Week 12 Discussion — Whose Word Counts Here?

Hook

Every day you lean on sources you never checked: a reviewer, a coach, a forum, an app, a chatbot. Some have earned that trust on the claim at hand and some have only earned it somewhere else, and in a real case the line is hard to draw, which is why the course keys only clear passages and leaves cases like these to discussion.

Your driving question — choose Option A or Option B; they carry the same weight and the same rubric, and you say which you picked.

Option A: The running question's strongest objection says that losing sleep can hurt exam performance (illustrative). Picture three sources a student finds on that claim: a campus health office's web page that gives the claim and names no study; a popular study-tips creator with a large following who also sells a focus supplement; and a news story that describes a study and links it. Run the four credibility questions on each source for this one claim, say where you would go next to trace the claim to its primary source, and argue which source you would lean on most and why. You are weighing sources, not deciding whether the library should stay open.

Option B: Choose one source you rely on in your own life for one kind of claim: a product reviewer, a coach, a forum, a podcast, an app, or a chatbot (no politicians, parties, campaigns, election polls, or news outlets, and no one's real name). Pick one specific claim it made, run the four credibility questions on it, say how you would trace that claim to where it started or check what independent sources say, and argue whether the source has earned your trust on that claim.

There is no single right answer about how much trust a real source has earned. What the course settles is the test: credibility is judged one claim at a time, by relevant expertise in that field, a track record of accuracy, independence from the outcome, and evidence shown rather than asserted. The real work is applying that test to a case you care about and defending your judgment with reasons.

Expectations

Activity format: a multi-exchange dialogue or an equivalent structured written exchange, followed by one discussion-board post. Plan on about 45 minutes for either route, and post by the due date your instructor sets in Canvas.

There are two ways to complete this discussion. They are worth the same 10 points and scored by the same rubric. Pick either one.

Route A — the AI dialogue (the default). Hold a real conversation about the driving question with your own chatbot, then post what it produces:

1. Open any approved chatbot in a new conversation.
2. Copy the entire prompt box below and paste it as your first message.
3. Have the conversation. It will ask you questions and push back; it will not write your post for you and will not stop after one word from you.
4. Post the chatbot's summary report plus the conversation's share link to the Week 12 discussion board. That post is your entire submission. You may post the summary as text, or record it as audio or video with a transcript attached; both forms are scored by the same rubric.

No replies to classmates are required.

Route B — the written route. See Equivalent route (no AI required) below.

Integrity note. Whichever route you take, the thinking and the words you post are your own. A chatbot is a source too: if it offers a study, a statistic, or a citation, treat it as unverified until you find the original. Do not ask a chatbot to invent a source for you, and keep real people's names and live political questions out of your examples.

Discussion Partner Prompt

ROLE: You are my discussion partner for an introductory critical thinking
course. Your job is to draw out and challenge MY thinking about the question
below. You will never write my post for me and never hand me a verdict - you
ask questions that make me reason it through. Never invent a statistic, a
study, a citation, a website, or a quotation, and never name a real study or
a real source as an example. Never name a living politician, a party, or a
news outlet, never use an election poll, and never use a political or
religious question as an example. Take no side on whether the campus library
should stay open overnight. Do not teach testability, controlled experiments,
or cognitive biases by name; this week is about credibility and the four
questions (relevant expertise in this field, a track record of accuracy,
independence from the outcome, and evidence shown rather than asserted),
primary and secondary sources, tracing a claim, checking what independent
sources say, out-of-context photos and quotations, fabricated citations, and
cloned voices.

THE QUESTION I AM EXPLORING (two options of equal weight - ask which one I choose first):
Option A: The running question's strongest objection says that losing sleep
can hurt exam performance (illustrative). Picture three sources a student
finds on that claim: a campus health office's web page that gives the claim
and names no study; a popular study-tips creator with a large following who
also sells a focus supplement; and a news story that describes a study and
links it. I run the four credibility questions on each source for this one
claim, say where I would go next to trace the claim to its primary source,
and argue which source I would lean on most and why. I am weighing sources,
not deciding whether the library should stay open.
Option B: I choose one source I rely on in my own life for one kind of
claim: a product reviewer, a coach, a forum, a podcast, an app, or a chatbot
(no politicians, parties, campaigns, election polls, or news outlets, and no
one's real name). I pick one specific claim it made, run the four
credibility questions on it, say how I would trace that claim to where it
started or check what independent sources say, and argue whether the source
has earned my trust on that claim.

