Syllabus - Jeff Maynes

Sherlock Holmes and the Art and Science of Reasoning
FRPG 1020-01, Holmes College, St. Lawrence University
Tuesday and Thursday, 10:10-12:20 (Hepburn 112)
Instructors:
Email:
Office:
Office Hours:
Course Website:
Community Assistants (CAs):
CA Email:
Resident Coordinator:
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Jeffrey Maynes
[email protected]
Piskor 109
W 10-12 (and by appt)
http://www.jeffmaynes.com/holmes
Emmanuel Ngenoh
[email protected]
Angelica Soto (x5362)
Tina Tao
[email protected]
Valentine 217
Th 1:00-3:00 (and by appt)
Eliza Meigher
[email protected]
Course Description
“When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth!”
This is a famous maxim of Sherlock Holmes, a rule used to reason through crimes and solve mysteries. In
this course, we will use Holmes as a guide to understand how to reason critically and responsibly. Students
will learn techniques for mapping arguments, identifying their logical structure, and evaluating their merits.
We will explore many of the most interesting Holmes stories, both in Doyle’s original short stories and in
television and film adaptations, to figure out exactly how he reasoned, and to evaluate it ourselves - was
Holmes that good, or just that lucky?
Students will practice understanding and evaluating arguments both from the Holmes stories and other
related texts on topics ranging from friendship to fingerprinting. Over the course of the semester, we will
practice these skills by pulling arguments from these texts, developing original arguments, and even writing
some Holmes stories of our very own (with well-crafted arguments at the heart of them!). By the end of the
course, students will be better prepared to reason through complex issues, both in and out of the classroom
(but no promises about one’s ability to solve crimes).
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Course Goals
By the end of the course, you should know:
• The basic concepts of good and bad argumentation.
• The basic concepts of scientific reasoning.
• The fallacies and biases that reasoners are prone to.
• The intellectual virtues, and the role they play in good reasoning.
Students will also be better able to:
• Identify and articulate the structure of arguments (map arguments).
• Identify fallacious reasoning.
• Use argument maps to construct and write essays.
• Speak clearly and accurately on complex arguments to audiences not familiar with them.
• Evaluate popular descriptions of scientific results and reasoning.
• Practice skilled metacognitive awareness of your own reasoning.
• Read and analyze complex argumentative essays.
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FYP Goals
At the conclusion of the first semester, first-year students will have increased their ability to:
• Engage in critical reading, analysis and interpretation of various kinds of texts, including their conventions and rhetorical strategies.
• Differentiate among and evaluate different kinds of sources and the various ways information is produced
and presented.
• Engage in sustained evidence-based discussion of texts and issues by:
– identifying and articulating ones own ideas;
– listening carefully to others, demonstrating an understanding of their ideas and responding respectfully; and
– identifying and exploring any areas of disagreement.
• Develop a focused and arguable thesis, supported by appropriate evidence which is cited in an ethical
manner.
• Produce written work with coherent and cohesive structure and content appropriate for its purpose.
• Prepare oral presentations with structure, content and delivery appropriate for their purpose.
• Consider what effect they intend their writing and speaking to have on their audience.
• Produce writing characterized by a mature prose style that conforms to conventions of standard English.
• Revise their written and oral work.
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Course Materials
These are the assigned texts for this course:
Doyle, Arthur Conan. Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories. Bantam Dell, 2003. Vol. I & II.
Bullock, Richard and Francine Weinberg. The Little Seagull Handbook. W.W. Norton & Company, 2011.
There will also be other readings distributed digitally via the course website. If you already own a copy of
the complete Sherlock Holmes, feel free to use it. We just ask that you have a hard copy which you bring to
class.
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Grading and Expectations
Participation
Argument Paper
Holmes Story
Drafts
Short Presentation
Group Presentation
Homework
Quizzes
15%
20%
15%
5%
10%
15%
15%
5%
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Participation Participation is vital to this course. We will be spending most of our class time actively
practicing the central skills of the course. The primary goals of this course are about becoming able to do
something, not just to learn some information. To really gain a skill, you need to practice it. Practicing
involves participation.
