Substance Abuse, Crime and The Life Course Discussion

Post #1: Find a short argumentative clip (about 5 minutes) or article that you can share with us here. (Try to post by Saturday, 2/20)

Post #2: (a) Select someone else’s post, and state the argument contained in the post in two premises and a conclusion. (b) Then state the argument in propositional form by substituting capital letters for the simple propositions.

Example: Suppose I select a post containing the argument that concludes inflammatory rhetoric intensifies hate crimes.

(a) I will state the argument as:

1. Since COVID-19 started, public discourse has blamed China for the pandemic and there has been a rise in hate crimes against persons of Asian Pacific Islander descent.

2. If this inflammatory rhetoric has increased hate crimes against persons of Asian Pacific Islander descent, then inflammatory rhetoric fuels hate crimes.

Therefore,

3. Inflammatory rhetoric fuels hate crimes.

(b) P: Public discourse has blamed China for the pandemic.

R: There has been a rise in hate crimes against persons of Asian Pacific Islander descent.

T: Inflammatory rhetoric fuels hate crimes.

1. P & R

2. R –> T

Therefore,

3. T

Post #3: Go back to your own post. If no one has responded to your post, don’t be sad or worried. (This is not social media! We all belong here.) Just go to any other post and (a) combine the premises into a conjunction and then (a) make it a conditional. If someone has posted a reply to your initial post, complete this using that person’s propositional symbolizations. Finally, (c) explain how, by using the actual context of the clip or article, that this conditional is true.

To continue with our example:

(a) (P & R) & (R –> T)

(b) [(P & R) & (R –> T)] –> T

(c) This is the challenging question. Let’s see how you logicians handle it.