Identifying Arguments. Can you distinguish a statement that is an argument from one that is not? Remember that an argument A. Puts forth a claim B. Offers support for it C. M akes an attempt to influence someone Now, consider the following statement:

If it rains tomorrow, I’m going home.

This is not an argument because the speaker offers neither a claim nor support for it. Rather, she merely states her intention, which does not depend on the other person’s acceptance. Furthermore, the speaker does not explicitly try to influence anyone else but merely states what she herself intends to do. Consider the following statements, decide whether or not they are arguments, and explain the reasons for your decision. Remember that statements of one’s emotional state or pure descriptions are not generally viewed as arguments.

*1. There is a plethora of credible scenarios for achieving human-level intelligence in a machine.

We will be able to evolve and train a system combining massively parallel neural nets with other paradigms to understand language and model knowledge, including the ability to read and understand written documents . . . We can then have our computers read all of the world’s literature—books, magazines, scientific journals, and other available material. Ultimately, the machines will gather knowledge on their own by venturing into the physical world, drawing from the full spectrum of media and information services, and sharing knowledge with each other (which machines can do far more easily than their human creators).

Ray Kurzweil, The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence (New York: Viking, 1999), 3.

2. Fred: Why are you leaving so early for the meeting?

Gale: Sue asked me to pick her up on the way. Are you going to watch that movie at 8 o’clock?

Fred: Yeah. It lasts until 10 and then I thought I’d go to bed early.

Gale: Fine. I’ll see you in the morning. 3. Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach . . .

today’s students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors.

These differences go far further and deeper than most educators suspect or realize. “Different kinds of experiences lead to different brain structures,” says Dr. Bruce D. Perry of Baylor College of Medicine . . . It is very likely that our students’ brains have physically changed—and are different from ours—as a result of how they grew up. But whether or not this is literally true, we can say with certainty that their thinking patterns have changed.

Marc Prensky, “Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants,” On the Horizon 9 (October 2001).

4. I try to remember when this rivalry between my daughter and me first began. I can’t. It sometimes seems that we have always been this way with each other, that we have never gotten along any better or differently. I would like to make my daughter less miserable if I can, to help her be happier and much more pleased with herself, I don’t know how.

Joseph Heller, Something Happened (New York: Ballantine Books, 1974), 179.

*5. As a linguist, Mr. McWhorer (a professor of linguistics at the University of California at Berkeley and a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a policy research group in New York City) knows that grammatical rules are arbitrary and that in casual conversation people have never abided by them. Rather, he argues, the fault lies with the collapse of the distinction between the written and the oral. Where formal, well-honed English was once de rigueur in public life, he argues, it has all but disappeared, supplanted by the indifferent cadences of speech and ultimately impairing our ability to think.

Emily Eakin, “Going at the Changes in, Ya Know, English,” New York Times (November 15, 2003), www.

nytimes.com 6. Charles: I think students care more about politics and the issues of higher education than at any time in the past.

Fred: You are wrong. Students have terrible voting turnout, they don’t read newspapers or engage in any kind of conversation about the major issues of the day.

The more I teach college students, the more I begin to think they are just not engaged.

Charles: M aybe their political expression is not in the classroom. I walk around campus and I hear their conversations. I watch protests and look at how students argue with one another. I think it is possible that we have failed in education. Students are learning on their own because we haven’t designed a curriculum to inform and inspire. Students are active; I just don’t think we see it all the time.

7. I don’t think anyone would disagree that animals are different from human beings. But, does that give us the right to abuse them? To subject them to painful experiments so that we can wear pretty cosmetics? We use animals to make our lives easier. Sometimes we use them as fashion accessories. Sometimes we use them to test new medical treatments and drugs. If it is true that human beings are the most evolved beings on the planet, doesn’t that mean we have that much more responsibility to ensure that all living beings are cared for?

8. John: Should we figure out salary raises on a 3 percent cost of living increase plus bonuses if people performed exceptionally?

Judy: That will work as long as we have enough in the budget to cover it. How much is available to us?

John: Well, we have a reserve fund to cover any excesses. I think we should start out with what the staff ought to receive and concern ourselves with what’s available later on.

Judy: That sounds fine to me, as long as we have some excess. 9. Newspapers, my friend, are a thing of the past. People no longer read in a linear fashion—

they pick and choose. They jump around. The old style is gone, replaced with e-readers.

People want to consume information differently than in the past. The digital video recorder

(DVR) gave us the ability to watch what we wanted when we wanted. The e-reader is the same thing. We pick our articles, we pick what we are interested in reading. There was a time, when people would sit and read an entire newspaper. Not now. We want headlines and, if something sparks our interest, we might read more. It’s a new world. The consumer has become their own editor—what is relevant and what is not. I think that’s good.

*10. Chevelle: I am truly worried about student debt. Too many young people are saddled with huge and seemingly insurmountable debt just to finish their bachelor’s degrees. It seems as though our educational system has put so much pressure on students to get a degree and then hasn’t provided them with enough resources to complete the degree.

Amy: But that’s the deal, right? Degrees benefit students. Why should the government pick up the costs? We know that a college education will help students get jobs, earn a good living, and be successful. College graduates earn much more than other people.

Why shouldn’t they pay for their own success? That just seems right, doesn’t it?

Chevelle: But if we go that route, only students with resources and wealthy families will ever get a college education. What about all those who don’t have the money?

It seems to me that you are saying we should go ahead and let wealth and privilege determine success. If we provide access for all of our students, then we can help all of our society be better off. Education is a public good, not just a private good. When we recognize that and provide qualified students with access, we will all be better off.