There are a number of aspects to participation. It means making well-supported, on-topic contributions to
class discussion. It means showing up to class with all of the materials you need, and paying attention to
your colleagues. It means contributing in group work. It means giving thoughtful comments to your partner
in peer review. You cannot do any of these things if you are not in class. If you miss three or more classes,
then you will not earn any points for participation.
Participation will be assessed in three ways. First, at various times in the semester we will ask you to do
a short in-class writing exercise reflecting on your participation in class that day. We will be looking for
detailed and self-aware reflections which make use of the key concepts of metacognition (intellectual virtue,
the strategies, etc.). Second, at the end of the semester you will write a short (3 page) reflection on your
participation over the entire semester. This reflection will be due during the final exam slot. Third, we will
evaluate your participation in class based on your preparation, the quality of your contributions in class,
and the nature of your interactions with your classmates.
Argument Paper In this paper, you will explain and evaluate someone else’s argument on a topic of
your choice, and you will offer your own argument in reply. You can write your paper on absolutely any
topic you like, provided you can find some arguments for a position on that topic (with one exception: you
cannot use Holmes, or Holmes-esque, stories). Sample topics include politics (‘the US policy on Syria should
be...’), sports (e.g., ‘football is too dangerous of a sport for children to play’) or popular culture (‘Facebook
is harmful to our privacy’). It is a good idea to start thinking about topics and looking for sources early, so
that we can help with any questions! The paper will be written in three stages, each of which will be turned
in separately as a draft submission before the full paper is due.
• Stage Zero: Prior to working on the paper, we will ask you to submit the article you plan on working
with, along with a short reflection (1-2 pages) about why you picked it. Due: 9/16.
• Stage One: In this stage, you will explain the argument your source offers in plain English. The aim
of this assignment is to demonstrate a clear understanding of the argument, as well as the ability to
explain that argument to another. As part of this stage, you have two assignments due:
– A map of the argument from your article - due 9/23.
– A draft of this section (3 pages) - due 9/30.
• Stage Two: In this stage, you will develop your own argument on the topic. In developing this section
of the paper, you should be writing up your map first, and then structuring your essay based on your
map. The two due dates are:
– A map of your argument - due 10/7.
– A draft of this section (3 pages) - due 10/14.
• Stage Three: In the final stage, you will evaluate both your own argument and the argument of your
article. Should we believe either? Why or why not? The draft for this section (3 pages) will be due
10/28.
For each stage, you will receive feedback from us, and you will do a peer review with a colleague. We expect
that you will be revising each stage up through the final submission. For the final submission, you will turn
in all three papers, along with a new introduction and conclusion tying them all together. In addition, you
wil include your prior drafts andl write up a short cover letter detailing how you have revised the paper.
The final submission is due 11/11.
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Holmes Story You will also try your own hand at writing a Holmes story. The story should involve
a strong argument, which you will map in advance. The story should be written for a general audience.
Your story will be evaluated based on its appeal to a general readership and the quality of the inferences
included. That is, the argument should be well constructed, and any limitations of it should be recognized
by the characters in your story. The appeal of your story will be evaluated on the quality and creativity
of the writing. We will discuss creative writing towards the end of term. The story should be 7-10 pages long.
There are two draft assignments for this paper. On 11/18 you will submit an outline of the story. This
outline should provide the details on the setting, characters, and a brief summary of the plot (think the blurb
on the back of a book!). The aim here is to give you a framework within which to construct an argument.
You will then submit a draft of your argument map on 12/2. The final story is due by 4:30 on 12/18.
Short Presentation Your first presentation will be on your argument paper. It should be about five
minutes long, with additional time for questions from the class. In the presentation, you will be expected
to explain your issue and the argument you are considering to the class. You should not presume any
familiarity with the topic from your colleagues, but can presume familiarity with the concepts discussed in
the course. This presentation should draw on the work you are currently doing for your argument paper.
The presentations will take place each day during weeks 6-9.
