GENERALIZATIONS,

ANALOGIES, AND GENERAL

PRINCIPLES
MA DO THI HA PHUONG
SESSION OBJECTIVES

■ Sufficiency

■ Generalization

■ Analogy

■ General Principles
SUFFICIENCY
■ The premises are true or acceptable + relevant + sufficient = a strong inductive
argument

 Sufficiency (sometimes called adequacy) refers to the degree of support provided by

the premises for the conclusion.

Eg: Durian are high-calories fruits and can increase your insulin’s rate. Therefore, you
shouldn't eat it.

-> The premise is not enough to conclude you shouldn't eat durian -> maybe yes only if you
are suffering from diabetes.

■ Additional information may be required before one is willing to grant sufficiency.

■ A premise or a series of premises is sufficient when their truth or acceptability and

relevance make the conclusion more probable than alternative conclusions.
GENERALIZATION

■ When we generalize, we make a general claim about something based on specific

evidence about that something.

■ Generalizations usually mean simply “in general”; they allow for exceptions -> those that
are universal statements are often overgeneralizations (all, every, none, etc).

■ It takes one counterexample to disprove such an overgeneralization.

Eg : All birds fly -> counterexample : the ostrich -> most birds fly.
GENERALIZATION
■ There are two important elements of a generalization: quantities and qualities.

- Good generalizations are usually based on surveys or experiments

- With regard to the quantities, it’s critically important that there are enough particulars in
the sample group; that is, the sample group should constitute a certain proportion of the
whole group

- With regard to the second element—qualities—it’s critically important that the particulars
in the sample group are representative of the particulars in the whole group; that is, they
should have the same relevant qualities

- There are different ways to obtain a sample group, some of which result in more
representative samples than others.
GENERALIZATION

■ OVERGENERALIZATION (AN ERROR)

- Almost all errors of generalization are errors of overgeneralization which includes scope,

frequency or certainty.

Eg: Everyone loves money.

The rich never gets McDonalds burgers.

I am sure anyone who is busy will go to convenience stores for dinners.

 GENERALIZATION

■ INSUFFICIENT SAMPLE (AN ERROR)

- The error of an insufficient sample

indicates a failure to meet the criterion of
sufficiency

- The sample size should be thought of as a

proportion rather than as an absolute
number.
GENERALIZATION
■ UNREPRESENTATIVE SAMPLE (AN ERROR)

- The error of an unrepresentative sample indicates

a failure to meet the criterion of relevance: an
unrepresentative sample is one which does not
have the relevant features of the population
generalized to

- The more certain you want to be, the more

representative your sample should be

- Noteworthy examples of unrepresentative samples

abound in the medical profession
 ANALOGY
■ An argument by analogy involves reasoning from one situation to an analogous, or similar,
situation; a conclusion is reached about something on the basis of it being similar to something
else.

■ The strength of an argument by analogy depends on whether there are sufficient relevant
similarities and no relevant dissimilarities

■ An important subset of argument by analogy is the appeal to precedent, usually made in the
legal context.

■ Since an argument by analogy moves from one specific case to another specific case, it is not
an argument of generalization

Eg: Peter is a child and he likes sweets

Mary is also a child

Mary will probably likes sweets.

ANALOGY
■ WEAK OR FALSE ANALOGY (AN ERROR)

- A weak analogy is one in which few of the relevant features are similar; in such a case,
your conclusion follows only weakly from your premises .

- A false analogy is one in which none of the relevant features are similar, or worse,
they’re dissimilar in the relevant aspects; in such a case, you’ve made a faulty
comparison and the argument should be rejected

- We often make this error because of a sort of lazy assumption: we assume that if two
things are similar in some ways, they’re similar in other, relevant, ways.

Eg: Living is like competing, you have to struggle against the others.

I know that you were in no good condition and ill during this weekend, but as a student,
just like everyone, you must submit the assignment.
GENERAL PRINCIPLE

■ An argument by application of a general principle involves reasoning from a general

principle to a particular instance of that general principle.

■ All A are subject to X; B is an A; so B is subject to X -> the clear relation to deductive

argument .

Eg: All women have the rights for their bodies

Abortion is when women takes decision about their bodies

You should respect abortion as the legal rights for every woman.
GENERAL PRINCIPLE

■ MISAPPLIED GENERAL PRINCIPLE (AN ERROR)

- A misapplied general principle involves applying a general principle to a particular

instance in which the principle doesn’t apply.

- We tend to make this mistake when we don’t carefully consider or understand either the
principle we’re applying or the instance we’re applying it to.

Eg:

Every students should be working on the exercises independently. Asking for help is
cheating. And you are having a counseling session with your academic tutor, so you are also
a cheater.