Recognizing Arguments

(Hurley, Section 1.2)

To be an argument, a passage must contain both a factual claim and an inferential claim. The factual claim is expressed in the premises, and the inferential claim is the claim that these sentences support or imply something further. The implication may be implicit or explicit.

Examples of Non-inferential Passages:

Warnings

Advice

Statement of belief or opinion

Loosely associated statements

Reports

Expositions

Illustrations

Explanations

Conditional Statements

More on Explanations: While an argument contains premises and a conclusion, explanations consist of an explanans and an explanandum. The former is the group of statements that are doing the explaining, and the latter is what is explained.

More on Conditionals: These are statements of the form "if ___ then ___." Two components to conditionals: The statement immediately following the "if" is the antecedent and the statement immediately following the "then" is the consequent. A conditional statement is not, by itself, an argument, though it may serve as a premise or conclusion (or both) of an argument, and some of them may be restated as arguments.

Conditionals express the relationship between necessary and sufficient conditions. The antecedent gives the sufficient condition, and the consequent gives the necessary condition:

If X is a dog, then X is an animal.

If X is not an animal, then X is not a dog.