We commit this fallacy when, instead of attacking an opponent’s views, we attack the opponent.

Appeals to popularity encourage readers to base their decisions too much on their underlying desire to fit in, to be hip to what everybody else is doing, not to be considered crazy.

Does the attempt to get the reader to trust suggest an idea that is not logical or not true? To what extent is the appeal to trust really relevant to the trustworthiness of the argument? Is the argument asking for more trust than is really warranted? Even if the attempt to gain our trust is logical and relevant, we should ask whether its importance has been exaggerated. Our decision to trust should be based on many different factors. Often appeals to trust imply that we should accept or reject a claim outright when in reality more caution is called for.

One approach would be to try to convince them that their fears are unfounded.  However, given the lack of trust between writer and audience, such an attempt might fail.  Another approach would be to argue that we must take into account the need of all people to be protected from violence, including refugees who face violence in their countries of origin.

It involves an emotional and intellectual commitment to move forward together. If a traditional combative argument is like a courtroom debate, Rogerian argument is like mediation.

Rather than giving up on addressing the opposing side at all, we might consider an approach called Rogerian argument, pioneered by therapist Carl Rogers

Just as arguments can change tone and emotional appeal, they can appeal to trust differently and create different imagined relationships with the reader at different moments.

If we feel we are being manipulated, we will likely recoil and resist both the emotions and the logic of the argument.

Even lies of omission can undermine trust. As readers, we want to believe that the writer is giving us a fair overview of what they know. If a writer fails to mention something relevant that makes them look bad, readers may well hear it from an opponent and consider the writer to have wrongly concealed it.

Correct misconceptions respectfully. If a writer is frustrated with popular misconceptions on a topic, they should give the reader the benefit of the doubt and politely assume that such daft misconceptions belong to others. We can refer to those who hold the misconception in the third person in a phrase like "some may assume that" rather than targeting the reader with a "you may be assuming that..."

Of course, too much description of what the writer is planning to do can become boring and can get in the way of the momentum of the argument.

Express ideas in a clear and straightforward way. Making things clear often takes a lot of mental sweat. Readers generally do not appreciate having to do the work of sorting out unnecessarily convoluted sentences.

Conversely, if the reader feels that the writer understands the reader's perspective and uses that understanding to make the experience of reading the argument as straightforward and intellectually pleasant as possible, the reader will trust the writer more.

Sometimes writers feel that the most powerful thing they have in common with readers is opposition to a group rather than membership in a group. They can try to get readers on their side by focusing on a group they presume the reader does not or will not want to belong to. Defining that group negatively becomes the basis for unity and trust between writer and reader.

long-term and intense contact between black and Latino people in urban neighborhoods has created a large overlap between Black English and, for example, “Nuyorican” English

An alternate approach to trust involves connection rather than distance. We relate to the writer as to a friend or loved one rather than an authority figure.

They can make the argument seem objective and solid, but they can also alienate the reader. After all, distance means we are being pushed away. Our trust in a formal argument depends on our trust in the institutions it represents, like the government or academia.

This approach to earning the reader's trust is all about setting aside the personal to pursue objective, neutral, unbiased pronouncements. It requires the writer to step back from their own personality and feelings to ally their speech with impersonal truth.

When a writer has no particular qualification in relation to the subject, they can still establish a certain degree of authority by citing authoritative sources.

This kind of trust depends on the qualifications of the writer rather than on the style of writing. It is sometimes called extrinsic ethos.

Using "I," also called speaking in the first person, can allow a writer to speak honestly and with conviction to further an argument.

What do I mean by relationship here? Each relationship implies expected ways people interact, and it often involves a shared identity, whether a family connection, an ethnic similarity, a job they need to complete together, or a situation they are concerned in.

This chapter will look at various approaches to creating trust in written argument, including establishing the writer's authority on the subject, convincing readers of the writer's moral character, showing respect and goodwill, and creating a sense of closeness or shared identity.