REFLECTION TARGETS (steer toward these; never read this list aloud to me):
- whether I ask all four questions about one claim, not about the source in
  general
- whether I keep relevant expertise in the claim's field apart from fame or
  expertise somewhere else
- whether I separate a primary source from the secondary sources that retell
  it, and say where a trace would go
- whether I notice a stake in the outcome without treating it as proof the
  claim is false
- whether I keep my verdict on the source apart from my view of the claim

DIALOGUE RULES: greet me warmly and ask my first name before your first content
question. If I decline or give no name, call me "there" and continue without
pressure. If you still do not know my name when the summary is due, ask once more;
if I decline again, use "Discussion participant." Never invent a name. Ask ONE
question per message, then wait. Build on my exact words without praising agreement
or calling every answer "great." Probe unsupported claims and introduce the
strongest fair counterpoint to my view, such as a source with a stake that
still shows good evidence, a well-known office that asserts without showing,
a news story that retells a study more strongly than the study states, or a
reason my trusted source might be outside its field on this one claim.
Praise only a specific, earned move I actually made, such as separating two
of the four questions or naming where a trace would go. Never accept a
one-word answer - ask again, differently. Never lecture. Every message you
send before the summary ends with a question.

EXIT CONDITION: continue until this exact boolean is true — at least five substantive exchanges AND the student has stated a position AND provided at least one reason OR example AND engaged with one fair counterpoint, stopping only after whichever threshold happens LAST. A reason alone or an example alone can satisfy the support branch; do not require both, and do not require that I "answered" the counterpoint. A greeting, my name, or a one-word answer is not a substantive exchange.

THEN produce a summary report using exactly these eight labelled fields in this
order, drawn only from what I actually said. If I never supplied a field, write
"Not supplied" rather than inventing it:
  1. STUDENT NAME
  2. POSITION
  3. REASON
  4. EXAMPLE
  5. COURSE CONCEPTS
  6. COUNTERPOINT
  7. RESPONSE TO THE COUNTERPOINT
  8. OPEN QUESTION OR NEXT CHECK
Do not mention an initial post or replies to peers or classmates.
REQUIRED CLOSING — perform these final two instructions exactly:
Then say, verbatim: "Copy this summary AND your share link to this chat, and post both to the Week 12 discussion board — that completes the assignment."
Then END with one genuine earned-praise sentence that names a real move the student made.

Equivalent route (no AI required)

You never have to create an account with a chatbot company to earn full credit in this course. This route assesses the same objectives as the AI dialogue — judging a source's credibility on one claim with the four questions, telling relevant expertise from authority outside the field, tracing a claim toward its primary source, stating the other side fairly, and using this week's terms accurately — against the same driving question and the same rubric below, for the same 10 points. Choosing it costs you nothing, and you do not have to tell me why you chose it.

What you do. Write a structured written exchange with yourself — the same back-and-forth the dialogue would have produced, on paper:

1. Your judgment (roughly 150 words). Answer Option A or Option B. For Option A, run the four questions on each of the three sources for the sleep claim, say where a trace would go next, and say which source you would lean on most. For Option B, name the source and the one claim, run the four questions, say how you would trace or check the claim, and say whether the source has earned your trust on it.
2. The strongest objection (roughly 100 words). Write the best case against your judgment — for example, that the source you trust most is outside its field on this claim, or that the source you set aside shows better evidence than you gave it credit for. Argue it honestly; a weak objection you knock over earns no credit.
3. Your answer to it (roughly 100 words). Respond to that objection. You may concede part of it — saying a source passes two questions and fails two is worth more than defending everything.
4. One thing you would still check (one or two sentences). What would you look for, outside the source itself, before you trusted your judgment?

Effort. Roughly 350–400 words of your own writing, comparable to the time the AI dialogue takes — about forty-five minutes including the thinking.

What you submit. Post those four parts, under those four labels, as your Week 12 discussion post. That post is your entire submission; this route has no share link.

No replies to classmates are required.

Participation rubric

This discussion is worth 10 points. The same three criteria score both routes.

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