1. TOK Chs. 7-8, p. 94-132
Team 1: 94-100
Team 2: 101-106
Team 3: 107-113
Team 4: 114-120
Team 5: 121-127
Team 6: 128-132
Week 2:
Logic and Epistemology
TOK, p. 115-132
Selected Readings

2. Where we are Going?
• Blog 1: Gun Control
Argue Out Teams (10
Minutes)
• Notes: Ch.1-3 (18 min.,
3 min. each)
• Finish Week 1:
– What is a Knower?
– Intro to Ways of Knowing
• Start Week 2:
– Activity 3: Witch Trial
– Laws of Logic
– Formal and Informal
– Fallacies
– Blog 2: Fallacies

3. Loftus and Palmer (1974)
• Elizabeth Loftus investigated the
interaction between language,
memory and eyewitness
testimony.
• Conclusions:
– The way a question is
worded often leads to a
new reconstruction of a
memory
– Eyewitness testimony and
estimations are often a
dependent variable.
– What other factors
contribute to memory
dependancy?

4. Memory
• Memory and testimony are the
cognitive foundation of the
"knower"
– Neurologically, memories are chemical
reactions resulting from synapse
activation within the brain.
– Rationally, memories are the calculator
and "rulebook" that allows for proper
and logical thinking.
– Emprically, memories are the record of
our senses reconstructed through will or
by outside stimulai
– Pragmatically, memories are the
priorities of the world in which p;ersonal
meaning is constructed.
• Do we have memories of the way
things are, or is there always
personal bias? Do our senses
create accurate pictures of
reality?

5. The Ways of Knowing
• Reason
– Analytic and synthetic
– a priori or a posteriori
– constructs of logic that define a thing or
to define basic laws using symbolacrae
• Sense Perception
– Correspondance testing between
memory and seeing, etc.
– Basis for scientific philosophy.
– Often subjective and vulnerable to bias.
see aesthetic philosophy.
• Intuition/imagination (?)
– Memories reconstructed often with
disregard for the backward looking sense
perception and/or rationality to project
to future events, develop innovative
hypothesis, or to be a great artist.

6. The Ways of Knowing
• Language
– The symbols that connect our
thoughts to others
– Intrinsically indirect and
requires assumptions about the
world (such as the existence of
other minds).
– Often can present challenges
to synergy of information
• Emotion
– The personal reaction and
cultural parameters of
expression connecting to
others by thou

7. Tests of “Truthiness”
• Correspondence
– Statements are true so much as the
relate to actual, observable data from
the world.
• “The snow is white”
• Coherence
– Statements are true so much as they
are logically consistent with previous
beliefs about the world.
• “there are no pink elephants in Lake Elsinore
because I know elephants are gray, live in
africa…etc.”
• Pragmatic
– A statement is true if +it allows you to
interact effectively and efficeintly with
the cosmos.
• “My belief that inanimate objects do not
spontaneously get up and move about is true
because it makes my world more predictable
and thus easier to live in. It “works”

8. Testimony or Knowledge by
Authority
• Information about the
world often comes
through degrees of
testimony
– Data is received, passed,
written, consolidated,
taught, and recited.
• How might the “authority
fallacy” be different than
“knowledge by
authority?”
• List 10 things you know by
authority
• List 10 things you know by
personal testimony.

9. Knowledge Prism
Knower • Knowledge is reliant upon
various presuppositions:
Proofs and Truth Tests
Empirical Observation
– Rationality, laws of logic, and
language can be used
consistently and with meaning
– Statements and observations
can be investigated against
counter-factuals to correspond
some semblance of “external
world” and “the way things
really are”
– An identity and mind to
process, articulate, and
construct a worldview based
on observation and truth
statements.
Rationality

10. Rational and Empirical
• What is the difference between the
following phrases?:
– “2+2=4”
– “This cat is orange.”
– “I was probed by an alien last night.”
• Rationality: intuited propositions
deduced towards knowledge.
– A priori knowledge
• Empiricism: Knowledge and
concepts needed for knowledge
come from our senses and
perception.
– A posteriori knowledge