If we don't have a certain degree of trust in the writer, we will be less willing to let an argument affect us. We may not allow even a skillfully worded emotional appeal to move us, and we may not be ready to agree even with a well-supported claim.

but their success depends on how well writers have gauged their readers' values and cultural associations. Now we can back up and look at readers' responses through a different lens: that of trust.

To be legitimate, emotional appeals need to be associated with logical reasoning.

The writer chose the faulty reasoning because they thought it would affect readers emotionally. Arguments that focus on a “red herring,” for example, distract from the real issue to focus on something juicier.

We made the case at the beginning of this chapter that emotion is a legitimate part of argument. But there is a reason emotional appeals have a dubious reputation: they are often abused.

An argument’s success will depend not just on how well the writer expresses emotion but on how well the writer gauges the reader’s likely response. Values, cultural beliefs, and life experiences shape our emotional reactions.

but Shakespeare famously wrote scenes of terrible puns, sex jokes, and plenty of slapstick into his most intense tragedies to keep the audience from pelting actors with rotten tomatoes. Similarly, a writer may choose to offer some relief or distraction after an impassioned appeal through a moment of humor or a neutral statement.

A more flexible, varied tone with moments of greater and lesser intensity can provide contrast and relief and thus seem more sensitive to the audience.

How does the writer feel about the topic of the argument? How does the writer feel about their own knowledge of the topic? What is the writer's attitude toward the reader?

The contrast between the orderly, neutral phrase "regulate the border" and the more aggressive-sounding "criminalizing people" suggests that one option is decent and the other cruel. 

When we read, we lack the visual and auditory clues, but we still intuitively sense the writer's attitude. Tone comes across through emotional word choice and choice of examples, as we have seen in 8.2: Word Choice and Connotation and 8.3: Powerful Examples, but also in other ways, both subtle and overt.

Tone refers to the overall emotional attitude of the argument. We know intuitively what “tone of voice” means when we’re describing a conversation. If we hear a person speaking and ask ourselves the following questions, we will usually be able to describe the tone:

Obviously, there are as many stories to choose from as there are immigrants. If a story serves as an illustration of a general point, we have to ask how representative it is. Is it presented as typical? If so, is there evidence to show its typicality? Arguments can complement specific examples with statistics to show typicality.

a hypothetical example where they themselves are desperately seeking to protect a child and bring them into the United States. The argument could well be expanded by adding the story of a real parent and child.

To feel connected to an argument, readers need to be able to imagine what it means in some particular case. Writers can bring an example to life by describing a scene, developing a character, or building suspense and ending with a dramatic resolution.

If we hear that “the new college president has transformed the admissions process” we are more likely to feel hopeful, perhaps impressed, without knowing anything at all about the nature of the changes. If we hear simply that “the new college president has changed the admissions process,” we will probably feel more skeptical about these changes and what their positive and negative impacts may be.

Now we will look at how writers choose words not only to convey ideas but to shape readers’ emotional experience and subconscious reactions.

Many, such as scientific journal articles, are calm and dispassionate

Should listeners have guarded themselves against feeling sympathy for those four children? If we care about things that matter and an argument is about something that matters, then we will and should have feelings about it.

But emotions and logic can work together

And yet we all know that arguments are not won and lost solely on the merits of the ideas. Humans are not robots.

He advises, “Be the kind of person who takes supplements -- then skip the supplements.”

The catchphrase "correlation is not causation" can help us to remember the dangers of the methods above. It's usually easy to show that two things happen at the same time or in the same pattern, but hard to show that one actually causes another.

In order to believe that one thing caused another, we usually need to have some idea of how the first thing could cause the second. If we cannot imagine how one would cause another, why should we find it plausible?

One common way to support a prediction is by comparing it to a past event that has already played out.

Causal arguments attempt to make a case that one thing led to another. They answer the question "What caused it?" Causes are often complex and multiple.

Love is the greatest quality humans possess and it can and should guide us to protect our mother ocean.

