Philosophy 110, Course Overview (Print and Read Carefully)

Before you enter this course, read carefully this overview, course evaluation, course assignments, course mechanics, and self-check activities.

Course Title: Introduction to Logic

Instructor: Professor Ronald C. Pine, Ph.D.

Course Credits: 3

Course Description:  The course develops basic techniques of analysis and an understanding of the principles and concepts involved in clear thinking.  Emphasized will be logical validity, deductive and inductive reasoning, fallacious arguments, symbolic logic, and scientific method as applied to criteria of reasonable evidence.

This course fulfills the Symbolic Reasoning requirement for the Foundation requirement for Honolulu Community College and the University of Hawaii at Manoa.  See the Manoa General Education requirements.

Prerequisites or Recommended Preparation: Should be able to read and write at the college level (Eng. 22 or 100), and possess basic Internet skills. Must have consistent Internet access.

Course Purpose:  Because we live in a highly technological society, students should gain a basic understanding and appreciation of formal reasoning and its connection with the informal reasoning of everyday life.  Students should also gain an understanding of the basic software foundations for our machines (computers, game consoles, cell phones, etc.), and the process of putting human thoughts into these machines.  Additionally, the course is based on the assumption that the less we think critically the more someone else will think for us -- usually with the intention of manipulating us. From this point of view, logic can be viewed as a defensive tool enabling each of us to defend ourselves against the onslaught of persuasive appeals that bombard our minds daily. As such it is an important element in the development of individual potential -- enabling us to be freer and more decisive individuals.

Course Objectives and Student Learning Outcomes:  Students will

• demonstrate an understanding of the beauty and power of symbolic systems, as well as their clarity and precision, through use of techniques of logical analysis, with the intention of enhancing the student's reasoning skills and appreciation of abstraction, pattern recognition, and formal systems of analysis
  
  
• demonstrate an understanding the concept of logical proof as a chain of inferences by producing symbolic chains of inferences of their own
  
• demonstrate skill in hypothetical reasoning, and gain experience in the presentation and critical evaluation of evidence
  
• demonstrate an ability to use symbolic techniques and formal rules in the context of problem solving by applying symbolic analysis techniques (translating, formal proof techniques, truth tables, argument pattern recognition) both to informal (fallacies) and formal reasoning.

Text: Essential Logic: Basic Reasoning Skills for the Twenty-First Century, Ronald C. Pine (Harcourt, 1996; online edition, 2011)

Qualified students with disabilities will receive appropriate accommodations in this course. Students with disabilities may obtain information on available services online at honolulu.hawaii.edu/disability.  Specific inquires may be made by contacting Student ACCESS at 844-2392, by e-mail at access@hcc.hawaii.edu, or by simply stopping by the office located in 2/409.

Course Evaluation

Your final grade for the course will be determined by your performance on two exams and weekly class discussion. The weight assigned to each activity is as follows:

Activity	Total Points Possible
Class Discussion and Participation	120 points possible
Exam (Chapters 1-5)	120 points possible
Final Exam (Chapters 7-10)	200 points possible
Total Points Possible	440 points

Your final grade for the course will be assigned according to the following schedule of total points accumulated:

Points	Grade
396-440	A
352-395	B
291-351	C
242-290	D
Under 242	F or N

An incomplete grade (Inc.) is also possible but is given only for special circumstances, usually an inability to take the final exam for a very good reason.  An N grade at HCC means "no grade."  It is usually given in place of an F grade if a student has a very good reason for why he or she performed poorly in the course.  If disasters beyond your control occur to you while you are taking this course, please feel free to discuss the N-grade possibility with me.

Course Assignments and Exams

Reading Assignments: We will be reading Chapters 1-5, 7-10, and 12. Chapters 6 and 11 are highly recommended for students who wish to obtain the maximum benefit from this course. The detailed schedule on what we call the Main Page will be posted a few days before the course starts.