Group Presentation In your group presentation, you will evaluate a popular use of science. We recommend looking at popular science sources, such as the New York Times Science page or Scientific American.
The article you pick can be on any scientific topic you find interesting, but it must be approved by one of
the instructors. Once you found an article, you will then find the journal article(s) that the popular article
is based upon. For the presentation, you should identify the argument as it is presented in both the journal
article and the popular article, and evaluate whether it is a fair representation of the original science. You
are not expected to master the scientific content. Rather, your goal should be to work out the structure of
the argument.
You will work in groups of 3 or 4 for this presentation, and each group member will be expected to speak
for approximately 5 minutes. Each group must meet with us during week 13 to discuss your articles and
presentation. Groups will be evaluated on the content of your analysis, and each individual will be evaluated
on the quality of his or her presentation. As with the short presentation, you should not presume any
familiarity with the topic, but may presume familiarity with the concepts discussed in class.
Homework You typically have two homework assignments due each week. First, on Tuesdays (see the
calendar for specifics) you will generally have to turn in an argument map of the main argument from one
of the assigned Holmes stories. You should be prepared to use this map in class, and to compare it with the
maps generated by your colleagues.
Second, on Thursdays, you will submit an entry in your argument journal. The argument journal is your
opportunity to reflect on the arguments you hear around you, and the quality of your own reasoning about
them. In each entry, you should answer three questions:
1. What was the argument?
2. Why did I reason as I did?
3. Did I reason well?
Remember: these entries should be about your reasoning! You will receive 1 point for doing each of these
questions adequately, and an additional point (for a max total of 4) for the overall depth of your reflection.
These journal entries should be approximately 1-2 pages long, and can be submitted in print, electronically
through email or you can create a blog and post them there. Just be sure to let us know how you will be
submitting your journal entries!
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Quizzes There will be periodic and unannounced quizzes on key concepts in the course. Be sure to keep
on top of the main ideas!
Grading Scale
A
4.0
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A3.75
A-/B+
3.5
B+
3.25
B
3.0
B2.75
B-/C+
2.5
C+
2.25
C
2.0
C1.75
C-/D+
1.5
D+
1.25
D
1.0
F
0.0
Course Policies
Attendance
Active participation and attendance are essential for a productive and cooperative class, as we will spend
most of the class time discussing the readings and the arguments that arise from them. In addition, some
class time will be dedicated to peer review and it is imperative that you be there for your classmates. If
you are aware of any events that may require you to miss class (such as an athletic competition or a schoolsponsored event), you should communicate this with us as soon as you know about it. Occasionally, life
happens in unexpected ways and illness or emergencies can come up. Therefore, it is important that if
you miss a class that you notify us immediately, either before class or at the very latest one day after the
absence, so that we haven’t assumed you’ve gotten lost in the Adirondacks. The accumulation of three or
more absences will result in the loss of your total participation grade (15% of the final grade for the course.)
If there is a personal or medical emergency which requires you to miss classes beyond that, please come talk
to us.
“General Politeness” Policy
Here at St. Lawrence and in the North Country, you will find that many people are polite - helping each other,
saying “Thanks!” and other respectful mannerisms. We want to practice this behavior in our classroom as
well. Here are a few guidelines for our FYP:
• Electronics - Cell phones, tablets, laptops, or any mobile devices should not be used during class time
especially when active discussion is occurring (you should be contributing to discussions, even if youre
not talking, by listening). Occasionally, we will ask that you bring your laptop to class and on these
days will take exception to our electronics policy.
• Talking in class - Discussions about non-class materials are distracting and can take away from the
interesting dialogues taking place.
• Be prepared - Bring your assignments, textbooks & readings, laptops (when required) and other materials you will need to class. You don’t want to be a nuisance to your classmates and constantly ask
to borrow their book or look over their shoulders.
• Be on time - Late arrivals will impede our progress and you may miss out on important information
that is discussed at the start of class. Being late is never fashionable, despite the popular saying.
• Be respectful to yourself and to others.