Thesis Statement: Because of its scientific importance and its power in the human imagination, the ocean should be a focus of environmental advocacy

it can be helpful to recognize our particular audience’s values and see where they align with our own. Convincing readers that we share values can enhance the sense of trust between reader and writer,

However, even values that seem universal may be defined differently by different groups.

Finally, the argument will need to provide evidence of the way in which the subject meets or does not meet the criteria.

we will need to articulate our judgment about the extent to which the subject meets or doesn't meet those criteria.

Evaluation arguments usually need to define and justify the criteria they use to make the evaluation.

n each case, the label implies a definition of the person and his behavior, and this extends the impression built in the mind of the audience.

Definitions involve emotional associations as well as descriptions of literal meaning.

When controversy revolves around an issue, defining terms explicitly and precisely is even more critical.  In Section 4.2: Check If the Meaning Is Clear, we saw how mixing different meanings of one term can disguise a problem with the logic of an argument (if this is done intentionally, it is called equivocation).

Definition arguments will need to provide evidence for any generalizations they make about a subject. If they use a specific example, how can they show that the example is typical? They may also need to justify the choice of criteria for the definition.

Definition arguments like this are arguments because they seek to shape our vision of reality.

Like a conversation, in addition to your audience affecting what you say, your audience can sometimes affect how you say that content as well. The following items are some things to consider:

What is your relationship to the audience? This can affect your tone and how much of yourself you insert into the paper. For example, addressing an authority figure would require a different approach than addressing a relative peer or a complete stranger.

What does your audience probably already know about your topic?

Analyzing your audience affects nearly every stage of your writing, from early drafting to how you revise and get to the final draft. Beyond writing to answer a prompt, at a really basic level, you’re writing to be read, by your peers, your professor, or by any audience designated in your prompt.

The more we imagine our audience's likely reactions as part of the writing process, the more likely we are to generate ideas, reach them, and convince them or affect their thinking.

An argument may contain multiple elements from this list, but if we can decide which is ultimately the most important, we can shape the introduction and conclusion with that goal in mind.

Identifying our purpose can help us decide what we need to include to achieve that purpose.

Many times, the purpose of a piece of writing is to encourage critical thinking on a subject, and maybe change something wrong in our world in response.

Author’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of Article.” Title of Journal, volume number, issue number, Date of Publication, page numbers. Title of Database, DOI or URL.

Online tools such as NoodleTools and Citation Machine can generate works cited entries automatically; just be sure to double-check that the entries are correct according to the MLA rules below.  You can also make a copy of Columbia College's Word MLA template or Google docs MLA template and then put in your own content.

In MLA style, each source cited in the text of your paper refers readers to the list of works cited, a complete list of all the sources you quoted, paraphrased, or summarized. Every source cited in the text of your paper must be included in the works-cited list, and every source in the works-cited list must be cited in the text of your paper.

Every in-text, parenthetical citation should point readers towards a more detailed Works Cited page entry. And every Works Cited page entry should match at least one in-text, parenthetical citation. If one or the other is missing, this is a form of plagiarism. Why? Because if a student is missing a Works Cited entry, there is no way for readers to find the original information.

To help readers find the original location of the quotation or the idea paraphrased, we should also add the page number, if any, in parentheses: (Lastname 21) or ("Abbreviated Title" 21). 

For English classes and a variety of humanities disciplines, the agreed-upon style is called MLA.  For other classes, you may also be asked to format your papers in APA or Chicago Style.

One of the ways we can create a sense of being part of one larger academic conversation is by adopting an agreed-upon, consistent and uniform way of presenting academic material.

