Subject: Re: Arguments From: "William J. Rapaport" Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2010 11:44:45 -0500 (EST) In response to my posting about terminology, where I wrote: "sentences can be true or false (or you can agree or disagree with them)", a student writes: "I'm just kind of confused by this. In my paper when I'm talking about the premises can I say I agree or disagree with each premise?" Reply: Strictly speaking, when you're analyzing an argument, you need to say, for each premise, whether it IS or is NOT true. But sometimes you don't know; after all, truth is not a matter of logic, but of correspondence with reality (as we discussed at the beginning of the semester). On the other hand, whether or not you KNOW the truth-value of a statement (whether it's a premise or a conclusion), you usually have some idea of whether you BELIEVE it or not. So, in the position papers, you can say either: "This statement is true (or false)", or "I think that this statement is true (or false)", or "I believe (or don't believe) this statement".