Transcript CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 3
USING THE TOULMIN MODEL IN
YOUR ARGUMENTS
Professor T. Castro
Houston Community College
English Dept.
WHAT IS TOULMIN MODEL
FOR?
• MAKING A CLAIM THAT IS DEBATABLE
• PRESENTING GOOD DATA AND
REASONS(GROUNDS AND EVIDENCE) TO
SUPPORT THIS CLAIM.
• EXPLAINING THE WARRANT, OR UNDERLYING
ASSUMPTIONS THAT CONNECT THE CLAIM AND
DATA.
• QUALIFYING THE CLAIM AS NECESSARY BY
ACKNOWLEDGING.
• RESPONDING TO COUNTERARGUMENTS AND
DRAWING CONCLUSION.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE
CLAIM, DATA AND WARRANT
CLAIM
(the assertion I shall try to persuade you to
accept as true
DATA
(The facts and logical reason that demonstrate
the true of my claim
WARRANT
(My guarantee that the data are based on
solid ethical or moral principle)
THE TOULMIN MODEL OF
ARGUMENT
• Argument begins with a claim – viewpoint
or thesis that you want reader to accept.
• To accomplish this goal, you must produce
compelling data, the grounds or evidence.
• Next, you need to ask of any argument
whether the data or grounds use to support
the claim truly are valid look for proper
warrant.
THE CLAIM
• TOULMIN CHOOSES TO CALL IT THE CLAIM
BECAUSE THAT TERM SUGGESTS A THESIS OR
ASSERTION THAT IS PARTICULARLY OPEN TO
CHALLENGE.
• FOR AN ARGUMENT TO SUCCEED :
-must ensure that the claim offered is worthy of deliberation.
-claims are not arguable
-2 basic types of claims :
a)Objective
b)Subjective
THE CLAIM (cont)
a)Objective claims
-assert that something actually exist and
present evidence that is demonstrably
factual.
b)Subjective claims
-assert that something should exist and
present evidence derived from ethical,
moral or aesthetic convictions.
THE DATA
• Suggest “hard facts” results from
experiments, statistic from surveys, as well
as historical, legal and biographical fact.
• Data or grounds must be presented as
accurately and as unambiguously.
THE WARRANT
• A warrant is the assurance that the evidence
brought in to support the claim is
completely reliable and it rests on sound
principle of value.
• There are 3 kinds of warrant :
-logical or scientific warrants
-ethical or forensic – based warrants
-emotional or artistic – based warrants
CHAPTER SUMMARY
• The Toulmin model of argument is valuable
because it emphasize careful reasoning without the
constraints of formal logic,the subject matter
being too filled with probabilities to be resolved
by logic.It also tied to the reality of social
interaction particularly of legal courts. This mode
of arguments recognize that the claim whether
objective or subjective, must be supported by data
which in turn must rest on a warrant.