Keep your summary short. Good summaries for annotated bibliographies are not “complete” summaries; rather, they provide the highlights of the evidence in as brief and concise a manner as possible. Summarize what you find helpful. You definitely won’t need to quote every part of an academic journal in your essay. For that reason, your summary only needs to include what is most relevant to your research essay topic. No need to quote from what you are summarizing. Summaries will be more useful to you if you write them in your own words. Instead of quoting directly what you think is the point of the piece of evidence, try to paraphrase it. Use abstracts to help you, but paraphrase them in your own words. Many of the periodical indexes that are available as part of your library’s computer system include abstracts of articles. Of course, copying the exact words from the abstract would be plagiarism.  Paraphrasing in your own words in the annotated bibliography will help you understand and explain in preparation for writing your paper.

The top of the entry is the citation. It is the part that lists information like the name of the writer, where the evidence appeared, the date of publication, and other publishing information.

Most often, an annotated bibliography is a list of sources on a particular topic that includes a brief summary of what each source is about, an assessment of the source’s reliability, and an overview of how you will use the source in your essay. Here is an example:

As you synthesize the evidence about negative impacts, you begin to wonder if scholars have documented some positive impacts as well.

One strategy is to brainstorm keywords and keep track of what you have tried in a table like this one:

A great approach is to find the top journals in the specific field of your course and browse through recent issues to see what people are publishing on.

Your campus library pays big money to subscribe to databases for Tier 1 articles. Some are general-purpose databases that include the most prominent journals across disciplines, such as Academic Search Premier (by EBSCO), Academic Search Complete (by EBSCO), Academic OneFile (by Cengage), General OneFile (by Cengage), ArticleFirst (by OCLC), and JSTOR (by ITHAKA). Some are specific to a particular discipline, such as PsycINFO (for psychology), CINAHL (for nursing), Environment Complete (for environmental science), Historical Abstracts (for history). Often they have the full-text of the articles right there for you to save or print.

Find them quickly. Instead of paging through mountains of dubious web content, go right to the relevant scholarly article databases in order to quickly find the highest quality sources. Use the abstracts. Abstracts tell you immediately whether or not the article you’re holding is relevant or useful to the paper you’re assigned to write. You shouldn’t ever have the experience of reading the whole paper just to discover it’s not useful. Read strategically. Knowing the anatomy of a scholarly article tells you what you should be reading for in each section. For example, you don’t necessarily need to understand every nuance of the literature review. You can just focus on why the authors claim that their own study is distinct from the ones that came before. Don’t sweat the technical stuff. Not every social scientist understands the intricacies of log-linear modeling of quantitative survey data; however, the reviewers definitely do, and they found the analysis to be well constructed. Thus, you can accept the findings as legitimate and just focus on the passages that explain the findings and their significance in plainer language. Use one article to find others. If you have one really good article that’s a few years old, you can use article databases to find newer articles that cited it in their own literature reviews. That immediately tells you which ones are on the same topic and offer newer findings. On the other hand, if your first source is very recent, the literature review section will describe the other papers in the same line of research. You can look them up directly.

Is the research question driving the paper timely and important? Does the paper sufficiently and accurately review all of the relevant prior research? Are the information sources believable and the research methods rigorous? Are the stated results fully justified by the findings? Is the significance of the research clear? Is it well written? Overall, does the paper add new, trustworthy, and important knowledge to the field? Reviewers send their comments to the editor who then decides whether to (1) reject the manuscript, (2) ask the author(s) to revise and resubmit the manuscript, or (3) accept it for publication.

Scholarly journals use a peer-review process to decide which articles merit publication

Most of your professors belong to some big, general one (such as the Modern Language Association, the American Psychological Association, the National Association for Sport and Physical Education, or the American Physical Society)

These sources are sometimes uncertain, which is all the more reason to follow the trail to a Tier 1 or Tier 2 source whenever possible.

but if the Tier 3 article describes a particular study or academic expert, your best bet is to find the journal article or book it is reporting on and use that Tier 1 source instead.

All three of these sources are generally well-researched descriptions of an event or state of the world, undertaken by credentialed experts who generally seek to be even-handed. It is still up to you to judge their credibility. Your instructors and campus librarians can advise you on which sources in this category have the most credibility.

