Crt-205_Argument_Evaluation

Argument Evaluation CRT-205 Argument- Terrorists were “extraordinarily successful” in their efforts to cause fear in the hearts of Americans. Premise- Goal of terrorism is to cause damage to their target and to make the population in general have fear that they might be next. Premise- Americans reacted with fear. Premise- Terrorists were successful in causing a great deal of damage. Conclusion- The terrorists achieved their major goal of spreading fear and thus disrupting lives. The first argument I chose to identify is in the first paragraph. In it, the author states that the terrorists were “extraordinarily successful” in their efforts to cause fear in the hearts of Americans. This argument is deductively valid since the premises logically involve the conclusion, and the premises provide a guarantee of the truth of the conclusion. The premises are true and they are easy to prove by simple research as to the security measures put into place in mass transit and government buildings and new restrictions on air travel since the attacks. The premises support the conclusion because the terrorists did strike fear in the hearts of Americans throughout the United States as proven by the very reactions that this article eludes to. Argument- Government wasted time, resources, and money after the terrorist attacks. Premise- Expenditures were completely ineffective. Premise- Disruptive practices were ineffective. Premise- The U.S.A. is not a terrorist target. Conclusion- Effort, time, and money should have gone to other matters with more promise of making the country a better place. The second argument that I chose is found in the last paragraph of this article. The argument is that the government wasted time, resources, and money after the terrorist attacks. The premises for this do not support the conclusion because there is no proof that the expenditures and the changes made to routines are ineffective. In addition, the implied premise that the USA is not a terrorist target in not true, as proven by the terrorist attacks written about in this article. These premises are not valid because they assume that no other terrorist attacks would have been carried out against this country even if no security changes or any other changes had been made. These premises would be very difficult to prove because there is no way to know whether any terrorists were deterred from further attacks by the amount of security that was put into place after 9-11-2001.