What is ‘humpty-dumptying’? Do ‘arguments from analogy’ ever stand up? How do I know when someone is using ‘weasel words’? What’s the difference between a ‘red herring’ and a ‘straw man’? This superb book, now in its third edition, will help anyone who wants to argue well and think critically. Using witty and topical examples, this fully-updated edition includes many new entries and updates the whole text. New entries Thinking from A to Z may not help you win every argument, but it will definitely give you the power to tell a good one from a bad one.
Nigel Warburton is Senior Lecturer at the Open University and author of a number of popular books about philosophy.
Warburton received a BA from the University of Bristol and a PhD from Darwin College, Cambridge and was a lecturer at the University of Nottingham before joining the Department of Philosophy at the Open University in 1994.
He runs a popular philosophy weblog Virtual Philosopher and with David Edmonds regularly podcasts interviews with top philosophers on a range of subjects at Philosophy Bites. He also podcasts chapters from his book Philosophy: The Classics.
هذا الكتاب، إلى جانب كتاب عادل مصطفى - أعتقد أن هذا مبسط ومقرب بشكل أكبر - هما قرائتين فرض عين على كل شخص في وقتنا الحالي، أذكر أني حين قرأت كتاب عادل مصطفى لأول مرة كنت مأخوذًا به للغاية، لشموله، ويسره، وكثرة أمثلته، ولكونه أول مرجع عربي شبه شامل عن المغالطات المنطقية والمنطق غير الصوري، على الرغم أني وقتها لم أكن قد فهمته مائة بالمئة، لأنه كان أول لقاء لي بالمنطق آنذاك أما هذا الكتاب، والذي يتكون من مئتين صفحة، بترجمة رائعة، ومقدمة مبشرة، وتعليقات جميلة من المترجمين، وإن تعدت الحد العلمي أحيانا حين تعرض الكاتب لنقد بضعة أفكار دينية، ومن الترجمة، للمتن نفسه، لم يختلف الأمر كثيرًا الكتاب هو مرشد مبسط للمغالطات المنطقية التي نعتاش جميعنا عليها في أي حوار وحديث ونقاش وحتى لو شئت القول في الإبداع الكتاب مصنف بشكل معجمي كأنه قاموس من الألف إلى الياء، أو من A to Z ربما لم تكن تلك أفضل فكرة لتحرير الكتاب خاصة وأن بعض المغالطات كانت تنبني على بعضها البعض الذي لا يبتدئ بنفس الحرف بالضرورة مما فد يسبب بعض التيه أو الحاجة للمراجعة أكثر من مرة بين مغالطة وأخرى لربطهما ببعض، لكن ربما كان ذلك بسبب رغبة الكاتب نفسه تبسيطًا وتيسيرا، أو حسب الدار نفسها، لكن على العموم الكتاب مذهل وممتع وجميل، وهو يتسم بالبساطة الشديدة، والوضوح المعجب، والشمول، والارتباط الحيوي - الملحوظ بشدة، حتى في مسميات المغالطات أو الحيل أو الحجج نفسها - وربما هذا ما ميزه عن كتاب عادل مصطفى الذي اتسم بالطابع الاكاديمي نوعا ما في شرحه لو أن هنالك عيبًا وحيدا بالكتاب فهو أنه اكتفى في بعض المغالطات بالشرح دون وضع أمثلة على كل مغالطة، ربما لبساطتها أو لتشابهها مع سواها لكنه كتاب مبهر، وقراءته واجبة حتى على سبيل تذكرة النفس بأن ليس هنالك أحد بعيد عن التفكير غير المنطقي، ولو كان أشدنا تجريدًا
First off, this author has a cool name: Nigel Warburton. That's already fifteen stars worthy.
I hope he owns at least two green sweaters. If not, he should buy them. I'm serious. Buy them.
Reading this book was refreshing, especially after browsing through the YouTube comment section. In a world of spray-on abs, NBC sitcoms, presidential candidates grinning on stage in animatronic form, a sincere belief in magical crystals and talking goat-heads that cure the flu, I needed to brush my teeth. And this book is a fine toothpaste, minty-fresh. It deals with some basic critical thinking skills, such as identifying different informal fallacies and using rhetorical techniques in arguments. I appreciated the explanations and points. They were as clear as vodka in a glass, but sadly, Nigel left me more sober than when I began. Mr. Warburton, dear old chap, you've done it again. I might read your history of philosophy book at a later date. But I will throw my underwear on stage during your next reading. Why? Because people who write about syllogisms are way hotter than rock stars.
Things I liked: reference book, introduction to critical thinking, refresher on fallacies, a pick-me-up
Things I didn't like: who cares what I didn't like? I'm just some random person on the internet. Make up your own goddamn mind.
