110 Phil Intro. To Philosophy / Professor Pruim TEST 1 STUDY GUIDE We have only begun our look at philosophy, but I think it would be useful to have a test on a small bit of material so that you will have an idea of what we are looking for in this course. (Hence, this test will count less than the other exams.) TOPICS The short exam will test your knowledge of terms and concepts. It will also ask you about key statements and positions in the arguments we have looked at and the criticisms of those arguments. You should know not only what a key statement says, but how it fits into the discussion of a given issue. Know the following names and terms: Bertrand Russell, internal/external question, analysis & argument, custom v. critical thinking, valid, sound, cogent, fallacy of ignorance, the method of counter-example, fallacy of the heap, fallacies of affirming the consequent and denying the antecedent, modus ponens, modus tollens, Be able to recognize examples of the four types of arguments involving "if...then" and know which are valid and which are not. About our general introduction to philosophy, review what we had say to about the following: what is meant by describing philosophical issues as general, fundamental, and external why reading ancient philosophers need not indicate that philosophy makes no progress the intellectual and practical values to pursuing external questions and studying philosophy
FORMAT The test will have mostly matching and multiple choice questions. So, please come to class with a no. 2 pencil. I may have some fill in the blank or definitions. And I may have one short answer question. SAMPLE MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS 1. "Every computer is a Macintosh computer. So, the computer on which this exam was written is a Macintosh." a) invalid b) unsound c) not cogent 2. The sense in which philosophy questions are external is that they have no bearing whatsoever on the issues we face in daily practical life. a) true b) false 3. Evaluate this argument: "If Nina doesn't pay her parking tickets, then she won't graduate. Nina did not graduate. Therefore, she didn't pay those tickets." a. valid, modus ponens b. valid, modus tollens c. fallacy of affirming the consequent. d. fallacy of denying the antecedent.