Critical Thinking Core Concepts

Understanding more complicated Passages:

• (1) Looking at the context- trying to determine the general point of the argument - may involve several steps:
• (a) May require several careful readings
• (b) may assume that we know something about the author or their views (or their opposition) - this will allow us to pick out satirical comments or tongue-in-cheek comments. (It will be important in this area to realize our own prejudices so that they do not interfere with our assessment of the argument. Classic example of the "phantom essay", where the name and title of the author were changed, but not the content of the essay. This changed the assessment of the essay by a college audience.)
• (c) What seems to be the most important point/conclusion reached? (good place to look here is the title or at the language use throughout the argument (watch out for satire)
• (d) As always, look for and note the premise and conclusion indicators, keeping in mind the lessons of the last section.

• (1) Locate the conclusion-
• (a) from here, you can more easily identify what statements will count as descriptions, explanations, etc. and which will serve as premises (also helps if you know what is being argued for in general)
• (b) will also help in identifying and adding any implicit premises (presuppositions) or conclusions.
• (2) Penetrate the Prose-
• (a) define any unknown terms or words, either by using the dictionary or by the context/use under which they appear (will depend on our experience)
• (b) rewrite the premises for clarity (you can oversimplify on the first go in order to understand the argument better), paraphrase if possible to make the claims more precise.
• (3) Eliminate the Excess-
• (a) get rid of anything which may distract us from the actual argument- Change any prejudicial language to a more neutral wording.
• (b) any non-controversial descriptions/explanations can be eliminated if they do not directly support the conclusion or any premises. (i.e.- eliminate any appeals to emotion, etc.) Of course, any controversial premises or claims which do support the argument will have to be defended.
• (4) Search out the structure-
• (a) Figure out which statements serve as premises, and paraphrase them in order to reveal the meaning/content of the claim. It may help to oversimplify on the first re-write and add in the original language on the second go-around. This step allows us to evaluate the formal structure of the argument- later on we will see how to attach the argument based on the justification of the individual premises.

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Last modified: 03/02/04