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Table of Contents

*= new to this edition

Preface

PART ONE Critical Thinking and Reading
1   Critical Thinking  
Thinking about Thinking         
Thinking as a Citizen   
Obstacles to Critical Thinking             
An Essay on Types of Thinking (and Rethinking)      
*Adam Grant, A Preacher, a Prosecutor, a Politician, and a Scientist
Thinking through an Issue
Evaluating a Proposal
Survey, Analyze, and Evaluate the Issue
VISUAL GUIDE: EVALUATING A PROPOSAL
Anticipating Counterarguments
Critical Thinking at Work: From a Cluster to a Short Essay
Alexa Cabrera, Stirred and Strained: Pastafarians Should Be Allowed to Practice in Prison (student essay)
Generating Ideas: Writing as a Way of Thinking     
Confronting Unfamiliar Issues
Using Clustering to Discover Ideas
Approaching an Issue (or an Assignment)
Prompting Yourself: Classical Topics and Invention
An Essay for Generating Ideas
*Asao B. Inoue, Do Grades Help Students Learn in Classrooms?
THINKING CRITICALLY: Generating Ideas
Generating Ideas from Multiple Perspectives
A Checklist for Critical Thinking
A Short Essay Calling for Critical Thinking
*Anand Jayprakash Vaidya, The Inclusion Problem in Critical Thinking: The Case of Indian Philosophy
Assignment for Critical Thinking

2   Critical Reading: Getting Started
Framing Arguments
Active Reading
Previewing
A Checklist for Previewing and Skimming
A Short Essay for Previewing Practice
Thinking Critically: Previewing
Charles R. Lawrence III, On Racist Speech
Reading with a Careful Eye: Underlining, Highlighting, Annotating
Reading: Fast and Slow
Summarizing and Paraphrasing  
A Checklist for a Paraphrase  
Patchwriting and Plagiarism  
Strategies for Summarizing  
Critical Summary 
A Short Essay for Summarizing Practice  
VISUAL GUIDE: WRITING A CRITICAL SUMMARY  
Susan Jacoby, A First Amendment Junkie  
A Checklist for a Summary  
Essays for Analysis
Gwen Wilde, Why the Pledge of Allegiance Should Be Revised (student essay)  
*Sohrab Ahmari, Porn Isn’t Free Speech — on the Web or Anywhere   
Suzanne Nossel, The Pro–Free Speech Way to Fight Fake News  
Assignment for Critical Summary  
 
*3   Understanding Rhetorical Appeals  
Argument and Persuasion  
Persuasive Appeals      
THINKING CRITICALLY: Identifying Ethos  
VISUAL GUIDE: EVALUATING PERSUASIVE APPEALS  
Seeing the Appeals in Real-World Events  
Unethical Uses of Rhetorical Appeals 
Are Such Appeals Always Unethical? 
Nonrational Appeals: Satire, Irony, Sarcasm  
Does All Communication Contain Arguments?
THINKING CRITICALLY: Emotional Appeals  
An Example Argument and a Look at the Writer’s Rhetorical Appeals                     
Kwame Anthony Appiah, Go Ahead, Speak for Yourself  
Arguments for Analysis
*Afrika Afeni Mills, A Letter to White Teachers of My Children    
*Dodai Stewart, The Case for a National One-Week Vacation
*Jeffrey T. Brown, The Yelling of the Lambs            
 Assignment for Rhetorical Analysis

*4       Identifying Procedures of Argument  
The Power and Perils of Reason
Rationalization 
Confirmation Bias        
Types of Reasoning  
Induction  
Deduction  
VISUAL GUIDE: DEDUCTION AND INDUCTION  
Premises and Syllogisms  
Testing Truth and Validity   
A Checklist For Evaluating A Syllogism  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Inductive and Deductive Reasoning  
Some Procedures in Argument  
Definitions  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Analyzing Definitions  
Evidence   
THINKING CRITICALLY: Authoritative Testimony  
A Checklist For Evaluating Statistical Evidence  
Assumptions    
A Checklist For Examining Assumptions  
An Essay for Examining Assumptions        
*Elizabeth Aura McClintock, Should Marriage Still Involve Changing a Woman’s Name?
An Example Argument and a Look at the Writer’s Strategies 
John Tierney, The Reign of Recycling  
Arguments for Analysis  
*John E. Finn, The Constitution Doesn’t Have a Problem with Mask Mandates
*Loren Laomina, 13 Thoughts on Reparations, Afropessimism and White Supremacy
Assignment for Identifying Procedures in Argument 

