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Philosophy and ReasonQ&A by dot point
A short Q&A bank for every QLD Philosophy and Reason syllabus dot point. Each question and answer is drawn directly from our worked dot-point page, so you can scan key concepts before opening the long-form answer.
Unit 3: Reason and formal logic
- analyse and evaluate arguments from analogy, assessing the relevance and number of similarities and the presence of relevant disanalogies5Q&A pairs
- reconstruct and map arguments from ordinary language, identifying premises, conclusions, hidden assumptions and argument structure6Q&A pairs
- analyse categorical statements and syllogisms, including the four standard forms and the rules for valid syllogistic reasoning7Q&A pairs
- identify and explain formal fallacies, including affirming the consequent, denying the antecedent and the undistributed middle5Q&A pairs
- evaluate inductive generalisations by assessing sample size, representativeness and the dangers of hasty generalisation and biased sampling7Q&A pairs
- explain Hume's problem of induction and evaluate proposed responses, including the appeal to the uniformity of nature and pragmatic justifications4Q&A pairs
- explain the hypothetico-deductive method and Popper's falsificationism, including the demarcation problem and the asymmetry of confirmation and refutation5Q&A pairs
- distinguish inductive from deductive reasoning and evaluate inductive arguments for strength and cogency rather than validity5Q&A pairs
- explain inference to the best explanation (abduction) and evaluate hypotheses using criteria such as simplicity, explanatory scope and coherence5Q&A pairs
- identify and explain common informal fallacies in arguments, including fallacies of relevance, ambiguity and presumption4Q&A pairs
- explain and apply Mill's methods of causal reasoning, including agreement, difference, joint method, residues and concomitant variation4Q&A pairs
- identify and distinguish between necessary and sufficient conditions and represent them using conditional statements4Q&A pairs
- apply basic probabilistic reasoning to evaluate arguments, including conditional probability, base rates and common statistical fallacies6Q&A pairs
- translate and symbolise propositions using logical operators, and use truth tables to test propositional arguments for validity6Q&A pairs
- distinguish validity from soundness, and evaluate deductive arguments for both, using premises and conclusions5Q&A pairs
Unit 4: Moral philosophy and metaphysics
- explain and evaluate the free will debate, including hard determinism, libertarianism and compatibilism, and the link to moral responsibility8Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate Kantian deontology, including the categorical imperative, the formula of universal law and the formula of humanity5Q&A pairs
- evaluate the limits of state power over the individual, including Mill's harm principle and the liberty paradox5Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate metaethical positions, including moral realism, relativism, subjectivism and emotivism7Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate theories of personal identity, including the body, soul and psychological-continuity criteria6Q&A pairs
- compare and evaluate rationalism and empiricism as accounts of the source of knowledge, with reference to Descartes, Locke, Hume and Kant4Q&A pairs
- analyse the nature and justification of rights, including natural, legal and human rights, and the will and interest theories3Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate scepticism about the external world, including Descartes's dream and demon arguments and proposed responses6Q&A pairs
- evaluate social contract theories of political authority, including the accounts of Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau7Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate theories of mind, including substance dualism, physicalism and functionalism, and the problem of consciousness7Q&A pairs
- compare and evaluate competing theories of distributive justice, including Rawls, Nozick and utilitarian approaches6Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate the justified true belief analysis of knowledge and the Gettier problem, including proposed responses5Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate utilitarianism, including the principle of utility, act and rule versions, and major objections6Q&A pairs
- explain and evaluate Aristotelian virtue ethics, including eudaimonia, the doctrine of the mean and practical wisdom8Q&A pairs