Also, Tier 1 sources tend to be highly specific, and sometimes you need a more general perspective on a topic.

They’re usually sponsored by some academic society. To get published, these articles and books had to earn favorable anonymous evaluations by qualified scholars.

when you should quote or paraphrase sources that you don’t agree with or do not find particularly compelling. They may convey ideas and opinions that help explain and justify your own argument. Whether or not we agree with a source, we can focus on what it claims and how exactly its claims relate to other sources and to our own ideas.

In your paper, you will need to show not just what each one says, but how they relate to each other in a conversation.  Describing this conversation can be the springboard for your own original point.

Knowing what question we are trying to answer can help us research efficiently. Before we start, we can use our focused topic to articulate a research question. 

So the sequence of topics as we narrow it down goes like this: Solar energy Solar thermal energy The Concentrated Solar Power technique for using solar thermal power to generate electricity The potential renewable energy contribution of Concentrated Solar Power thermal energy plants Ivanpah Solar Power Facility as a model for renewable electricity through large-scale Concentrated Solar Power thermal energy plants

We can start with any general area of interest within the guidelines of the research essay prompt. See Section 11.3: Brainstorming on ways to come up with ideas. In most cases, as we research we will want to narrow our topic

First, circle or highlight all of the most important verbs in the prompt. Verbs are action words that often communicate the most important tasks in the assignment, like analyze, evaluate, describe, and so on. 

We’ll focus more on summarizing, assessing, and responding to main ideas rather than examining all the twists and turns of each argument.

As we start the research paper, we can enjoy a bit more freedom. We can find multiple perspectives on the same topic and decide how much of each to include

The process of writing a research paper can help us learn about a complex topic and come up with our own informed perspective.  It’s a way to find clarity when the world is complicated.  We immerse ourselves in others' ideas and then come to our own conclusion. 

Eligon focuses only on the Black community in America, but it would be interesting to learn more about the appeal of reclaiming negative terms by looking at trends among other marginalized groups.

Why has the Black community continued to gravitate toward previously negative terms?

However, he also quotes prominent naysayers and describes a variety of counterarguments, like the idea that capitalization gives too much dignity to a category that was made up to oppress people.  (Note: Summary of a counterargument.)

“A Debate Over Identity and Race Asks, Are African-Americans ‘Black’ or ‘black’?”

I started reading her article with a feeling of frustration.

The Pandemic started as a public health crisis and brought along an economic one. Women are mainly affected by this crisis more than men because women are more likely to take housework and childcare responsibilities while men are expected to work and “bring home the bacon.” (Note: The author provides a clear thesis statement to close the opening (introduction) paragraph).)

While the Pandemic has affected everyone’s lives in every aspect, its impacts on women are even more severe. Helen Lewis, the author of “The Coronavirus Is a Disaster for Feminism” explains why feminism cannot survive during the Pandemic. (Note: An outside text is introduced that the essay will engage with.)

We should recognize that this pattern is limited to cases where _____________.

If we just analyzed an argument we found to be weak, we may already have an opposing argument or an alternate argument in mind. If readers are convinced that the first argument is without merit, they will be looking for a replacement. Our critique puts us in a good position to present an alternate vision. 

The idea is to point the reader in a new direction. We may want to qualify or limit our suggestion with words like “perhaps,” “it may be that,” or “The idea that _____________ is worth considering…”  

If we can’t agree with the argument’s main claim, we probably have some ideas of our own on the subject.

Sometimes we may agree with an argument’s claim, but for a different reason.  In that case, we can make an original contribution just by pointing out the alternate reason.

Sometimes we forget that agreement doesn’t have to be the end of a conversation.  The process of assessing an argument starts us thinking about all the issues it brings up, and primes us to add our own two cents. 

We should recognize that this pattern is limited to cases where _____________.

We can advance the conversation by qualifying or limiting the original argument.  One way to do so is to state that the argument only applies in a certain set of cases.

Further research on _____________ could show us _____________.

