Hilary E. Davis

hdavis@yorku.ca

Virtual Office hours: by appointment on Zoom

ASYNCHRONOUS ONLINE COURSE

(all course materials and assessments will be online)

ACCELERATED COURSE

(12 Class Modules in 6 weeks)

• This course (PHIL 2200) will introduce you to the basics of informal logic that is present in practical, everyday arguments. You will learn how to distinguish between inductive and deductive reasoning, how to identify and explain informal fallacies, and about argument diagramming and argument schemas. In learning how to identify, evaluate, and construct arguments, you will learn how to express yourself more clearly and how to think more critically.

Course credit exclusions: AP/MODR 1730, 1760 and 1770 6.00, this means you may not take this course for credit if you are currently enrolled in or have a credit in either MODR 1730, 1760 or 1770.

ASYNCHRONOUS ONLINE COURSE

(all course materials and assessments will be online)

ACCELERATED COURSE

(12 Class Modules in 6 weeks)

This course moves at an accelerated pace.  Two modules of material – lecture videos, forum activities, quizzes will be posted weekly on eClass.  12 modules will be covered in 6 weeks.

All lectures will be pre-recorded and offered asynchronously on eClass.  All assessments will also be done asynchronously.

Technical requirements for taking the course:

To participate in the asynchronous portions of this course, students will require a computer and/or smart device an internet connection.

To meet with Prof. Davis during her virtual office hours on Zoom, you will need a computer or smart device with webcam and microphone and a stable internet connection.  Zoom can be downloaded as an app on most smart phones.  Google chat is also an option for Prof. Davis’ virtual office hours.

Here are some useful links for student computing information, resources and help:

Student Guide to EClass

Zoom@YorkU Best Practices 

Zoom@YorkU User Reference Guide

Computing for Students Website

Student Guide to eLearning at York University

To determine Internet connection and speed, there are online tests, such as Speedtest, that can be run.

Lewis Vaughan.  Concise Guide to Critical Thinking, Third Edition.  (Oxford, 2024).

Additional readings may be posted on eClass

1. Online Forum Activities (weekly) = 30%

2. Argument Assignment = 30%

3. Online Quizzes (weekly) = 30%

4. Participation = 10%

Total 100%

 All quizzes and online forum activities are due at 11:59pm EDT on Fridays
 All other assignments are due at 11:59pm, EDT on their respective due dates.
 Please note that this schedule of deadlines and grading breakdown is non-negotiable. The value of assignments will under no circumstances be reweighed or redistributed.

• Weekly lectures will be pre-recorded and students will view them asynchronously. The weekly forum activities and quizzes will also be engaged with asynchronously.
• All course materials are accessed through eClass.
• There are non-negotiable weekly deadlines for the online forum activities and quizzes. The Argument Assignment deadline is also non-negotiable.
• Weekly course material (e.g. video lectures, handouts, web links, practice exercises, forum activities, etc.) will be posted on eClass in the morning each Saturday.
• All modules, assignments, and forum activities are opened weekly. None will be opened in advance of their scheduled date.
• All deadlines and launch times are Eastern Daylight Savings Time (EDT).
• Weekly quizzes and weekly online forum activities will be due at 11:59pm EDT on Fridays.
• This is an accelerated course. Each week covers 2 modules, i.e. what would be 2 weeks worth of material for a regular in-class 3.0 credit course. If you took this course on campus, then you would be required to attend two 3-hour lectures/tutorials weekly. The content displayed each week reflects this time commitment. While you don’t have to log in to eClass at a specific time each week, but you need to keep up.
• If you are planning a vacation, work full time, have a heavy course load, or will be engaged in any other events that prevent you from logging onto eClass 2 or 3 or 43 times per week, you are strongly urged to rethink whether you should enroll in an accelerated course.

By the end of this course, if you apply yourself, do all the reading, watch all pre-recorded lectures, and complete all assignments, activities, and quizzes, you can expect to see improvement in the following areas:

• Reading Comprehension: You will become a more active reader which includes learning how to read between the lines and how to ask critical questions.
• Critical Reasoning Skills: You will learn to identify and evaluate arguments in order to distinguish strong from weak arguments.
• Critical Thinking Skills: Ideally, you will learn to become a 'reasonable skeptic' and become able to identify and discuss the weaknesses and strengths in claims and arguments you encounter in the media, academic texts, and everyday conversation.

Course policies

• The lecture slides, handouts, and all materials found on this site are for the personal use only of students who are registered in this course, PHIL2200M. They are for educational purposes only and intended only to enhance accessibility. The instructor of this course holds the copyright to this material and does not give permission for any course material to be to duplicated, copied, and/or distributed outside of the class.  Nor do students have permission to upload course materials to commercial websites, file sharing websites or apps, or social media.  Anytime you download material from this eClass site you agree to these terms. Any person who uploads or shares course material without the instructor's permission violates copyright regulations and also FIPPA  and will face serious consequences.

• In this course, all work should be completed by you and you alone. As such, you are not allowed to use generative artificial intelligence (AI), such as ChatGPT, to help you complete any of your work in this course (e.g., tests, papers, assignments, presentations, etc.). If you do not know whether an online resource or tool can be used in this course, please contact me for guidance. Any use of generative AI in this course will be considered a breach of the Senate Policy on Academic Honesty http://www.yorku.ca/policies/senate.
• Plagiarism and other misappropriation of the work of another will not be tolerated in this course.  Plagiarism is the representation of another person's ideas or writing as one's own. The most obvious form of this kind of dishonesty is the presentation of all or part of another person's published work as something one has written. However, paraphrasing another's writing without proper acknowledgement may also be considered plagiarism. It is also a violation of academic honesty to represent another's artistic or technical work or creation as one's own. Just as there are standards to which one must adhere in the preparation and publication of written works, there are standards to which one must adhere in the creation and presentation of music, drawings, designs, dance, photography and other artistic and technical works. In different forms, these constitute a theft of someone else's work. This is not to say that students should not use the work of others with the proper acknowledgement.  It is also a violation of academic honesty to forge another student’s signature on an attendance sheet.  Please see the Senate Policy on Academic Honesty at http://www.yorku.ca/policies/senate.
• Successful academic performance includes students not only completing assignments, but completing them on time. Late penalties are applied to assignments submitted after the due date. Exceptions to the late penalty can be presented to the course director by email for consideration. All essays must be uploaded to Turnitin via eClass.

• An assignment will be considered late one minute past the Turnitin deadline.

• You are strongly encouraged to avoid uploading assignments within the last hour of a deadline. If, for whatever reason, your document does not upload, it will be considered late.
• There will be no opportunity to make-up missed weekly Online Forum Activities or weekly quizzes.  If you miss these weekly deadlines, you will receive a “0” for the assigned work. 

• No make-up work or outstanding assignments will be accepted after the last day of the S2 term, Tuesday, August 4th.