11. Plato: “Justified True Belief”
• Knowledge, according
to Plato, has three
parameters:
– Justified: Is a truth claim in
the realm of falsifiability?
– True: is there enough
evidence or reasonable
argument for its probable
correctness?
– Belief: do I internalize and
assume the claim into my
worldview and
understanding

12. Acquaintance vs. Description
• “If you can’t
say it, you
don’t know it”
– Hans Reichenbach (German
philosopher of science, 1891-1953)
• “I know more
than I can say.”
– Michael Polanyi (Hungarian
philosopher of science, 1891-1976)

13. Imagination
• “I am enough of an artist to draw freely
upon my imagination. Imagination is
more important than knowledge.
Knowledge is limited. Imagination
encircles the world.”
• “Everything you can imagine is real”
• “We are what we pretend to be, so we
must be careful about what we pretend
to be.”
• Can Imagination be a source of
knowledge? What would its limits be?
Can you know something that is only
feasible in your mind?

14. TOK Chs. 7-8, p. 94-132
Team 1: 94-100
Team 2: 101-106
Team 3: 107-113
Team 4: 114-120
Team 5: 121-127
Team 6: 128-132
Week 2:
Logic and Epistemology
TOK, p. 94-132
Selected Readings

15. Activity 3: The Illogical Game
• Watch the following clip from
Monty Python’s Quest for the
Holy Grail
• Identify 5 statements that
“don’t add up” based on your
prior knowledge and common
sense
• In teams of four, see if you can
identify the formal and informal
fallacies behind your
statements. List them out.
– If you don’t know the names, try
and describe/explain why they are
illogical.

16. Break down of the Argument
1. All witches are things that can burn.
2. All things that can burn are made of
wood.
3. Therefore, all witches are made of
wood. (from 1 & 2)
4. All things that are made of wood are
things that can float.
5. All things that weigh as much as a duck
are things that can float.
6. So all things that weigh as much as a
duck are things that are made of wood.
(from 4 & 5)
7. Therefore, all witches are things that
weigh as much as a duck. (from 3 & 6)
8. This thing is a thing that weighs as much
as a duck.
9. Therefore, this thing is a witch. (from 7 &
8)

18. Laws of Logic
• 1. Law of identity.
– Everything is what it is.
A is A or A is Identical
with A.
• 2. law of
Contradiction.
– A cannot be A and
not A at the same
time.
• 3. Law of Exculded
Midddle.
– A is either a or not A

19. Formal Logic
• Syllogism
– Two statements that
create conditions
towards and absolute
conclusion statement.
• Distribution
– A line in logic that is
properly moving from
specific to general (i.e.
all cats are mammals)
based on language.
• Modus Ponus
– Form of logical reasoning
that forms the basis of all
formal logic

20. Deductive Reasoning
• Taking general
statements of truth
about the world
and reasoning
towards a specific
conclusion.
• Formal logical
constructs like the
modus ponens are
deductive

21. Inductive Reasoning
• Inductive reasoning
is perhaps the
opposite of
deduction
• One takes specific
statements and
arrives at a general
conclusion/principle
• Which is more
scientific?

22. Formal Fallacies
• Affirmative conclusion
from a negative premise
(illicit negative) – when a
categorical syllogism has a
positive conclusion, but at
least one negative
premise.
• Fallacy of exclusive
premises – a categorical
syllogism that is invalid
because both of its
premises are negative.
• Fallacy of four terms
(quaternio terminorum) – a
categorical syllogism that
has four terms.

23. Formal Fallacies
• Illicit major – a
categorical syllogism
that is invalid because
its major term is not
distributed in the major
premise but distributed
in the conclusion.
• Illicit minor – a
categorical syllogism
that is invalid because
its minor term is not
distributed in the minor
premise but distributed
in the conclusion.

24. Formal Fallacies
• Negative conclusion
from affirmative
premises (illicit
affirmative) – when a
categorical syllogism
has a negative
conclusion but
affirmative premises.
• Fallacy of the
undistributed middle –
the middle term in a
categorical syllogism is
not distributed.

25. Quick Application
1. If it's raining, I'll • Modus Ponens
meet you at the
movie theater.
2. It's raining.
3. Therefore, I'll meet
you at the movie
theater.

26. Quick Application
• If the cake is made • Modus Tollens
with sugar, then the
cake is sweet.
The cake is not
sweet.
• Therefore, the cake
is not made with
sugar.

