EVALUATING MORAL ARGUMENTS
’ QUICK REVIEW statement—An assertion that something is or is
not the case.
argument—A group of statements, one of which is supposed to be supported by the rest.
premise—A supporting statement in an argument.
conclusion—The statement supported in an argument.
indicator words—Terms that often appear in argu- ments to signal the presence of a premise or conclusion, or to indicate that an argument is deductive or inductive.
deductive argument—An argument that is sup- posed to give logically conclusive support to its conclusion.
inductive argument—An argument that is sup- posed to offer probable support to its conclusion.
valid argument—A deductive argument that does in fact provide logically conclusive sup- port for its conclusion.
invalid argument—A deductive argument that does not offer logically conclusive support for the conclusion.
strong argument—An inductive argument that does in fact provide probable support for its conclusion.
weak argument—An inductive argument that does not give probable support to the conclusion.
sound argument—A valid argument with true premises.
cogent argument—A strong argument with true premises.
the assembled arguments. In many cases, though, there is an additional obstacle: some premises may be implied instead of stated. Sometimes the prem- ises are implicit because they are too obvious to
213006_03_039-064_r1_el.qxp:213006_03_039-064_r1_el 8/3/15 9:46 AM Page 47
mention; readers mentally fill in the blanks. But in most cases, implicit premises should not be left unstated. It is often unclear what premises have been assumed; and unless these are spelled out, argument evaluation becomes difficult or impossi- ble. More to the point, unstated premises are often the most dubious parts of an argument. This prob- lem is especially common in moral arguments, where the implicit premises are frequently the most controversial and the most in need of close scrutiny.