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A premise or premiss [a] is a proposition—a true or false declarative statement—used in an argument to prove the truth of another proposition called the conclusion. [1] Arguments consist of a set of premises and a conclusion. An argument is meaningful for its conclusion only when all of its premises are true. If one or more premises are ...
Following the usual convention in argumentation theory, arguments are given as a list of premises followed by a single conclusion.The premises are the grounds given by the speaker or writer for the hearer or reader to accept the conclusion as true or as provisionally true (regarded as true for now).
If yes, the argument is strong. If no, it is weak. A strong argument is said to be cogent if it has all true premises. Otherwise, the argument is uncogent. The military budget argument example is a strong, cogent argument. Non-deductive logic is reasoning using arguments in which the premises support the conclusion but do not entail it.
An argument is correct or incorrect depending on whether the premises offer support for the conclusion. This is often understood in terms of probability: if the premises of a correct argument are true, it raises the probability that its conclusion is also true. Forms of logical reasoning can be distinguished based on how the premises support ...
Example of an early argument map, from Richard Whately's Elements of Logic (1852 edition). Argumentation theory is the interdisciplinary study of how conclusions can be supported or undermined by premises through logical reasoning.
The following is an example of an argument that is “valid”, but not “sound”: Everyone who eats carrots is a quarterback. John eats carrots. Therefore, John is a quarterback. The example's first premise is false – there are people who eat carrots who are not quarterbacks – but the conclusion would necessarily be true, if the premises ...
The third kind of enthymeme consists of a syllogism with a missing premise that is supplied by the audience as an unstated assumption. In the words of rhetorician William Benoit, the missing premise is: "assumed by rhetor when inventing and by audience when understanding the argument." [8] Some examples of this kind of enthymeme are as follows:
The second premise is an assertion that P, the antecedent of the conditional claim, is the case. From these two premises it can be logically concluded that Q, the consequent of the conditional claim, must be the case as well. An example of an argument that fits the form modus ponens: If today is Tuesday, then John will go to work. Today is Tuesday.