Ben Dottinger's 3/2

Today, in Mr. Rivers’s absence (and in Mr. S’s presence), we continued what we had been doing yesterday and the day prior with logical fallacies and our research of different types. Yesterday and the day prior, the different groups of desks researched 4 of the given 24 fallacies on a website (yourlogicalfallacyis.com). Some of the fallacies on the website include ad hominem (attack on the character of the opposing arguer), strawman (misrepresenting an opposing argument), and tu quoque (refuting criticism with more criticism). What happened today was we rearranged the groups of 2 to 4 so that each of us had researched different logical fallacies and could teach the others the ones we were now well-versed. After we had fully explained the aforementioned logical fallacies to one another, we began to draft a counterclaim paragraph based on our own research paper and our own topic. When it comes to the counterclaim paragraph, there was some ambiguity as to the format of the paragraph: would it be better to refute just one well-developed (through multiple sentences) antithesis, or to refute multiple smaller, less-developed counterclaims (through only a sentence or two). Upon emailing Mr. Rivers and rescuing him--albeit briefly--from the fatal, overwhelming boredom of his meeting, he promptly replied with some answers. He explained that it would be beneficial to argue against one well-developed counterclaim at a time, and that it would not be a daft idea to, especially in larger works than even our own, include multiple counterclaim paragraphs. This would also help ensure that multiple opposing arguments are effectively countered rather than with merely a blanket attempt and a vague refutation. In the picture below, we see ad hominem. Jimmy may seem to have a strong argument, capitalizing off of the opposition’s own insecurities, but we can quickly poke holes in his argument when we realize that he’s purely using logical fallacies (sorry Jimmy). All in all, it was still a rather productive day.