Rule 1: Identify premises and conclusion

The very first step in making an argument is to ask yourself what you are
trying to prove. What is your conclusion? Remember that the conclusion
is the statement for which you are giving reasons. The statements that
give your reasons are your premises.
Consider these lines from Winston Churchill:
I am an optimist. It does not seem to be much use being anything else.
This is an argument—as well as an amusing quip—because Churchill is
giving a reason to be an optimist: his premise is that “It does not seem to
be much use being anything else.”
Premises and conclusion are not always so obvious. Sherlock Holmes
has to explain one of his deductions in “The Adventure of Silver Blaze”:
A dog was kept in the stalls, and yet, though someone had been in and
fetched out a horse, [the dog] had not barked…. Obviously the … visitor
was someone whom the dog knew well.1
Holmes has two premises. One is explicit: the dog did not bark at the
visitor. The other is a general fact that Holmes assumes we know about
dogs: dogs bark at strangers. Together these premises imply that the
visitor was not a stranger. It turns out that this is the key to solving the
mystery.
When you are using arguments as a means of inquiry, you sometimes
may start with no more than the conclusion you wish to defend. State it
clearly, first of all. Maybe you want to take Churchill a step farther and
{4} argue that you and I should be optimists too. If so, say so explicitly.
Then ask yourself what reasons you have for drawing that conclusion.
What reasons can you give to prove that we should be optimists?
You could appeal to Churchill’s authority. If Churchill recommends
optimism, who are we to quibble? This appeal will not get you very far,
however, since equally famous people have recommended pessimism.
You need to think about the question on your own. Again, what is your
reason for thinking that we should be optimists?
One reason could be that optimism boosts your energy to work for
success, whereas if you feel defeated in advance you may never even try.
Optimists are more likely to succeed, to achieve their goals. (Maybe this
is what Churchill meant as well.) If this is your premise, say so explicitly.
This book offers you a ready list of different forms that arguments can
take. Use this list to develop your premises. To defend a generalization,
for instance, check Chapter II. It will remind you that you need to give a
series of examples as premises, and it will tell you what sorts of
examples to look for. If your conclusion requires a deductive argument
like those explained in Chapter VI, the rules outlined in that chapter will
tell you what types of premises you need. You may have to try several
different arguments before you find one that works well.
Exercise Set 1.1: Distinguishing premises from
conclusions
Objective: To give you practice distinguishing premises from conclusions in other
people’s arguments.

Instructions: Rewrite each argument below, underlining the conclusion of each

argument and putting brackets around each premise.

Tips for success: Distinguishing premises from conclusions is sometimes more of

an art than a science. We wish people were always clear about the premises and
conclusions of their argument, but that’s just not the case. Therefore, learning to
distinguish premises from conclusions takes practice. As you practice, there are
two strategies that you should keep in mind.
The first strategy is simply to ask yourself what the author of this argument is
trying to convince you to believe. The claim that the author is trying to get you to
believe is the argument’s conclusion. Then you can ask what reasons the author
gives to try to convince you. These will be the argument’s premises.
{5} The second strategy for distinguishing premises from conclusions is to look
for indicator words. Some words or phrases are conclusion indicators. These are
words or phrases that tell you that you’re about to read or hear the conclusion of
an argument. Other words or phrases are premise indicators. These tell you that
you’re about to read or hear a premise. Here’s a sample of the most common
conclusion and premise indicators:

Conclusion Indicators Premise Indicators

therefore because
thus since
hence given that
so for
consequently on the grounds that
this shows that this follows from

You’ll start to notice more indicator words as you get better at analyzing
arguments.
Two more pieces of advice: First, don’t rely solely on indicator words. Some
arguments will not use any indicator words. Others will use indicator words in
other ways. Some words, like because, since, and so, have many other uses; not
every use of because indicates that you’re about to hear a premise. When in doubt,
fall back on our first strategy: ask yourself whether the author is giving you a
reason for the conclusion. If your answer is no, you haven’t found a premise, even
if the sentence includes because or since.
Second, don’t assume that everything in a passage is either a premise or a
conclusion. Not all passages contain arguments. Some passages are telling stories,
describing things, giving explanations, issuing commands, making jokes, or doing
other things besides giving reasons for a conclusion. Even in passages that do
contain arguments, some sentences or clauses will provide background
information, make side comments, and so on. Again, the key is to ask yourself, “Is
this sentence stating a conclusion or giving me a reason to believe that
conclusion?” If it is doing either, it’s part of an argument; if not, it’s not.
 {6} Sample
[In order to prosper, a democracy needs its citizens to be able to carry
out their responsibilities competently.] [Being a competent citizen
requires familiarity with the basics of math, natural science, social
science, history, and literature, as well as the ability to read and write
well and the ability to think critically.] [A liberal education is essential to
developing these skills.] Therefore, in order for a democracy to prosper,
its citizens must get a liberal education.
Adapted from: Steven M. Cahn, letter to the editor, New York Times,
May 21, 2004

The markings in this sample problem indicate that the last sentence is
the conclusion and that each of the first three sentences is a separate
premise. Although each sentence in this letter to the editor expresses
either a premise or a conclusion, remember that many passages contain
sentences (or parts of sentences) that are neither premises nor
conclusions. You don’t need to bracket or underline those (parts of)
sentences.