5    Visual Rhetoric: Thinking about Images as Arguments  
Uses of Visual Images  
Seeing versus Looking  
VISUAL GUIDE: ANALYZING IMAGES  
Reading Advertisements  
A Checklist for Analyzing Images  
Detecting Emotional Appeals in Visual Culture     
Reading Photographs
Do Photographs Always Tell the Truth?  
A Checklist for Inspecting Digital Photographs  
Are Some Images Not Fit to Be Shown?  
A Checklist for Publishing Controversial Images  
Accommodating, Resisting, and Negotiating the Meaning of Images  
Writing about Political Cartoons and Memes  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Analyzing Memes and Political Cartoons  
An Example: A Student’s Essay Analyzing Images  
Ryan Kwon, The American Pipe Dream? (student essay)  
Visuals as Aids to Clarity: Maps, Graphs, and Pie Charts  
A Word on Misleading or Manipulative Visual Data 
A Checklist for Charts And Graphs  
Using Visuals in Your Own Paper  
Visual Arguments for Analysis  
Dorothea Lange, Migrant Mother  
Nora Ephron, The Boston Photographs  
Assignment in Visual Rhetoric 
 
PART TWO Critical Writing  
6   Writing an Analysis of an Argument  
Analyzing an Argument  
Examining the Author’s Thesis  
Examining the Author’s Purpose  
Examining the Author’s Methods  
Examining the Author’s Persona  
Examining the Author’s Audience  
A Checklist for Analyzing an Author’s Intended Audience  
Organizing Your Analysis  
VISUAL GUIDE: ORGANIZING YOUR ANALYSIS  
Summary versus Analysis  
A Checklist for Analyzing a Text  
An Argument, Its Elements, and a Student’s Analysis of the Argument  
Nicholas D. Kristof, For Environmental Balance, Pick Up a Rifle  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Examining Language to Analyze an Author’s Argument  
The Essay Analyzed   
Theresa Carcaldi, For Sound Argument, Drop the Jokes: How Kristof Falls Short in Convincing His Audience (student essay)  
An Analysis of the Student’s Analysis  
A Checklist for Writing an Analysis of an Argument  
Arguments for Analysis  
*Jennifer Bartlett, Disability and the Right to Choose     
Matthew Walther, Sorry, Nerds: Video Games Are Not a Sport  
Justin Cronin, Confessions of a Liberal Gun Owner  
*Roxane Gay, The Price of Black Ambition     
Assignment for Writing an Analysis of an Argument 
 
7   Developing an Argument of Your Own  
Planning an Argument  
Getting Ideas: Argument as an Instrument of Inquiry  
Brainstorming Strategies   
Revision as Invention  
The Thesis or Main Point  
Raising the Stakes of Your Thesis    
A Checklist For A Thesis Statement  
THINKING CRITICALLY: “Walking the Tightrope”  
Imagining an Audience  
Addressing Opposition and Establishing Common Ground  
A Checklist for Imagining an Audience  
Drafting and Revising an Argument  
The Title  
The Opening Paragraphs  
Organizing the Body of the Essay  
VISUAL GUIDE: ORGANIZING YOUR ARGUMENT  
Checking Transitions 
The Ending  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Using Transitions in Argument  
Uses of an Outline  
A Checklist for Organizing an Argument  
Tone and the Writer’s Persona   
THINKING CRITICALLY: Eliminating We, One, and I  
A Checklist for Establishing Tone and Persona  
Avoiding Sexist Language  
Peer Review  
A Checklist for Peer Review  
A Student’s Essay, from Rough Notes to Final Version  
Emily Andrews, Why I Don’t Spare “Spare Change” (student essay)  
Assignment for Developing an Argument of Your Own  