قرأت عددا من الكتب حول التفكير ومغالطاته المنطقية، وهذا الكتاب يشبه نوعا ما كتاب المغالطات المنطقية لعادل مصطفي، إلا أنه مرتب أبجديا، وهو ليس أفضل كتاب في موضوعه، الأفضل حتي الآن هو كتاب 52 خطأ في التفكير عليك تجنبها.
يقدم الكتاب مسميات او تعريف لاساليب ومدخلات مستخدمة عادةً في النقاش و أساليب خاطئة في الاستدلال واساليب للاقناع و اخرى للتهرب وأخيراً مدخلات نفسية تعرقل عملية التفكير النقدي بأن يشرحها بختصار ويضرب مثالاً يسقط عليه المدخل المشروح زيادةً في التوضيح، وسيكون ترتيب تلك المدخلات لا على اتصال الموضوع بل على حروف الهجاء الانجليزية، لكن الكاتب يبدأ مقدمته بقول "هذا الكتاب مقدمة في التفكير النقدي" وهذه العبارة تحمل الكتاب فوق حقيقته لانه لا يتعدى تجميع مسميات وشرحها بضرب الأمثله، وهذا قطعاً ان الكتاب عديم فائدة بل انه مفيد جداً خاصة كمقدمة قبل الشروع في كتب متخصصه في التفكير النقدي لانه ببساطة يعمل كالمعجم بعد قراءته، والترجمة فيه استثنائية حقاً فلم اقرأ كتاباً مترجماً أضاف المترجم على الكاتب و صحح له بل ورد عليه، هالة عباس و أسامة..شكراً لجعل النسخة العربية من هذا الكتاب أجمل من الكتاب نفسه..ختاماً في الكتاب مشكلتين الأولى بسيطة وهي عدم ترابط الأسلوب او المدخل مع الذي يسبقه وهذا كما قلت لأنهم مرتبين على الأحرف لا الموضوع و الثانية وهي مشكلة أخلت به..هي مشكلة الأمثلة خاصةً وأنه يعتمد عليها كأساس في الشرح ولا أمانع حين تكون امثلته بعيده لكن أن لا تكون هناك علاقه بين الشرح و المثال هذا خلل، في ص81 نفي التالي في القضية الشرطية : إذا أ إذن ب..ليس ب إذن ليس أ، وضرب مثلاً : إذا أمطرت ستبتل..لم تبتل إذن لم تمطر، ويمكنك بلا دراسة للمنطق أن تشعر بشيء من الخطأ، ذلك لأن المثال لقضية شرطية حملية إتفاقية لا قضية شرطية حملية متصلة، فالصحيح في نفي التالي ان تكون قضية متصله كما في المثال المشهور :إذا طلعت الشمس فالنهار موجود....ليس النهار موجوداً إذن ليست الشمس طالعه ، ومع ذلك يمكنك قراءة الكتاب دون أن معرفة بالمنطق وتستفيد لكن لا تستريح كثيراً للامثلة..
"Eleştirel düşünmenin ana amaçlarından biri, doğru öncüllerden doğru bir uslamlama yoluyla doğru sonuçlara varabilmektir." s.186
Bu kitabı okurken fark ettim ki Türk televizyonlarındaki tartışma programlarında yazarın bahsettiği düşünce yanlışlarının tamamı yapılıyor. Eleştirel düşünme konusunda toplum olarak büyük bir sıkıntımız var vesselam.
I've had to read this book through several times for work, and it's forced me to become a more logical thinker and to recognize thinking fallacies in myself and in other people.
I would urge you that if you're interested in this type of material, read this book over and over again. You'll probably miss much of the material if you only read it once.
Intelligent, concise, yet tough to use at times. Wonderful for reference--if you happen to know the name of the idea or tactic you want to read about. I ended up reading it cover-to-cover, since the dictionary-style alphabetical categories lacked a topic index in the back. Still, worthwhile.
This isn't the sort of book that's really made to sit down and read through, but it's a great little encyclopedia on types of rational thought and argument, and the many ways these can commonly go wrong.
