A-level Critical Thinking

CRITICAL THINKING REVISION NOTES

Credibility of evidence

Reputation Reputation is the regard in which a person or organisation is held. People can have good or
bad reputations based upon their character, organisations can have reputations because of their actions.
Newspapers can also have a reputation for quality
and accuracy.

Argument: A proposal/conclusion supported by a

reason or reasons.

Observation- Eyewitness accounts are direct evidence. Evidence from those that saw an event rsthand .

Evidence: Information that supports an argument.

Credibility: The believability of information.*

Observations are aected by:

Senses short-sightedness would aect an eye-witness

Source: Where information comes from e.g. a newspaper
account. Memory eye-witness accounts can be poor a
or a Website.
long time after an event because memory can fade. Bias
Prejudice can distort an observation. Prior knowledge
Truth Something that is correct
Expertise can aect the way that an eye-witness account
is told.
Neutrality A neutral source is impartial and does
not take sides. The neutral source does not favour
Corroboration When more that one source of evone point of view over another. Neutral sources are
idence supports the same conclusion. The evidence
generally seen as more reliable.
points in the same direction.
Selectivity How representative information or evidence is. Surveys can be unrepresentative in terms
of size and the type of people that they survey. To
be neutral selected information should be representative of all of the information available.

Vested Interests A person or organisation has a

vested interest if they have seething to gain from
supporting a particular point of view. This can cause
a person or organisation to lie, tell the truth, distort evidence or present one-sided evidence. Vested
interests can increase or decrease the credibility of
a source. Vested interests do not necessarily mean
that a source will be biased.

Context The setting in which information has been

collected (e.g. a war-zone)

Bias Bias is a lack of impartiality. Biased sources

favour a particular point of view. It has been argued
that an unbiased source is impossible as everyone
has a particular viewpoint

The historic context Attitudes can change over a period of time. The scientic context The response to
new scientic ideas if aected by what already known
(e.g. Darwinism initially discredited). The journalistic
context Embedded reporters in a war zone how ac1. Propaganda 2. Bias can be seen in the selective use of curate can they be? Interview context People respond
dierently to dierent interviewers. Linguistic context
language 3. Cultural bias Ethnocentrism
Language can aect the type of answers people give.
Expertise Expertise is specialist knowledge in a
particular eld. Experts are only regarded as knowledgeable in their own particular eld.

Credibility criteria: Criteria used to assess how believable a source of information is

1.Neutrality How impartial a source of information is

(biased or not). 2.Vested Interest When a person or
Experts disagree. Experts have made incorrect judge- organisation have something to gain from supporting a
ments . Some have argued expertise is harmful. (e.g. point of view. 3.Expertise Where the writer of informamedicine) Expertise changes over time.
tion has specialist subject knowledge in a particular area.
However

4.Reputation The regard in which a person of organisation is held in, based on their track record and their status.
5.Observation A report from someone who directly perceived (heard, saw, felt) an event an eyewitness account.
6.Circumstantial evidence - Physical evidence supporting
the conclusion. 7.Corroboration Where more than one
source of evidence supports the same conclusion. 8.Selectivity A measure of how representative information
is compared with all of the information available. 9.Context The situation in which information is collected.
An easy, quick way of remembering the main credibility
criteria: C onsistency

TYPES OF REASONING

Interviews Does interview style aect the responses gained?

Questionnaires Are they representative and will
people be honest ?

4 Making a reasoned judgement

Corroboration and conict
Balance of evidence
Weight of evidence

R eputation

Quality of evidence

A bility to perceive

Credibility criteria

V ested interest

Judgement

E xpertise
N eutrality / bias

5 Unit II
Argument = Reason + Conclusion

Sources and types of evidence

History
Primary sources sources from the time or period
of study
Secondary sources sources not from the time
of study. These can include books with primary
sources that have been processed and analysed by
historians.
Sociology

Argument The presentation of one or more reasons

to support a conclusion.
Reason A claim that supports a conclusion.
Conclusion A claim that is supported by one or
more reasons.
Argument indicator - A word which links a reason
and a conclusion.
Arguments are often presented without using reason indicators. Reasons are dierent to evidence evidence
supports a reason.

Primary evidence new evidence collected as part of

The reasons and conclusions separated by an inference
research
bar Conclusions can be identied by conclusion indicators
Secondary evidence all other evidence such as gov- (e.g. Therefore).
ernment statistics.
Some arguments have an intermediate conclusion a con First-hand evidence eyewitness accounts from
those who have directly observed an event.
Second hand-evidence hearsay, evidence from
those that have heard an account.
Direct evidence eyewitness evidence .
Circumstantial evidence - non-direct evidence from
which something can be inferred .
Statistics can they be trusted?
Participant observation does it aect behaviour?

clusion before the main conclusion is stated.