8   Using Sources  
Why Use Sources?  
Entering a Discourse  
Understanding Information Literacy  
Choosing a Topic  
A Checklist for Approaching a Topic  
Finding Sources  
Finding Quality Information Online  
VISUAL GUIDE: FINDING DISCOURSE ON YOUR TOPIC  
Finding Articles Using Library Databases  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Using Search Terms  
Locating Books  
Evaluating Sources  
Scholarly, Popular, and Trade Sources  
Evaluating Online Sources  
A Checklist for Identifying Reliable Websites 
A Checklist for Identifying Fake News    
Considering How Current Sources Are  
A Checklist for Evaluating Sources  
Performing Your Own Primary Research  
Interviewing Peers and Local Authorities  
Conducting Observations  
Conducting Surveys  
Research in Archives and Special Collections  
Synthesizing Sources  
Taking Notes  
A Note on Plagiarizing  
A Checklist for Avoiding Plagiarism  
Compiling an Annotated Bibliography  
Quoting from Sources  
VISUAL GUIDE: INTEGRATING QUOTATIONS  
Thinking Critically: Using Signal Phrases  
Documentation  
A Note on Footnotes (and Endnotes)  
MLA Format: Citations within the Text  
MLA Format: The List of Works Cited  
An Annotated Student Research Paper in MLA Format  
Lesley Timmerman, An Argument for Corporate Responsibility (student essay)  
APA Format: Citations within the Text  
APA Format: The List of References  
A Checklist for Critical Papers Using Sources  
An Annotated Student Research Paper in APA Format  
Hannah Smith Brooks, Does Ability Determine Expertise? (student essay)  
Assignment for Using Sources  

PART THREE  Further Views on Argument  
9   A Philosopher’s View: The Toulmin Model  
Understanding the Toulmin Model  
VISUAL GUIDE: THE TOULMIN METHOD  
Components of the Toulmin Model  
The Claim  
Grounds  
Warrants  
Backing  
Modal Qualifiers  
Rebuttals  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Constructing a Toulmin Argument  
Putting the Toulmin Method to Work: Responding to an Argument  
*Jonathan Safran Foer, Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast    
Thinking with the Toulmin Method  
A Checklist for Using the Toulmin Method  

10  A Logician’s View: Deduction, Induction, and Fallacies  
Using Formal Logic for Critical Thinking  
Deduction  
Examples of Deduction  
Induction  
Observation and Inference  
Probability  
Mill’s Methods  
Fallacies  
VISUAL GUIDE: COMMON FALLACIES         
Fallacies of Ambiguity  
Fallacies of Presumption  
Fallacies of Irrelevance  
A Checklist for Evaluating an Argument with Logic  
Additional Fallacies  
THINKING CRITICALLY: Identifying Fallacies  
Max Shulman, Love Is a Fallacy 
 
11 A Psychologist’s View: Rogerian Argument  
Rogerian Argument: An Introduction  
VISUAL GUIDE: ROGERIAN ARGUMENT  
A Checklist for Analyzing Rogerian Argument  
Carl R. Rogers, Communication: Its Blocking and Its Facilitation  
*Lewis Oakley, Is It Time to Retire the Word “Privileged”?               