Weekly Homework Assignments: The Main Page will also show the exercises for each chapter.  The answers for these exercises will be posted for you to compare with your answers, but you should discipline yourself not to look at the answers until after you have finished each exercise.  Otherwise you will get a false sense of confidence that will most likely be unrealistic for exam expectations.  In some cases I will be asking each student to post an answer to some exercises as part of class discussion using the Discussion program in Laulima.  You may also e-mail me your questions related to your answers to exercises privately for feedback.  Please feel free to e-mail me at any time if you have questions at:

pine@hawaii.edu (primary e-mail address for our course)

rncpine@yahoo.com (backup e-mail address)

Please note that we will be using the UH Laulima gateway program for our course.  Once registered for the course, you can log in at:

https://laulima.hawaii.edu/portal

You log in by using your UH e-mail login name and password.  You will need to use your UH e-mail account for this course.

Class Discussions: You should follow the schedule and participate regularly in the class discussion forums which will occur online using the Laulima Discussion program.  I will be posting general questions for each discussion forum.  In most forums two posts will be required.  At least one of your comments must be a direct response to my question, but any others can be questions or responses to another student's comment.  As noted above, sometimes I will be asking each of you to post an answer to a selected exercise.  Other than e-mail exchanges and reading the textbook, Laulima class discussions via the bulletin board program are the primary method we will be using to interact with each other.  The discussions are a very important part of the course.

Exams: The items on the midterm and final exam will not be a surprise for you.  Many of the exercise items at the back of each chapter are all from previous exams.  I will let you know which ones.  So, although the content will be of course different, the type of question or problem will be clear.  These exams will be given on campus or at an approved proctored site.

Course Mechanics

• As an online course we have lots of flexibility up to a point.  Although there are deadlines for class participation that follow our schedule, you get to decide during the week when you participate in the course.  Via e-mail and our Laulima discussion forums I will be available to you throughout most of each week..  You can of course also call me at 845-9163.  Leave a clear voice mail message and number to call if I am not in.  I return calls and e-mails almost always the same day.  Usually within hours.  Every morning I attempt to answer all discussion questions posted on the Laulima discussion forum before my on-campus courses start.  Normally I also respond to discussion questions throughout the day.  Late at night and on the weekends expect me to be a little slower.  I do have a family and a life.

• Following the Content Schedule, doing the reading in a timely manner and participating in class discussions are very important.  As in mathematics, learning logical analysis is a step by step process.  Each chapter should be read slowly.  Note the parts that you don't understand and use the Laulima discussion program or e-mail to ask questions.
  
  
• Do the exercises in a timely manner as indicated in the Schedule.  The reading, the exercises, and class interaction should require at least 10 hours per week for a six week format.  Please understand that for every hour you don't put in one week, you will have to add that many hours to the next week's work to catch up.  I know of no other way to do well in a course such as this.  It is step by step.  Also, most likely you will not understand each concept right away.  You will probably have to think about a concept and look at the examples several times and ask questions before all the connections are made.  Connecting the dots takes time and effort.
  
  
• Each chapter from the textbook Essential Logic is essentially the lecture portion of the course.  (There are also supplement lectures for each chapter.)  In a course such as this, it is very important that you read each chapter in a step by step manner.  Don't try to read only the concept summaries, jump around, or just talk to other students alone, thinking that will be enough.  On the exams you will not have to memorize anything.  All of the exams are open-book with notes allowed.  (Because the book is free online, you will have to cut and paste from the book to notes, or arrange printing.)  You will, however, have to make a lot of connections on abstract concepts.  To do this well, you need to read the book carefully, note what you don't understand, ask questions of me and other students, do the exercises and compare your answers with mine, and take the practice quizzes.  Each chapter will also have a lecture supplement that highlights and repeats important points in the chapter.  The Main Page contains links to the supplement lectures and is the main gateway page for communication and understanding.  To access the Main Page you must register for the course.
  
  A practice quiz will be posted for key portions of the course.  A recommended amount of time will be given for each quiz.  These quizzes have been designed and carefully sequenced to give you feedback on the necessary skills you will need to do well on the major exams (first exam and final).
  