27. Quick Application
• Either the Sun orbits • Disjunctive Syllogism
the Earth, or the
Earth orbits the Sun.
The Sun does not
orbit the Earth.
Therefore, the Earth
orbits the Sun.

28. Quick Application
• Everyone who • Reasoning by
drives at 80 MPH is Transivity
speeding
• All who speed P->Q
break the law. Q->R
• Therefore, everyone ______
who drives at 80
MPH breaks the Law Therefore: P->R

29. Quick Application
• No fish are dogs, and • Affirmative
no dogs can fly, conclusion
therefore all fish can
fly. • If A ⊄ B and B ⊄ C the
n A ⊂ C.
• We don't read that
trash. People who
read that trash don't
appreciate real
literature. Therefore,
we appreciate real
literature.

30. Quick Application
• No mammals are • Fallacy of exclusive
fish. premies
• Some fish are not • No X are Y.
whales. • Some Y are not Z.
• Therefore, some • Therefore, some Z
whales are not are not X.
mammals.

31. Quick Application
• All fish have fins. • Fallacy of four terms
• All goldfish are fish.
• All humans have
fins.

32. Quick Application
• All dogs are • Illicit major
animals.
• No cats are dogs.
• Therefore, no cats
are animals.

33. Quick Application
• All cats are felines. • Illicit minor
• All cats are • All A are B.
mammals. • All A are C.
• Therefore, all • Therefore, all C are
mammals are B.
felines.

34. Quick Application
• All cats are animals. • Negative
• Some pets are cats. conclusion from
• Therefore, some affirmative premises
pets are not (illicit affirmative)
animals.
• if A is a subset of B,
and B is a subset of
C, then A is not a
subset of C.

35. Quick Application
• Money is green • Fallacy of the
• Trees are green, undistributed
• money grows on middle
trees. • All A's are C's.
All B's are C's.
• All A’s are B’s

36. Informal Logic
Ad Hominem
A personal attack: that is, an argument
based on the perceived failings of an
adversary rather than on the merits of the
case.
Ad Misericordiam
An argument that involves an irrelevant
or highly exaggerated appeal to pity or
sympathy.
Bandwagon
An argument based on the assumption
that the opinion of the majority is always
valid: everyone believes it, so you should
too.
Begging the Question
A fallacy in which the premise of an
argument presupposes the truth of its
conclusion; in other words, the argument
takes for granted what it's supposed to
prove. Also known as a circular
argument.

37. Informal Logic
Dicto Simpliciter
An argument in which a general rule is
treated as universally true regardless of
the circumstances: a sweeping
generalization.
False Dilemma
A fallacy of oversimplification: an
argument in which only two alternatives
are provided when in fact additional
options are available. Sometimes called
the either-or fallacy.
Name Calling
A fallacy that relies on emotionally
loaded terms to influence an audience.
Non Sequitur
An argument in which a conclusion does
not follow logically from what preceded
it.

38. Informal Fallacies
Post Hoc
A fallacy in which one event is said to be
the cause of a later event simply
because it occurred earlier.
Red Herring
An observation that draws attention
away from the central issue in an
argument or discussion.
Stacking the Deck
A fallacy in which any evidence that
supports an opposing argument is simply
rejected, omitted, or ignored.
Straw Man
A fallacy in which an opponent's
argument is overstated or misrepresented
in order to be more easily attacked or
refuted.

39. Activity 4:
• In teams of 4 watch the
following videos on
your iPad by going to
tctok.us
• Identify the primary
fallacy being used.
• Explain why it is being
used. Why is it
effective?
• Discuss how a topic
could have been
approached should
the fallacy be
corrected (avoid bias)

40. Blog 3: Logical Argument
• Create a logical
proposition with a
formal or informal
fallacy.
• Respond to another
student’s
proposition with the
correct
identification. Offer
a correction.

41. Blog 3: Logical Argument
• Decide on a position
that you care deeply
about.
• Find someone online
(blogs, youtube,
facebook, etc.) who
you agree with on this
position, but can see a
logical fallacy in their
presentation.
• Write your position, their
quote, and an analysis
of the fallacy in one
paragraph.

42. Thinker Portrait: Rene Descartes