derived from two premises and a conclusion. Using this theory, a valid argument has to be made before you have to decide your ‘true’ conclusion.

What is truth then? Truth is [...]

What is reasoning? I think it is a very hard question to answer.

Think in this way, what are our reasons based on? Is it DEDUCTIVE or INDUCTIVE?

Sometimes, we get out the rule from specific situation (inductive). On the class, the teacher gave an example about black and white swans. Before, people just [...]

Recently we took our first step into the field of reasoning in TOK classes. There are two types: deductive and inductive. Deductive reasoning is when we apply general rules onto specific situations. (e.g. pythagoras theory) Inductive reasoning is when we exploit specific situations to work out general rules. (e.g. white and black swans).

I [...]

Benjamin Franklin—printer, entrepreneur, scientist, inventor, community organizer, revolutionary, diplomat, celebrity—wrote one of the earliest autobiographies. In it he tells a story from his youth that neatly illustrates the value of reason in our lives.

I believe I have omitted mentioning that, in my first voyage from Boston, being becalm’d off Block Island, our people [...]

In now day, everything had changed in our society, people can use their eyes and ears to see and hear more informations from morden machines like computer, TV, radios etc.  we need sight to help us understand the informations that we read form books or Internet, we need hearing  to listen other people talking, [...]

Many influential people in history have used the same techniques shown in the documentary today. As long as the speaker “brings out” emotions within the crowd, he/she can influence them very easily. For example, not long after 9/11, George Bush made a speech that evoked anger against Iraq. This ultimately led to support for [...]

I think this is quite a confusing topic. I can’t put my head around to which are inductive and which are deductive reasoning. I think this is the easiest way to explain it;

“In deductive reasoning, the person offering the argument takes it that the premises guarantee the truth of the conclusion. If the premises are true, [...]