12 A Literary Critic’s View: Arguing about Literature  
Why Is Literature Important?              
Interpreting  
Judging (or Evaluating)  
Theorizing  
A Checklist for Arguing about Literature  
Example: A Student Interprets Richard Blanco’s “One Today”  
Richard Blanco, One Today  
*Jackson DiPiero, Unity in Times of Division: An Analysis of Richard Blanco’s “One Today” (student essay)  
A Short Story for Analysis         
Kate Chopin, The Story of an Hour  
Thinking about the Effects of Literature   

13 A Debater’s View: Oral Presentations and Debate  
Oral Presentations  
Methods of Delivery  
Audience  
A Checklist for an Oral Presentation  
Delivery  
Content  
Formal Debates  
Standard Debate Format  
A Checklist for Preparing for a Debate  

PART FOUR  Current Issues: Occasions for Debate  
Debates as an Aid to Thinking  
A Checklist for Analyzing a Debate  

14  Student Loans: Should Some Indebtedness Be Forgiven?  
*Hillary Hoffower and Madison Hoff, The Case for Canceling Student Loan Debt Isn’t Political, It’s Practical  
Analyzing a Visual: Student Loan Debt  
Justin Wolfers, Forgive Student Loans? Worst Idea Ever 
 
*15 Artificial Intelligence: Should We Let Computers Decide?  
Safiya Umoja Noble, Missed Connections: What Search Engines Say about Women  
Analyzing a Visual: Predictive Search  
*Mark Manson, I, for One, Welcome Our AI Overlords 
 
16  (Un)safe Spaces: Can We Tolerate Intolerant Speech on Campus?  
Julia Serano, Free Speech and the Paradox of Tolerance  
Analyzing a Visual: Student Views on Speech  
*Shira Hoffer, Safe and Free: Envisioning a New Guide for Speakers on Campus  
 
*17  Bitcoin: Fad or Future?    
*Elizabeth Kolbert, Why Bitcoin Is Bad for the Environment      
Analyzing a Visual: Bitcoin Meme  
*Russell Okung, An Open Letter to the Nigerian Government 
 
18  Genetic Modification of Human Beings: Is It Acceptable?  
Ronald M. Green, Building Baby from the Genes Up  
Analyzing a Visual: Genetic Modification of Human Beings  
Richard Hayes, Genetically Modified Humans? No Thanks 
 
*19 Should we Cancel “Cancel Culture”?  
*Dana Brownlee, Is “Cancel Culture” Really Just Long Overdue Accountability for the Privileged?    
Analyzing a Visual: Cancel Culture Cartoons from the Left and Right  
*Evan Gerstmann, Cancel Culture Is Only Getting Worse    

PART FIVE  Current Issues: Casebooks  
20 A College Education: What Is Its Purpose?  
Andrew Delbanco, 3 Reasons College Still Matters  
Edward Conard, We Don’t Need More Humanities Majors  
Christian Madsbjerg and Mikkel B. Rasmussen, We Need More Humanities Majors  
*John Sailer, Is Our Obsession with College Fueling a Mental Health Crisis?
Caroline Harper, HBCUs, Black Women, and STEM Success  

*21 Racial Injustice: Is the Problem Systemic?  
*Kmele Foster, David French, Jason Stanley, and Thomas Chatterton Williams, We Disagree on a Lot of Things. Except the Danger of Anti-Critical-Race-Theory Laws
Except for the Dangers of Anti-Critical Race Theory Laws
*Ibram X. Kendi, Dueling Consciousness
Marian Wright Edelman, The Cradle to Prison Pipeline  
*Reyna Askew and Margaret A. Walls,Diversity in the      Great Outdoors: Is Everyone Welcome...
*Tressie McMillan Cottom, Know Your Whites              
Heather Mac Donald, The Myth of Criminal-Justice Racism  

22 The Ethics of Appropriation: Is It OK to Copy?  
Kenan Malik, The Bane of Cultural Appropriation  
Yo Zushi, What’s Mine Is Yours  
K. Tempest Bradford, Cultural Appropriation Is, in Fact, Indefensible  
Conor Friedersdorf, A Food Fight at Oberlin College  
Kenneth Goldsmith, Uncreative Writing  
Andrea Pitzer, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan 
 
23 Online versus IRL: How Has Social Networking Changed How We Relate to One Another?  
Stephen Marche, Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?  
*Jia Tolentino, The I in Internet  
*Kristin Arola, Indigenous Interfaces  
*Hossein Derakhshan, How Social Media Endangers Knowledge  
*Josh Rose, How Social Media Is Having a Positive Impact on Our Culture  
*Jaron Lanier, Trolls  
*Touria Benlafqih, Has Social Media Made Young People Better Citizens? 
 