If we have called into question a reason or an assumption, we may want to recommend further research or support. Perhaps we are not ready to accept something without more evidence. In that case, we might describe the kind of study or investigative journalism that could uncover a reason. 

we can still add to the conversation by pinpointing what makes us uncertain.  What is it we need to know in order to form our opinion of the argument?  Does the writer need to clarify what they mean?  Or do we need more information that could come out of research or new studies?

Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, etc all encourage responses; we read a post and then add our own comment as we react, reply, share, or retweet. Of course email, texting, messageboards, forums, blogs and some news media also invite original commentary. Practicing academic response writing, then, can enrich our repertoire of responses in everyday life. 

Many college writing assignments call for responses that go beyond agreeing or disagreeing with an argument. The response can be a place to bring in opinion and personal experience as they relate to the argument. Even if an assessment assignment doesn’t specifically ask for a recommendation, it often makes sense to add one to a conclusion. Whether we agreed or disagreed with the argument, pointing toward a next step for the larger conversation on the issue can give the essay a sense of momentum and purpose. 

Just as there are many ways to respond when a friend tells us something, there are many ways to respond in writing to a written argument. We don’t have to have all the answers; there are many ways to contribute without being experts.

Academic writing gives us the chance to join a worldwide conversation about what is true on every subject under the sun.  

The argument claims that _____________ will inevitably lead to _____________, but this is far from certain.  

She convincingly supports this claim by _____________.

What exactly does X mean by _____________? 

There are many ways to follow up on your critique, as we will see in the next chapter on making recommendations in response to an argument.

readers will still want an overall sense of how strong or weak we find the argument to be.

In our overall assessment, we want to make it clear to what extent we agree, disagree, or partially agree with an argument. Here are a few phrases we can use:

Try putting the strengths and weaknesses in order from most important to least important.  This may help us decide what to highlight in our thesis. 

make a list of the strengths and weaknesses of the argument that emerged as we checked the argument for clarity, evidence, assumptions, exceptions, and counterarguments.

Think of the parallel to a Yelp or Amazon review of a product. We might appreciate some aspects of the product and have frustrations with others, but we need to decide how many stars to give it and we need to have a short caption for our whole review.  Then in the text of the review, we can explain why we rated the product the way we did in more detail, exploring the particular strengths and weaknesses.

Sometimes an argument points toward something worth considering even if it doesn’t convince us completely. It may raise an important question for further discussion or study.

After we zero in on the weakness, we can highlight whatever parts of the argument proved to be sound.  If we are assessing an argument that is developed over the course of one or more pages, there will be many related claims and reasons.  The reasoning in one section might be valid even if the next point has us wincing or wanting to rant.  

However, even if we do find weaknesses, it’s important to recognize any contributions as well. Doing so will show readers that our assessment is fair-minded.

If we do not uncover any weaknesses as we review the argument’s logical structure, use of evidence, and handling of counterarguments, then we can naturally describe those as strengths.

If an argument constructs and defeats a straw man, it is really only defeating a made up debate.

Often, a writer may be tempted to summarize the other side in a distorted way, to exaggerate the counterargument in order to make it easier to disprove. This goes by the name of the straw man fallacy.

Ask ourselves if there is any particular group of people or school of thought likely to object to the argument.  What would they say?

This can help get our minds going. Instead of the more formal phrase “This way of thinking is completely wrong,” why not consider the argument we’re assessing and then try out the phrase, “What, are you crazy? You think _____________?  But haven’t you considered_____________?”   

Once we look for it, we see it everywhere, including on the news and in reputable academic settings. 

They need to show that there is a likely way in which the first event could cause the second. They need to ask if something else have caused the second event.

Arguments often claim casually that an earlier event caused a later event. To be sound, such arguments need quite a bit of support.

One type of invalid comparison comes in arguments that make a dramatic prediction that if one thing happens, other more dramatic things will inevitably follow.

