Chapter 7 of Critical Thinking is based on Counterarguments. This come is to play when you are debating. This chapter talks also about raising objections, refuting an argument (both directly and indirectly), and attempts to refute an argument that are bad arguments. To me, the sections on refuting arguments were most interesting. So, now I will talk about the difference between refuting directly and indirectly.
Refuting Directly: There are three fundamental ways to directly refute an argument.. You just need to point out reasons why a particular argument is no good.
1. Show that at least one of the premises is dubious.
2. Show that the argument is not valid or strong.
3. Show that the conclusion is false.
Refuting Indirectly: Sometimes you can't exactly point out a specific reason why an argument is no good, even if you do know that there is something wrong with the premises. When this occurs, you should Reduce to the Absurd. Meaning that you should show at least show that one or more claims is false, or that collectively they are unacceptable. You can do this by drawing a false conclusion from them. Because if an argument has a false conclusion, then at least one of the premises is false.
Hey caleb-natov, firstly I liked how you explained the terms "refuting directly" and "refuting indirectly" in detail, but in saying that I do have some comments. Although your definitions are completely true and straight from the text, I feel that you should supply more creative examples to add greater understanding and also show your own personal grasp of the term and its definition. Sometimes it might be hard for people to know if you truly understand the concept without inputting personal examples because the definition could be easily written from the text. In any case though, it's always room for improvement :) Keep it up!
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