Late assignment policy
Due dates are provided for assignments in order to keep you on task and to allow us time to evaluate and
grade your work. Any assignment that is turned in late will be penalized with a 0.5 pt/per day late deduction
(on a 4.0 scale). Drafts must be turned in on time so that your peer reviewers can complete their end of the
assignment. Your Holmes story and participation reflection are due at the end of the Final Exam time slot
and will not be accepted late.
Plagiarism and Collaboration
All students are expected to abide by principles of honesty in their work. It is expected and encouraged,
however, that students will discuss their paper projects with classmates. Students are encouraged to present
ideas for criticism and discussion and trade drafts. If a classmate influences the arguments and direction of
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your paper in either of these capacities, their contribution should be acknowledged in a footnote. For more
details on academic dishonesty and what counts as plagiarism, see section 10 below.
Papers, however, are not collaborative. All arguments presented should be the author’s original work, and
where it is not, appropriate citation must be supplied. Classmate input is an important part of refining your
argument, but should not be the source of it. If you have any questions about a potential case of plagiarism,
ask us before you turn in the assignment.
Disability and Accessibility Services If you have a disability and need accommodations please be sure
to contact the Disability and Accessibility Services Office right away so they can help you get the accommodations you require at: http://www.stlawu.edu/disability-and-accessibility-services. If you will need to use
any accommodations in this class, please talk with us early so you can have the best possible experience this
semester. Although not required, we would like to know of any accommodations that are needed at least 10
days before a quiz or test, so please see us soon.
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Course Schedule
Date Topics
Reading
Assignments
—
Course Syllabus
Bring laptops
Week 1
8.25
The Liberal Arts
8.28
Introduction: What is an Argument?
Week 2
9.2
Premises and Conclusions
9.4
Intellectual Virtue and Academic
Planning
Week 3
9.9
Argument Mapping
9.11
Metacognition and Writing
Week 4
9.16
Mapping and the WORD Studio
“The Dancing Men” (I: 806-832)
“A Scandal in Bohemia” (I: 239263)
O’Brien, “Cryptology”
—
Damer, “A Code of Intellectual
Conduct”
Paragraph summary of
argument in each reading
“The Greek Interpreter” (I: 682701)
“The Naval Treaty” (I: 701-736)
—
Seagull, W1-W5
Kahneman, Thinking Fast and
Slow, selection
Identify premises in argument from “Greek
Interpreter”
Read TBD Op-Ed Piece
Map the Op-Ed
Stage Zero Reflection
—
9.18
No Class - FY Convocation
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Bring your laptop and other
syllabi
Journal Entry
Journal Entry
Date Topics
Week 5
9.23
Mapping Definitions and Objections
9.25
Effective Reading
Week 6
9.30
Mapping Practice and Peer Review
10.2
Assignments
“The Bruce-Partington Plans”
(II: 398-428)
“The Three Students” (I: 946964)
—
Kinghorn, “A Case of Insincerity”
Seagull, W14
Paper Stage 1 Map
Baggett, ”Sherlock Holmes as
Epistemologist”
—
Stage 1 Draft
Mapping Sherlock
Week 7
10.7
Evaluating Arguments
10.9
Reading
Map “Bruce-Partington”
Use SEM on Reading!
