What makes an Argument Valid
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Submitted by Anonymous on 12/31/1997 10:00 PM Flag This Paper
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What makes an Argument Valid
Thoughout History, Philosophers and Logicians have been debabting how one can decide whether and by what arguments are either valid, invalid, sound or unsound. Gottleb Frege, a Ancient Logician, states the following, "Arguments are valid if and only if all the premises are true when the conclusion is false, or when all the conclusions are true when and if the premises are all false." This, he brilliantly claims, is the definition of an invalid argument.
Years later, Aristotle would argue with Frege and claim that only Categorical statements make arguments valid, whereas first order predicate variables make arguments unsound. Soundnesss, thus, and validity are, according to Aristotle but not Frege, mustually exclusive properties that cannot be aplplied willy-nilly to logic in general.
The question must be addressed from the other direction. Instead of asking, "what makes and argument valid," we must ask, "what makes a person make invalid arguments." Simone de Beauvoir once wrote, "It is man who makes man invalid -- of this I am sure."
In conclusion, I think that Frege is right and Aristolte is wrong. An argument is valid only if it is uncategorically true viz a viz the premises, and unproblamatically true, viz a viz the conclusion.