*24  Representation Matters: How Does Media Potray Us?  
*Terese Mailhot, Native American Lives Are Tragic, But Probably Not in the Way You Think
*Anna Swartwood House, How Jesus Became a White European 
*Marianna Cerini, Why Women Feel Pressured to Shave      
*Rebecca Jennings, The $5,000 Quest for the Perfect Butt    
*Marilyln Greenwald, Dr. Seuss, Meet the Sanitized Sleuths Known as the Hardy Boys 
*Aubrey Gordon, Into Thin Air                                  
*Tracy Deonn, Every King Arthur Retelling Is Fanfic             

*25 Conspiracy Theories: Are They a Cultural Problem?      
Russel Muirhead and Nancy Rosenblum, The New Conspiracists  
*James B. Meigs, Conspiracies All the Way Down        
*Anne Appelbaum, The My Pillow Guy Really Could Destroy Democracy   
*Ariel Bogle and Jane Lee, Children Feature in COVID-19 and QAnon Conspiracy Theories
*James Peterson, What’s Behind Black Conspiracism?         
*Ben Crair, Why Do So Many People Still Want to Believe in Bigfoot?         
  
PART SIX  Enduring Questions: Essays, Poems, and Stories 
26 What Is the Ideal Society?  
Thomas More, From Utopia  
*John Horgan, What’s Your Utopia?                
*Michael Shermer, Utopia Is a Dangerous Ideal: We Should Strive for “Protopia”
Niccolò Machiavelli, From The Prince  
Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence  
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions  
Emma Lazarus, The New Colossus  
*Lao Tzu, Far Indeed Is This from the Way                     
Ursula K. Le Guin, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas 
 
27 How and Why Do We Construct the “Other”?  
Jean-Paul Sartre, Anti-Semite and Jew  
Hans Massaquoi, Destined to Witness  
W. E. B. Du Bois, Of Our Spiritual Strivings  
Bridget Anderson, The Politics of Pests: Immigration and the Invasive Other  
John Barth, Us/Them  
Jacob Riis, How the Other Half Lives (photographs)  
Simone De Beauvoir, The Woman as Other  
Rudyard Kipling, We and They  
Emari DiGiorgio, When You Are the Brownest White Girl  

*28 What Is Happiness?  
Henry David Thoreau, Selections from Walden  
*Gretchen Rubin, Buy Some Happiness
*Horace, Ode 1.11 (“Carpe Diem”)       
*John Martin Fischer, The Problem of Now              
Epictetus, From The Handbook  
Bertrand Russell, The Happy Life  
The Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler, Inner Contentment  
Daniel Gilbert, Does Fatherhood Make You Happy? 
 
Index of Authors, Titles, and Terms  
 

Authors

Sylvan Barnet

Sylvan Barnet was a professor of English and former director of writing at Tufts University. His several texts on writing and his numerous anthologies for introductory composition and literature courses have remained leaders in their field through many editions. His titles, with Hugo Bedau, include Current Issues and Enduring Questions; Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing; and From Critical Thinking to Argument.

Hugo Bedau

Hugo Bedau was a professor of philosophy at Tufts University and served as chair of the philosophy department and chair of the university’s committee on College Writing. An internationally respected expert on the death penalty, and on moral, legal, and political philosophy, he wrote or edited a number of books on these topics. He co-authored, with Sylvan Barnet, of Current Issues and Enduring Questions; Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing; and From Critical Thinking to Argument.

John O'Hara

John Fitzgerald O’Hara is an associate professor of Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing at Stockton University, where he is the coordinator of the first-year critical thinking program, and former Director of the Master of Arts in American Studies Program. He regularly teaches writing, critical thinking, and courses in American literature and history and is a nationally-recognized expert on the 1960s. He is the co-author of Current Issues and Enduring Questions; Critical Thinking, Reading, and Writing; and From Critical Thinking to Argument.

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