Journal Entry
Journal Entry
“The Lion’s Mane” (II: 673-693)
“The Red-Headed League” (I:
263-287)
—
Stage 2 Map
Map “The
League”
Red-Headed
No Class - Fall Break
—
Week 8
10.14 Fallacies I
10.16
Peer Review and Practice
Stage 2 Draft
—
“The Musgrave Ritual” (I: 604623)
Read Peer’s Paper
Week 9
10.21 Fallacies II
Journal Entry
Fallacy Example and Reflection
—
10.23
Mid-semester Check-In
Week 10
10.28 Identifying Argument Types
10.30
“Black Peter” (I: 885-906)
“The Speckled Band” (I: 396423)
—
Argument Types Practice
Week 11
11.4
Evaluating Deductive and Inductive Arguments
11.6
Journal Entry
Evaluating IBEs
Stage 3 Draft
Map “Speckled Band”
Journal Entry
“The Reigate Puzzle” (I: 623644)
O’Brien, “Handwritten Documents”
—
“Silver Blaze” (I: 521-546)
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Map “Reigate Puzzle”
Journal Entry
Date Topics
Week 12
11.11 Public Speaking
11.13
Introduction to Scientific Reasoning
Reading
Assignments
A Pocket Guide to Public Speaking, selection
—
“Thor Bridge” (II: 626-655)
Argument Paper
Gould, Mismeasure of Man, selection
Bring in presentation articles
Journal Entry
Journal Entry
Week 13
11.18 Scientific Reasoning Practice
11.20
Forensics Activity
Week
11.26
11.27
11.28
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No Class - Thanksgiving Break
No Class - Thanksgiving Break
No Class - Thanksgiving Break
Week 15
12.2
Mystery
“Boscombe Valley Mystery” (I:
306-331)
“Beryl Coronet” (I: 467-492)
“Priory School” (I: 852-885)
O’Brien, “Footprints”
—
Story Outline
Experiment Design
Journal Entry
“Yellow Face” (I: 546-565)
Virtue Reflection
Story Map
—
12.4
Presentation Practice
Presentation Draft
Journal Entry
Week 16
12.9
Presentations
12.11 Presentations
Final Exam Slot (12/18)
Due: Participation Reflection and Holmes Story (with map)
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First-Year Program Philosophy and Goals
The First-Year Program (FYP) and First-Year Seminar (FYS) are the first steps in a four-year process of
helping you meet the Universitys Aims and Objectives and the broader goals of a liberal education. The
faculty of the FYP and FYS see themselves as partners and mentors in the process of working with you to acquire the intellectual habits of mind, the writing, speaking, and research skills, and the ethical self-reflection
that are at the core of a liberal education. The FYP and FYS will ask you to consider new perspectives on
the world and your place in it and will challenge you to confront many of the hidden assumptions you bring
to college with you. We hope to open you to new ideas, help you to see the complexity of the way in which
knowledge gets produced and used in society, and encourage you to see yourself as an active contributor in
making the world a better place. The course topics, the texts you will read, listen to, and watch, the in-class
and out-of-class activities you will engage in, and the writing, speaking, and research assignments you will
work on are all designed to introduce you to the depth of critical thinking and the quality and complexity of
the communication skills that will be expected of you at SLU and as a citizen of an increasingly diverse society.
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First and foremost among our goals are those related to your abilities as a communicator. The work of
the FYP and FYS asks you to design and deliver written, spoken, performed and/or visual texts that
demonstrate basic skills in the relevant modes of communication and with an increasing degree of rhetorical
sensitivity. Our focus on rhetorical sensitivity means that we expect you to cultivate the awareness that all
of your communication, whether formal or informal, involves having to make choices about your messages,
whether written, spoken, aural or visual. To become a good communicator, you need to recognize that
the creation of meaningful and powerful written, spoken, performed, or visual texts involves both a creator
and an audience, and that therefore the voice you adopt in your communication, the audience you imagine
yourself communicating to, and the social and ethical context of the content, matter a great deal in creating
such texts. One important way to become a better communicator is to become a better critical reader,
viewer, and listener, which is why we will ask you to engage challenging materials in a variety of forms and
work with you to learn how to interpret them.
Learning to read, listen, write, speak, do research and/or perform well also requires feedback. As faculty, we
submit our work for feedback from colleagues all the time, and giving and receiving constructive feedback
from both friends and strangers is central to collaborative work in any field and is itself a form of critical
thinking and learning. We further recognize that this feedback process is not linear and that good communication requires that you continually rethink, restructure, and revise your work in order for it to be your
best. This is why we require that your writing, speaking, and performance assignments be projects that
include preparatory exercises and multiple drafts or rehearsals, all of which ask you to continue to reflect
critically on the choices you have made in the texts that you produce. Furthermore, we see all of these forms
of communication as complementary and intertwined, which is why many of your assignments will ask you to
integrate elements of the written, spoken, performed, and visual. Finally, developing good habits of critical
inquiry and communication also means reflecting on the ethical dimensions of how your work represents that
of others, thus one of our goals is to help you to understand both the nature of academic integrity and the
social processes by which knowledge is produced and represented.
