This assignment is designed to help you learn to analyze and craft arguments. It is intended to assist you in preparing for your debates and lay the groundwork for your major argument papers. On Monday, you should have reviewed the catalog of reasons that each of your group members developed and chosen the four most compelling reasons for each side of your topic (so 8 reasons in total). You should have divided these reasons up between the debaters so that each group member had 1 pro reason and 1 con reason.
Directions
You should develop at least 2 argument tables for this assignment, 1 for an argument supporting the debate motion and 1 for an argument opposing the debate motion.
- Develop an argument, complete with premises and conclusions, using the process described in Vucetich and Nelson (2012). In doing so, make sure you include all of the premises that are necessary to arrive at the conclusion present in the argument (Question 1).
- After you have completed developing your argument, you should address question #2 of argument analysis, namely “Are all of the premises true or appropriate?” To do so, you should complete an argument table. You can copy and use the blank table below, adding rows as necessary. Expect to struggle with this assignment, and don’t worry if your argument table is lacking some elements or you are otherwise not sure whether its complete. You’ll be sharing it with your debate group mates and revising them collectively.