6 Types of reasoning
Simple reasoning There is a conclusion that is supported by a reason.
side by side reasoning Two reasons independent of
each other support a conclusion.
Joint reasoning Two reasons from which one conclusion can be drawn. It would not be possible to
draw a conclusion from one of the reasons on its
own.

3
Chain reasoning Reasoning linked together.
Joint reasons: Reasons which have been used together to support a conclusion.

7 Deductive and Inductive reasoning

In a deductive the conclusion is deductively valid. If the

conclusion is not guaranteed to follow from the reasons
then the argument is invalid and the argument ceases to
Principal: A principal is a general statement about be a deductive reasoning.
how something should be. There are moral, legal
Inductive arguments: Where is the reasons are true then
and ethical principals. Principals are inexible and
the conclusion will probably be true. (Chelsea are 12pts
cannot be bend to t particular situations.
ahead in the Premiership with only a few games to go it
its likely that they will win the league).
Counter argument: A counter argument is an argument that opposes another argument. Counter ar- In a strong argument reasons are only relevant if they
guments can be included in an argument in order to make a dierence to the conclusion.
dismiss that argument .
Deductive reasoning: There the conclusion is guaranteed
Assumption: An Assumption is an unstated reason

to follow from the reasons.

Counter claims: Counter claims or counter assertions are claims that are dismissed in an argument. Inductive reasoning: If the reasons are true then it is likely
that the conclusion is true.
The claims to not agree with the main conclusion.
Often there s a lot of evidence in arguments to support
A counter-example is an example that challenges the reasons which support conclusion.
truth of a claim. Counter-examples challenge generalizations.
Hypothetical reasoning - Something will happen on
the condition that something else happens .

8 Flaws in Arguments

Value judgements A judgement based upon a Appeal to Tradition

value (e.g. murder is wrong). People have conicting values and values change over time.
we've always done it this way Arguing that because
something has always been done in one way in the past,it
Denitions Denitions are precise meanings of a should continue to be done that way.
word or phrase. Denitions can be argued other e.g.
Appeal to Popularity
the denition of rape.
Causal explanations Cause and eect (Smoking Everyone likes them Arguing that something must be
causes cancer).
the case or true or good because many people engage in
an idea or activity.
A common cause A correlation between two things
Appeal to History
is caused by a third factor.
A correlation between two things may be caused by If something has happened before, it will happen again.
chance .
Arguing that what has happened in the past is always a
guide to the future and/or the past will repeat itself.
Direction of causation Does A cause B or does B
Appeal to Emotion
cause A.
Some things have multi-causal explanations explana- These poor puppies have been abandoned and you could
tions which show that there are more than one causes give them the loving home they so desperately need. Arguing through tugging at peoples emotions rather than
causing an eect.
through logical reasoning/argument.
An analogy is a comparison between two things which are
Appeal to Authority
seen to be similar .
Criteria to evaluate an argument by analogy 1.Number of
instances 2.Number of similarities 3.Strength of conclu- Trying to persuade a reader to accept an argument based
on the respect for authority rather than logic.
sion 4.Relevance 5.Number of dierences
Extreme analogies should be avoided as they can weaken False Dichotomy
an argument

8 FLAWS IN ARGUMENTS

either or Reducing an argument to only two extreme reasoning given prior.

options when there are other possibilities.
Ad Hominem
Restricting the Options
Latin meaning against the man. In an argument, this
E.g We blindfold him or we knock him out....or you just is an attack on the person rather than on the opponents
let your ancee your wedding dress. Presents a limited ideas.
picture of choices available in a situation in order to sup- Post Hoc
port one particular option.
Confusing Necessary and Sucient Conditions

Latin for after this, therefore because of this. Arguing

that because one thing follows another, the rst caused
E.g I have done everything necessary,registered and the second. But sequence is not cause.
trained for the race. But is it sucient/enough for me to
Add or remove terms from this set
win the race?" Necessary conditions are conditions which
must be fullled in order for an event to happen. Sucient conditions are conditions which, if fullled, guarantee that an event will happen. Some people confuse
necessary and sucient conditions.
Hasty Generalisation
Drawing a general conclusion from insucient evidence/limited examples.
Conation
Putting two or more things together that aren't related.
Treating two things as the same when in fact they aren't.
eg. Obesity often conated with lack of tness.
Straw Man
Misrepresenting and exaggerating one part of the opponents argument in order to dismiss it and the entire argument. Changing or exaggerating an opponents position
or argument to make it easier to refute.
False Cause
Wrongly assumes a cause-and-eect relationship ('A'
causes 'B' without proof that a relationship actually exists).
Slippery Slope
Making one or more unsupported leaps in an argument to
arrive at an extreme conclusion.
Circular Argument
People like dogs because dogs are kind pets which people like. Where a reason is the same as the conclusion,
so the argument doesn't go anywhere as it just restates the
argument rather than actually proving it.
Non Sequitur
Latin for it does not follow. An inference or a conclusion that does not follow from the premises,evidence or

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