There is of course a strong inherent usefulness in terms of analyzing arguments in terms of fallacies as our digital age is permeated with false or bad reasoning along with an astoundingly ability for its perpetrators to remain unscathed from such criticism. Thus, very obviously fallacious reasoning has in many ways been integrated as a strong norm for discourse, which from a critical point of view has all the negative consequences that one can think of. Part of the problem lies in what has been termed Brandolini's law, namely the principle that states that the amount of energy needed to clean up bullshit is of orders of magnitude larger than what is needed to produce it. Other factors that play a role is taking advantage of the very hardwired nature of human beings themselves where emotional hijacking always remain a threat as well as the fact that it is impossible for human beings to be in a state of rationality at all times. This does however not mean that one should strive for betterment when both analyzing one's own arguments as well as others. This book then, 'Thinking from A to Z' is a small stepping stone towards this goal where by critically examining arguments then one can become better reasoners which should be a shared goal for humanity. Some obvious benefits of this process is becoming better at not being taken advantage of , being better at communicating as well as being better at defending others through a rationalized discourse. In addition to bringing up fallacious arguments where a formal fallacy is taken to be any invalid form of argument in which one or more the premises of an argument may be true without the conclusion being true, the book also touches upon (although in brevity) the structure of arguments such as including some important theoretical concepts such as sufficient and necessary reasoning. Glad also to see a mention of Wittgenstein in this book as his contribution towards understanding language has been very influential historically.
Warburton, which is a rather striking name introduces many 'cherished' fallacies such as ad hominem appeal to emotion, strawman , non sequitor arguments, but the book also contains more novel or even exotic fallacies such as sorites paradox. A paradox that arises from the use of vague terms, like "heap" or "tall." It works by taking a true premise and a series of seemingly true assumptions to reach a false conclusion. For example, a classic example being one grain of sand does not make a heap, where if one sticks to this one may draw the false conclusion that no amount of sand will result in a heap which is clearly false. One should note that this is a reference book an not meant as a introduction or academic treatment on the subject, so keep this in mind. This also makes it so that one may skip around in the book as one pleases.
Lastly, as a criticism of the book. One should be aware of the fact that fallacies may be particularly easy to over analyze such that an overabundance of ascription's to fallacies may also lead to severe problems when engaging in reasoned dialogue. The obvious result being less than fair interlocutor stands out immediately, but there are also problems such as claiming a fallacy being committed by the opponent where it may be difficult from context to see if this is indeed the case. For example take the case of a person wanting to defend a specific bill on healthcare. If this person starts out with 'healthcare is a human general right such that we should consider this bill' then one may it seems justifyingly so ascribe a fallacy of relevance claim against this person as this statement has nothing to do with the specific bill in question. However, it could very well have been the case that had the person been allowed to continue his argumentation then this person would have brought up both merits and details regarding this bill, such that the fallacy of irrelevance does not hold in this case. This is only to show how difficult assigning fallacies can be, especially in contexts when you are engaging in argumentation with another person. There is however a silver lining that if one keeps this in mind and practices careful analysis of argumentation then one may become better at reasoning altogether. There is also plenty of lazy reasoning unfortunately , especially by people in the media such that in these cases one bring accusations of fallacies to the table with a good conscience.
In all a recommenced reference book on fallacies , although I wish the author had stressed more the structure and psychology of arguments throughout.
Note: I don't like the star rating and as such I only rate books based upon one star or five stars corresponding to the in my opinion preferable rating system of thumbs up/down. This later rating system increases in my humble opinion the degree to which the reader is likely to engage with a review instead of merely glancing at the number of stars of a given book.)
Thinking from A-Z by Nigel Warburton. It’s a nice little handbook describing key terms and fallacies in critical thinking. In a time when we are presented with so much ambiguity and seemingly conflicting information, everyone needs to be a critical thinker. Strong recommendation from me.
this is simply a dictionary. why was i assigned to read this cover to cover for a rationality gened. doesn’t seem very rational to me 🤨. fine dictionary though i guess
An awesome book! I read it twice but I still feel I need to have it again. Thought-provoking, funny and addictive. The knowledge I got from this book is priceless. My style and technique of argument has really improved since this piece came into my hands. I took several philosophical classes, full of debates and questions. Applying some contents from this book proved how worthy it is.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Felsefe, dil, mantık ilişkisini kabul gören düşünme disiplinlerinden yola çıkarak oldukça yararlı bir kaynak hazırlanmış. Kim isterse, istediği önerme, tanıt veya ilkeden başlayıp kendine göre bir yol çizebiliyor bu kitapta. Araştırma yapan herkesin masasında bulunması araştırmacılara daha az şaşıran bir dil üretimin geleceğine katkı sağlayacağını düşünüyorum.
