Author: Walton, Douglas N.
Title: Informal Logic : A Pragmatic Approach
Description: Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, (2008). 2nd Edition, orig.cloth. 22x14cm, xvi,347 pp.. Minor rubbing. An ink mark to bottom page-edge. VG. ¶ Contents: Argument as reasoned dialogue -- Questions and answers in dialogue -- Criticisms of irrelevance -- Appeals to emotion -- Valid arguments -- Personal attack in argumentation -- Appeals to authority -- Inductive errors, bias, and fallacies -- Natural language argumentation. ["This is an introductory guidebook to the basic principles of how to construct good arguments and how to criticize bad ones. It is non- technical in its approach and is based on 150 key examples, each discussed and evaluated in clear, illustrative detail. Professor Walton, a leading authority in the field of informal logic, explains how errors, fallacies, and other key failures of argument occur. He shows how correct uses of argument are based on sound strategies for reasoned persuasion and critical responses. Among the many subjects covered are: forms of valid argument, relevance, appeals to emotion, personal attack, uses and abuses of expert opinion, problems in deploying statistics, loading terms, equivocation, arguments from analogy, and techniques of posing, replying to, and criticizing questions. The book will be ideally suited to courses in informal logic and in the introduction to philosophy. It will also prove valuable to studetns of pragmatics, rhetoric, and speech communication" - publisher's description].

Keywords: Logic, Reasoning, , , , , , ,