Important Details:

Class meets Monday, Wednesday and Friday 2:40 -3:55 in Dewing 305.

Your host: Prof. Michael P. Wolf
Office: 201 Humphrey House
Phone: 337-7077
E-mail: wolf@kzoo.edu

Office Hours: Monday and Wednesday 10:00-12:00 and by appointment

Required Texts
Hurley, A Concise Introduction to Logic.
 

What Is This Course About?
Our aim is to learn something about the basics of logic in this class. That is, we are going to be looking at various methods and systems for representing and analyzing the structure of our claims and beliefs and how they relate to one another to form arguments and defenses of what we believe. This entails examining and analyzing a lot of arguments so that we can begin to see what good arguments have in common and why we should feel compelled to accept them. Unfortunately, most arguments are couched or even hidden in convoluted presentations and ambiguous terms. People are rarely kind enough to make their points in the pristine forms that philosophers and logicians would prefer. So much of the work in the early part of this course will be learning how to analyze texts in order to dig out the real premises of their arguments. After this, we will go on to take a look at some more subtle fallacies that mask errors of reason. The final section of this course will involve learning some of the basics of symbolic logic - a formal method of representing the structure of arguments and reasoning.

Assessment
Homework will be assigned starting the second week and will be assigned for every subsequent week in which we do not have an exam. You will each have to turn in a copy of each assignment. I do not prohibit you from working with others, but I will not accept collective efforts. Each assignment will be counted towards a homework grade and that grade will be worth 25% of your final grade.

There will also be three exams, one at the end of each section of the class. Each exam is worth 25% of your final grade. You are not permitted to miss an exam without documentation of some personal calamity. There will be no additional final exam in this class. The exams are not cumulative, strictly speaking. However, much of the background knowledge that you need to do different tasks later in the course will be laid out in the earlier sections of the course.
 
 

A Tentative syllabus

Class 1. (September 23): Introduction

Class 2. (September 25): Arguments
Read Hurley 1.1 - 1.2

Class 3. (September 27): Arguments
Read Hurley 1.1 - 1.2

Week 1 Homework: Exercises 1.1.I-II and IV (evens), 1.2.I-III and IV (evens). (Click here to check grades.)

Class 4. (September 30): Validity
Read Hurley 1.3 - 1.5

Class 5. (October 2): Validity
Read Hurley 1.3 - 1.5

Class 6. (October 4): Validity
Read Hurley 1.3 - 1.5

Week 2 Homework: 1.3.I and III (evens), 1.4.I-III and V (evens), and 1.5 (evens). (Click here to check grades.)

Class 7. (October 7):  Informal Fallacies
Read Hurley 3.1 - 3.3

Class 8. (October 9):  Informal Fallacies
Read Hurley 3.1 - 3.3

Class 9. (October 11):  Informal Falacies
Read Hurley 3.4 - 3.5

Week 3 Homework: 3.1 (evens) 3.2.I and II (evens), and 3.3.I and III (evens). (Click here to check grades.)

Class 10. (October 14): Informal Fallacies
Read Hurley 3.4 - 3.5

Class 11. (October 16): Exam Review

Class 12. (October 18): EXAM #1 (Click here to check grades.)

Class 13. (October 21): Propositional Logic
Read Hurley 6.1-6.4

Class 14. (October 23): Propositional Logic
Read Hurley 6.1-6.4

Class 15. (October 25): Propositional Logic
Read Hurley 6.1-6.4

Week 5 Homework: 6.1 (evens), 6.2 (evens) 6.3.I and II (evens), 6.4 (evens). (Click here to check grades.)

Class 16. (October 28): Propositional Logic
Read Hurley 7.1-7.4

Class 17. (October 30): Propositional Logic
Read Hurley 7.1-7.4
 

Class 18. (November 1): Inference and Deduction
Read Hurley 7.5-7.6

Week 6 Homework:  7.1.I and II (every third problem), 7.2.I-II (every third problem), 7.3.I-II (every third problem), 7.4.I-II (every third problem)
(Note: In doing every third problem, do not do those that have answers in the book, e.g. do 2,5,8.. instead of 1,4,7..) (Click here to check grades.)

Class 19. (November 4): Inference and Deduction
Read Hurley 7.5-7.6

Class 20. (Novermber 6): Exam Review (MAKE SURE you have done some of the problems from Chapter 7.5 and 7.6) - Answers to the even problems are available here

And as long as we're here, have the answers to most of the problems from chapter 7 that don't already have answers in the back.

Class 21. (November 8): EXAM #2 (Click here to check grades.)
Answers to this exam are now available as a Word file.
Some of the larger truth tables are also available as an Excel file.

Class 22. (November 11): Predicate Logic

Class 23. (November 13): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.1-8.2

Class 24. (November 15): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.1-8.2

Week 8 Homework: 8.1 (evens), 8.2 (every third)
(Note: In doing every third problem, do not do those that have answers in the book, e.g. do 2,5,8.. instead of 1,4,7..) (Click here to check grades.)
Answers to these exercises are available here, as well.

Class 25. (November 18): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.3 and 8.4

Class 26. (November 20): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.3 and 8.4

Class 27. (November 22): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.3 and 8.4

Week 9 Homework: 8.3 (every third) and 8.4 (evens) (Click here to check grades.)
Answers to these exercises are available online.

Class 28. (November 25): Predicate Logic
Read Hurley 8.3 and 8.4

Class 29. (November 27): Exam Review

Final Exam is during December 3, 2002 at 1:00 PM in the same room in which we have class. (Click here to check grades.)