Week 13 — Argument, Reasoning & Logical Fallacies

Why this matters

A shift supervisor deciding whether a new schedule really caused fewer late arrivals and a neighbor weighing arguments at a town meeting about a community garden both need to tell a sound argument from one that only sounds sound.

In plain language

This week you look under the hood of an argument (a claim plus the reasons and evidence offered for it). You learn four ways of reasoning (getting from evidence to a conclusion) and how to tell a strong path from a shaky one. You learn to draw any argument as a small map whose most important part is the warrant (the unstated link between your evidence and your claim). And you learn 12 fallacies, the flaws that make an argument look stronger than it is, so you can keep them out of your own speech and catch them in someone else's.

• Already covered: evidence and the oral citation (Week 4) and the persuasive claim built on three appeals (Week 12).
• This week: four types of reasoning, Toulmin's map of an argument, and the fallacies this course names.
• How they connect: this week tests the logos inside your persuasive speech.
• Where we're going next: Week 14, Special-Occasion & Small-Group / Team Communication.

Focus

How do you build an argument that holds, and spot one that only sounds like it does?

By the end of this module, you should be able to:

• [ ] name the four types of reasoning and write a syllogism
• [ ] map an argument's claim, evidence, and warrant, and tell the warrant from the evidence
• [ ] spot the course's fallacies and check a chatbot's fallacy label against the definition

To-do

Plan your week

1. Read Chapter 13 (about 45 minutes), then the lecture and slides.
2. Do the tutorial (60–90 minutes) and the practice set (about 20 minutes).
3. Do the Speech Workshop (about 90 minutes), the discussion, and the assignment.
4. Take the quiz.

This week's checkpoint: map one main point of your own persuasive speech as claim, evidence, and warrant, and check it for fallacies.

You've got this

Ask your instructor if a step snags.

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