From owner-cse584-sp07-list@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU Fri Apr 6 11:12:57 2007 Received: from ares.cse.buffalo.edu (ares.cse.Buffalo.EDU [128.205.32.79]) by castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU (8.13.6/8.12.10) with ESMTP id l36FCuid027286 for ; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:56 -0400 (EDT) Received: from front2.acsu.buffalo.edu (upfront.acsu.buffalo.edu [128.205.4.140]) by ares.cse.buffalo.edu (8.13.6/8.13.6) with SMTP id l36FCsp6043763 for ; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:54 -0400 (EDT) Received: (qmail 18240 invoked from network); 6 Apr 2007 15:12:54 -0000 Received: from mailscan5.acsu.buffalo.edu (128.205.6.137) by front2.acsu.buffalo.edu with SMTP; 6 Apr 2007 15:12:54 -0000 Received: (qmail 18228 invoked from network); 6 Apr 2007 15:12:54 -0000 Received: from deliverance.acsu.buffalo.edu (128.205.7.57) by front2.acsu.buffalo.edu with SMTP; 6 Apr 2007 15:12:54 -0000 Received: (qmail 10229 invoked from network); 6 Apr 2007 15:12:43 -0000 Received: from listserv.buffalo.edu (128.205.7.35) by deliverance.acsu.buffalo.edu with SMTP; 6 Apr 2007 15:12:43 -0000 Received: by LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU (LISTSERV-TCP/IP release 14.5) with spool id 4434160 for CSE584-SP07-LIST@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:43 -0400 Delivered-To: cse584-sp07-list@listserv.buffalo.edu Received: (qmail 6161 invoked from network); 6 Apr 2007 15:12:43 -0000 Received: from mailscan4.acsu.buffalo.edu (128.205.6.136) by listserv.buffalo.edu with SMTP; 6 Apr 2007 15:12:43 -0000 Received: (qmail 25037 invoked from network); 6 Apr 2007 15:12:42 -0000 Received: from castor.cse.buffalo.edu (128.205.32.14) by smtp5.acsu.buffalo.edu with SMTP; 6 Apr 2007 15:12:42 -0000 Received: from castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU (rapaport@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU (8.13.6/8.12.10) with ESMTP id l36FCfLK027265 for ; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:41 -0400 (EDT) Received: (from rapaport@localhost) by castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU (8.13.6/8.12.9/Submit) id l36FCfeH027264 for cse584-sp07-list@listserv.buffalo.edu; Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:41 -0400 (EDT) X-UB-Relay: (castor.cse.buffalo.edu) X-PM-EL-Spam-Prob: : 7% Message-ID: <200704061512.l36FCfeH027264@castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU> Date: Fri, 6 Apr 2007 11:12:41 -0400 Reply-To: "William J. Rapaport" Sender: "Philosophy of Computer Science, Spring 2007" From: "William J. Rapaport" Subject: FETZER ON LOGIC, REASONING, AND ARGUMENT ANALYSIS To: CSE584-SP07-LIST@LISTSERV.BUFFALO.EDU Precedence: list List-Help: , List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Owner: List-Archive: X-UB-Relay: (castor.cse.buffalo.edu) X-DCC-Buffalo.EDU-Metrics: castor.cse.Buffalo.EDU 1335; Body=0 Fuz1=0 Fuz2=0 X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.0 required=5.0 tests=AWL,BAYES_00,SUBJ_ALL_CAPS autolearn=no version=3.1.7 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.7 (2006-10-05) on ares.cse.buffalo.edu X-Virus-Scanned: ClamAV 0.88.6/3028/Fri Apr 6 09:31:35 2007 on ares.cse.buffalo.edu X-Virus-Status: Clean Status: R Content-Length: 3169 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Subject: FETZER ON LOGIC, REASONING, AND ARGUMENT ANALYSIS ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Fetzer's paper makes some comments about the nature of logical reasoning and about knowledge and belief that are relevant to what you've been doing in your argument analyses. 1. On p. 1050, column 1, he says: [W]hat makes ... a _proof_ a proof is its validity rather than its acceptance (by us) as valid, just as what makes a sentence true is [that] what it asserts to be the case is the case, no[t] merely that it is believed (by us) and therefore referred to as _true_. Note that I've been allowing you to evaluate the truth-value of the premises of an argument, *not* by trying to demonstrate whether they *are* true, but by trying to say whether and why *you believe* them. According to Fetzer's quote, it would follow that you are not *really* evaluating the premises. He's correct! Whether a statement (or premise) *is* true or not does *not* depend on whether you (or anyone) *believes* it to be true. It is (or isn't) true iff what it states corresponds to reality. Nevertheless, that's very hard (if not impossible) to prove. And that's why I'm allowing you to do something that is a bit easier, and a bit more realistic, and--for our purposes--just as useful, namely, to try to explain whether and why you believe the statement. 2. In the same location, at the beginning of the next section, Fetzer says: Confidence in the truth of a theorem (or in the validity of an argument) ... appears to be a psychological property of a person-at-a-time.... It's that "confidence" that I've been asking you to examine, explain, and defend. Because it's a "psychological property of" *you* *now*, I only grade you on how well you explain and defend it, not on what it is. 3. Finally, in column 2 on the same page, he says: [A]n individual z who is in a state of belief with respect to a certain formula f ... cannot be properly qualified as possessing knowledge that f is a theorem unless his belief can be supported by means of reasons, evidence, or warrants.... This is a very complicated way of making the following important point: If you *believe* a statement f, that belief doesn't count as *knowing* that f is the case *unless* you have a *reason* for your belief. In other words, knowledge is belief plus (at least) a reason. (Actually, most philosophers agree that knowledge requires a third thing: knowledge is belief, plus a reason, *plus* f being true: You can't "know" something that's false.) This need to justify your beliefs is what turns a mere opinion, or an expression of feeling, into a claim that is worthy of holding and of convincing others of. It's why we have arguments to justify conclusions, and why we have to also justify all the premises of the arguments. (And it's why we have to justify, recursively, all the justifications, until we reach some starting point that is a self-justifying belief. But it's not clear that there really are any, which means that our investigations may never end!)