1. Racial segregation reduces some persons to the status of things. Hence,

segregation is morally wrong.
Adapted from: Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,”
Liberation: An Independent Monthly, Jun 1963

2. While performing an autopsy on a dead sea turtle, Dr. Stacy found

shrimp in the turtle’s throat. Sea turtles can only catch shrimp if the
turtles are stuck in nets with the shrimp. Therefore, the dead sea turtle
was probably caught in a net.
Adapted from: Shaila Dewan, “Animal Autopsies in Gulf Yield Mystery,”
New York Times, Jul 14, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/15/science/
earth/15necropsy.html

3. Most people experience no side effects from the yellow fever vaccine.
People with egg allergies shouldn’t get the yellow fever vaccine,
though, because some part of the vaccine is grown inside eggs.
 Adapted from: Division of Vector Borne Infectious Diseases, “Vaccine | CDC
Yellow Fever,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/YellowFever/vaccine/

{7} 4. There are two ways of settling a dispute: by discussion and by

physical force. Since the first way is appropriate for human beings and
the second way appropriate for animals, we must resort to force only
when we cannot settle matters by discussion.
Adapted from: Cicero, De Officiis 11

5. Positron-emission tomography, better known as PET, is a method for

examining a person’s brain. Before undergoing PET, the patient inhales
a gas containing radioactive molecules. The molecules are not
dangerous for the patient because they break down within a few
minutes, before they can do any damage.
Adapted from: Bryan Kolb and Ian Q. Wishaw, Fundamentals of Human
Neuropsychology, 5th ed. (New York: Worth Publishers, 2003), 161

6. The head of the spy ring is very dangerous. He is also exceptionally

clever and a master of disguise. He has a dozen names and a hundred
different appearances. But there is one thing he cannot disguise: he is
missing the tip of his little finger. So, if you ever meet a man who is
missing the top joint of his little finger, you should be very careful!
Adapted from: The 39 Steps, directed by Alfred Hitchcock
(London: Gaumont British, 1935)

7. Some people buy college degrees on the Internet because they’re trying
to pretend that they went to college. That’s a waste of money, since it’s
easy to make a college degree on your computer, and a degree that you
make yourself is just as good as a degree that you bought on the
Internet.
Adapted from: “Fake Degrees in Government,” The Onion, Oct 18, 2006,
http://www.theonion.com/articles/fake-degrees-in-government,15092/

8. People are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights.

Governments exist to protect those rights. When a government violates
those rights, people have a right to rebel against that government and
create a new one. The king of Great Britain has repeatedly violated the
 rights of the American colonists. Thus, the American colonists have a
right to rebel against the king of Great Britain.
Adapted from: U.S. Declaration of Independence

{8} 9. In the film Interstellar, the main characters travel through a

“wormhole,” which is a tunnel through space-time that would enable
space travelers to zip from one part of the universe to another. In theory,
wormholes are possible, but it’s probably impossible to use wormholes
to travel around the universe. Keeping wormholes open long enough to
travel through them would require enormous amounts of “negative
enery,” and it’s probably impossible to generate that much negative
energy.
Adapted from: Mike Wall, “‘Interstellar’ Science: Is Wormhole Travel Possible?”
LiveScience, Nov 24, 2014, http://www.livescience.com/48890-interstellar-movie-
wormhole-travel-feasibility.html

10. The only remaining question was why the man had been murdered. Was
it a politically motivated crime or a private one? I thought right away
that it must be a privately motivated crime. Political assassins move
quickly and flee. But in this case, the murderer’s footprints are all over
the room, showing that he had spent quite a while in this room.
Adapted from: Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet (London:
Ward Lock & Co., 1888; repr., London: Penguin, 2001), 138

Model responses for odd-numbered exercises can be found on page 287.

Need more practice? Take a look at the editorials, op-eds, and letters to the
editor on the Web site for your favorite newspaper. Most of these will
contain arguments. Working by yourself or with a classmate, identify the
premises and conclusions in those arguments.