To ensure that the program is meeting its stated goals, all FYP and FYS syllabi are read by other faculty in
the program to determine if they include a variety of assignments that foster the writing, speaking, research,
and critical thinking goals of the program. All FYP and FYS courses have to be approved by faculty in the
program before they are offered.
Approved by SLU program faculty in 2006.
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WORD Studio
The Munn Center for Rhetoric and Communication maintains The WORD Studio in ODY Library - a place
to get feedback from peers on assignments in Writing, Oral communication, Research, and Design of visual
projects. You can come for a consultation to plan a paper or presentation; to find ways to improve the ideas,
organization, and style of a draft; to videotape and review a presentation rehearsal; to practice a PowerPoint
presentation, and more. However, peer tutors are not proofreaders or editors who silently fix your work for
you; instead, they are trained to have a conversation with you about ways you can fix problem areas yourself
and become better overall communicators. You may use the WORD Studio for consultations on assignments
for any of your courses. The tutors do ask that you bring your professors assignment sheet with you so that
their feedback addresses the parameters of the assignments as specifically as possible.
The WORD Studio is open Monday through Thursday, 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.; Friday, noon to 4:00 p.m.;
and Sunday, 1:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. by appointment or for drop -in sessions, if tutors are available. Consider
making an appointment and sending your assignments in advance to minimize wait time and increase the
productiveness of your session. The email address is [email protected]. You may also IM the Studio
during regular hours with quick questions about grammar, citation, and style: SLUword.
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Honor Code
All students at St. Lawrence University are bound by honor to maintain the highest level of academic integrity. By virtue of membership in the St. Lawrence community, every student accepts the responsibility to
know the rules of academic honesty, to abide by them at all times, and to encourage all others to do the same.
Responsibility for avoiding behavior or situations from which academic dishonesty may be inferred rests
entirely with the students. Students should be sure to learn from faculty what is expected as their own work
and how the work of other people should be acknowledged.
Academic Honesty
A major commitment of the University is to the intellectual development of the student (St. Lawrence University Aims and Objectives) which can be achieved only by strict adherence to standards of honesty. At St.
Lawrence, all members of the community have a responsibility to see that these standards are maintained.
Consequently, St. Lawrence University students will not engage in acts of academic dishonesty as described
below.
Academic Dishonesty
1. It is assumed that all work is done by the student unless the instructor/mentor/employer gives specific
permission for collaboration.
2. Cheating on examinations and tests consists of knowingly giving or using or attempting to use unauthorized assistance during examinations or tests.
3. Dishonesty in work outside of examinations and tests consists of handing in or presenting as original
work which is not original, where originality is required.
The following constitute examples of academic dishonesty:
1. Plagiarism: Presenting as ones own work the work of another person–words, ideas, data, evidence,
thoughts, information, organizing principles, or style of presentation–without proper attribution. Plagiarism includes paraphrasing or summarizing without acknowledgment by quotation marks, footnotes,
endnotes, or other indices of reference (cf. Joseph F. Trimmer, A Guide to MLA Documentation).
2. Handing in or presenting false reports on any experiment.
3. Handing in or presenting a book report on a book one has not read.
4. Falsification of records.
5. Supplying information to another student knowing that such information will be used in a dishonest
way.
6. Submission of or presentation of work (papers, journal abstracts, oral presentations, etc.) which
has received credit in a previous course to satisfy the requirement(s) of a second course without the
knowledge and permission of the instructor/supervisor/mentor of the second course.
7. Knowingly making false statements in support of requests for special consideration or special timing
in the fulfillment of course requirements.
Claims of ignorance and academic or personal pressure are unacceptable as excuses for academic dishonesty.
Students must learn what constitutes ones own work and how the work of others must be acknowledged.
Any student found guilty of academic dishonesty by the Academic Honor Council may have a letter placed
in his or her permanent file.
Last updated: August 7, 2014
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