Me gustó este libro porque toca temas que pueden ser monótonos pero que el autor hace muy entretenidos, es un libro práctico porque lo que aquí aprendes te puede ser útil para evitar ser manipulado. Creo que lo poco que pudiera mejorarse sería el hecho que necesita más ilustraciones con ejemplos de los temas desarrollados
كتاب جيد وأسلوبه سهل لكن أهم شئ أفادني إياه أن الهوى مؤثر في تفكير الإنسان بدرجة كبيرة مهما تظاهر بالعقلانية والتزام المنطق فالمؤلف هنا يسرد مجموعة من قواعد التفكير السليم وينبه علي بعض المغالطات المنطقية وفي نفس الكتاب يخرق هذه القواعد ويرتكب تلك المغالطات حين يحتاج إلي التدليل على بعض يهواه وتميل إليه نفسه
كتاب التفكير من الألف إلى الياء ... للكاتب الفيلسوف الإنجليزي ناجيل واربرتون Nigel Warburton هو الحقيقة مش فيلسوف أوي ... بس هو كاتب جيد في الفلسفة لغير المتخصصين. المهم الكتاب بيسرد المغالطات المنطقية مرتبة من A إلى Z فعلًا رغم إن حجم الكتاب - حوالي 200 صفحة - يكاد يكون نصف حجم كتاب المغالطات المنطقية لد. عادل مصطفى، إلا إنه بيتعرض لعدد مغالطات منطقية تكاد تتجاوز ضعف ما هو مشروح في كتاب د.عادل مصطفى، والسبب في ده إن كل مغالطة منطقية شُرحت في صفحتين أو ثلاثة مع أمثلة مبسطة عليها مقارنة بالأمثلة الأكثر تعقيدًا والأكثر استفاضة عند د.عادل مصطفى ... أحيانًا بيكون عيب بعض الأمثلة بتاعة ناجيل واربرتون التسطيح الشديد أو المباشرة الشديدة ... لكن في المجمل الشرح وافي وكافي لتوصيل المقصود بالمغالطة. الكتاب يصلح كمقدمة ممتازة في المغالطات المنطقية عمومًا 4/5
J'ai lu ce livre parce qu'il est recommandé pour mes études. Cependant est ce qu'il est intéressant ? Oui. Tout le monde peut le lire ? Oui. Est ce que j'ai appris des trucs ? Oui
Cependant je ne l'aurais pas lu si il n'était pas recommandé parce que je connaissais déjà la plupart des concepts évoqués. Ça parle énormément de rhétorique surtout, chose que j'ai appris en lisant l'art d'avoir toujours raison. On va dire que c'était plutôt des révisions.
Je l'ai lu majoritairement en lecture rapide, surtout à la fin parce que ça commençait à me courir sur le haricot.
Il n'empêche que je vous le conseille de le lire si vous êtes intéressé par la rhétorique.
A very well written and comprehensive guide to critical thinking. This is my first book about logic and it appears to me very approachable and beginner-friendly.
I especially like the fact that the author went to great length to make different points interconnected, quoting other points in paragraphs and constructing the book in a dictionary manner,making it much easier to make references.
It is quite an experience reading this book, as I find myself flipping through the pages, hopping between different relevant words and mysteriously finishing the book in a very short time.
Bir Nigel Warbunton kitabı olmasaydı kesinlikle okumazdım. Çünkü bu kitap, eleştirel düşünceye giriş niteliğinde alfabetik bir sözlük. Bir sözlük okumak ne kadar keyifli olabilirse bu kitap da o kadar keyifliydi. Madde içlerinde atıflar olsa dahi muhtemelen arada atlanan maddeler olacağı için alfabetik okumak bir zorunluluğa dönüşüyor. Peş peşe okunan maddeler arasında bir ilişki olmayışı da okumayı zorlaştırıyor. Yine de Warbunton’un akıcı dili ve verdiği nitelikli örnekler kitabı keyifli hale getiriyor.
An easy-to-read dictionary of valid and invalid thinking. The book contains many fun entries (e.g., "the lawyer's answer") and many examples. I read the book back to back, but ultimately the dictionary-format is somewhat unhelpful. In any case, many of the rules for thinking discussed are routinely violated in papers I read and in discussions that I am part of. This book might help me better spot those instances and break fewer rules myself, too.
Okumasi eglenceli bir elestirel dusunce kavramlari sozlugu. Kitabi kavramlar arasinda gidip gelerek ve zamana yayarak okumaya calistim. Bana elestirel dusunmeye giris yaptirarak kendimin ve diger insanlarin dusuncelerine elestirel yaklastigimda eksikleri veya yanlislari fark edebilecegim metodik bir dusunme bicimine zihnimde kapi aralamis oldu. Dolayisiyla kitaptan oldukca faydalandigimi soyleyebilirim.
Spotting fallacies and understanding what makes a good or poor argument is vital for participating in or thinking through political, legal, philosophical and scientific debate. Anybody serious about discussing the issues of our time should keep this book handy for reference.