• The Laulima discussion portion of the course is very important.  Other than the textbook and e-mail, it is our primary method of communicating and finding out if we are all on the same page.  I will post questions on the chapters and sometimes sections of chapters that I want everyone to respond to.  As a student, you can also post questions and get reactions from other students and me.  As a basic requirement, in most sections you need to post two comments on each question within the time allotted by our schedule.  One must be a direct response to my original question, but any others can be basic questions or comments on other student comments.  Your comments should be thoughtful attempts to reveal what you have learned by reading the textbook.  They should not be wimpy statements, such as "Me to," "I agree," or "Good point."  You will find me commenting often on a student comment.  Watch for these comments.  If I see a misunderstanding that appears to be somewhat common in the class, I will be responding actually then to the whole class, even though it will technically be a response to a particular student.  This method of communication has great potential if everyone takes it seriously.  As for questions that you may post, they should be highly focused and show evidence that you have done the reading.  They should not be like, "Can anyone summarize Chapter 1 for me?"  An excellent question would be something like, "I don't get it; can anyone tell me why the conclusion of a valid argument can be false?"  It is also important to read the comments and questions of all the other students in the class.  This reading will not only probably address questions that you have, but it will ensure that the same questions are not repeated over and over.  Suggestion: Students who use the discussion forum to ask lots of questions prior to posting their answer to the main forum question do best in this class.
  
• Note that there will be two major exams on the material covered in the course. As noted above, you will be able to use the book and your notes.  The exams will be timed, however.  You will be required to come to a campus to take the exam at a scheduled time.   Each campus in the UH system has a proctoring site (Click Here).  However, we will create together an acceptable proctoring arrangement on another campus even if you are not in Hawaii.  You can even be in another State or Country.  Such arrangements though must be made early in the semester. Students have taken this class successfully form all over the world.

Self Check

• Are you putting the time into this course --  at least 10 hours in a six week course?
  
  
• When reading the book are you stopping to write down your questions to be shared during class discussion and/or sent to the instructor by e-mail?
  
• Are you following the schedule and making at least two posts in the Laulima class discussion forums?
  
• Are you doing the exercises in a timely manner as indicated on the Main Page?  Are you looking at the answers only after you have attempted them all yourself? Ask questions if you don’t understand the answer or if you are unsure if your answer is also correct?
  
  
• Are you taking each practice quiz and testing if you can finish the quiz in the suggested allotted time?

Note:

I will be saying this again and again throughout the semester because I sincerely want you to be successful.  Students who “jump in” and fully participate in the Laulima discussion posting do best.  Students who don’t, usually do not pass the course and have to take it over again.  Some students take this class three times before they can get their schedules controlled enough to put in the time and fully participate.  I have had online classes where 80% of the students have received A and B grades.  These classes have students in them that literally beat me up all week asking lots of questions (more than the minimum).  If you do that I will attempt to answer them all in a timely manner – almost always within hours.  I have had classes in which only about 20% of the students passed.  Yikes!  The students in these classes could not keep up and did not fully participate.

Also, the students who do best do not wait until the due date to make their posts.  They ask questions as they proceed through the reading little by little.  They generally budget their time so that they start on a section early in the week and then ask questions related to the main topic throughout the week.  On the other hand, students who struggle make the mistake of trying to do all the work for a week in one day (generally the due date day) and then just go through the motions and make posts a few minutes before the deadline.

The learning in logic and math classes is sequential (step by step).  Hence it is very important to stay on schedule.  If you miss one whole week for whatever reason, generally you have twice the amount of work the next week, because you cannot get step 2 if you did not yet get step 1.  Also, if you try to do all the work on one day, you are trying to cram a number of steps that should be spread out into a short amount of understanding time.  You will be making life much harder than it needs to be.  It takes time, discipline, and thinking to connect the dots in life.

Because of the step by step nature of logic, no late posts are counted.  Our Laulima discussions are locked at 12 midnight on the due dates.  I used to allow late posts.  Chaos was the result.  As soon as students know that a deadline is not a real deadline, you know what happens.  It is also unethical to allow for late posts because a summary is posted the next day on the Main Page with the answers to the posting questions.  In the past, many good students would complain to me, "What's up with this?!  I busted my butt to do the work on time and you let xxx get credit for the posts even after the answers were posted?!"  These students were right.  So, I stopped accepting late posts for credit.

BUT, you can of course ask questions about previous material in which you may be behind on, either in the next Laulima forum or by direct e-mail to me. (Don't use the Private Message option if you want a timely response.  I will often miss the message.  I am notified right away via e-mail for a regular Laulima forum post and I check my e-mail all day. So email is usually better than Private Message.)

Bottom line: Starting with the very first week, budget your time and try to participate a little at a time throughout each week.  Feel free to ask as many questions as you want.