Are the two things really similar enough to justify the conclusion? If not, we have what is often called a false analogy fallacy.

The tactic is often, but not always, intentional:

Questioning assumptions can be a way to speak back to authority

sometimes because they seem obvious and sometimes because drawing attention to the assumptions might draw attention to a weakness in the argument. We will need to identify these assumptions on our own. 

we do not need to find every underlying assumption in order to assess an argument; we only need to know which are questionable.

By first recognizing and then changing our assumptions, we can, to use a common phrase, “think outside the box.”

Testimonial evidence can be convincing if it is collected from relevant authorities. Whether or not a testimonial is convincing depends not just on how well regarded the expert is but on how relevant their expertise is to the topic at hand.

we need to know whether that institution is credible.

This fallacy is often called appeal to ignorance because the arguer is citing their own lack of knowledge as the basis for their argument. 

negative stereotypes. Stereotypes are general claims about religious or racial groups, ethnicities and nationalities. Even if we do have evidence that a certain trait is more common among people of one ethnicity, we still cannot assume that a particular individual of that ethnicity will have the trait.

People who deny that global warming is a genuine phenomenon often commit this fallacy. In February of 2015, the weather was unusually cold in Washington, DC. Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma famously took to the Senate floor wielding a snowball. “In case we have forgotten, because we keep hearing that 2014 has been the warmest year on record, I ask the chair, ‘You know what this is?’ It’s a snowball, from outside here. So it’s very, very cold out. Very unseasonable.”

Most academic arguments are inductive; they explore evidence in the form of specific examples, facts, statistics, testimonials, or anecdotes in order to arrive at a general conclusion.

a writer may end up summarizing that belief again in a different way. Other times the writer may knowingly perform this sleight of hand, hoping the reader will not notice.

Sometimes a reason given is not really a reason at all, just a repetition of the claim itself in different words. In effect, the writer asks us to believe an idea because of that very same idea. This is called circular reasoning or "begging the question."

inductive argument that uses examples to make a general claim. 

The original argument does not mention any of these exceptions.  By pointing this out, we can show that the argument as expressed is invalid.

If there is an exception that the argument hasn’t accounted for, that may point us to a weak spot that we should mention in our assessment. Often, a particular claim or reason may sound plausible, but we need to slow down and ask if it is true in all cases.

if we see a general statement, we should ask ourselves whether it is true in all cases or whether we can identify any case that doesn’t fit the pattern.

There may or may not be legitimate reasons to oppose legal abortion. However, the above argument does not hold up because it depends on a sleight of hand, a shift from the idea of a human, meaning a human being, to the adjective "human," which can apply to anything with human cells and DNA, including hair and toenails. We can tell that the above argument is faulty if we substitute "fetus" for "hair" to construct a similar argument: "No medical professional should be allowed to intentionally harm a human. Surely our hair and fingernails are human, not animal. Therefore cutting hair and nails should be illegal."

The lack of clarity may not be a serious flaw if we can make a reasonable guess as to what the author intends based on the rest of the argument.  We can simply point out such a case: The writer does not specify whether _____________ or _____________, but we can infer that _____________ because _____________.

we can make an educated guess as to what the author meant based on clues we find in the rest of the argument.

Since our goal in an assessment is to decide how effective we think the argument will be at getting its point across, any charge of vagueness implies some failure to communicate that point. This becomes a critique.

We do not need any special vocabulary to point out ambiguity, but sometimes seeing typical phrases can help jumpstart our thinking. Here are some approaches:

In our assessment, we can describe any areas of ambiguity by adding questions to our summary of the argument.

Let’s look at the elements of the border argument we have studied and ask ourselves if any of the statements need to be clarified. Below, question marks indicate statements that are in some way ambiguous.

but major questions still remain about what the writer means.

We will look at problems with the clarity of the claims, the solidity of the reasons, and the validity of the assumptions.

Our critique will be clearer since we have spent time thinking about the foundations of the argument and the author’s purpose and meaning.