this is my final assignment. I will attach all the lecture slides and one sample that can help you to finish the assignment. there are 3 main steps one is an 500 essay and the rest are described in the attachment. because its an assignment I dont know how many pages its going to be but if its more than 5 pages there is no problem I can pay more I just need to get perfect on this assignment

MODR1730M W19

PASSAGE ANALYSIS ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS

BASIC INFORMATION:

• Worth 35% of final mark.


• Due: April 8, 2019, 9:00 am.


• Pages must be numbered.


• Upload assignment to link posted to Session 24, on or before April 8, 9:00 am.


• Choose only one (1) of the 3 passages provided below.


• Complete all the Passage Analysis Steps, as taught in class, following the model and format taught in class. See below for Passage Analysis Steps, grading criteria and assignment topics. 


• Assignment includes 3 parts: Out of total 108 marks

1. 1.      Copy of annotated passage. 10 marks


2. 2.      Written answers to the Passage Analysis Steps. 64 marks.


3. 3.      Essay. 34 marks

GRADING RUBRIC & CRITERIA:

= Out of 108 marks

Step 1:

Read, annotate and clarify the passage.

taught in session 16.

• Skim for meaning, purpose, and conclusion.  = Not marked, since no way of knowing that student has completed this step. It is assumed that student has done this.


• Read the passage over once from beginning to end without marking it up. = Not marked, since no way of knowing that student has completed this step. It is assumed that student has done this.

Read for detail and annotate the article = out of 35 marks

• Draw a line separating each paragraph of the article.


• Number each paragraph.


• Underline or highlight the main point (topic sentence) of each paragraph. Do not over highlight. Indicate only the most main points.


• Indicate the main or central concepts by circling, underlining, highlighting.


• Clarify the meaning of key concepts, phrases and claims. Highlight, circle or underline any words that you do not know the meaning of.  Look these words up in the dictionary.  Write the definition in the margin of the article or insert definition in body of the text.


• Put boxes around “logical indicator words.” Underline or highlight “signal words.”


• Make notes in the margins about your response to the article; for example, your thoughts, emotional reaction, questions, confusions, interesting points, and so on.

Create a Summary of the Passage = out of 2 marks

• Type out each of the main points for each numbered paragraph.
  
  
  
  • Must only be as many numbers as there are paragraphs, as per the model taught in class, not more.
  
  
  
  

Step 2:

Portray the basic argument and conceptual structure in the passage.

taught in session 17.

• Identify the main conclusion of the passage. = 2 marks
  
  
  
  • Must be the most main conclusion of the passage; the most main point that the author is trying to convince the reader of.
  
  
  • Diagram the argument in Standard Argument Form; include: (1) most main stated premises; and (2) any stated reasons the author has given for believing these most main premises. = 5 marks
    
    
    
    • Must be in standard argument form as taught in class; not diagramming with arrows.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  • State the two most main concepts around which the passage turns. = 2 marks
  
  
  • Formulate the most main conceptual question with which the passage is concerned. = 2 marks
    
    
    
    • Question must be (1) conceptual, not (2) empirical/factual or (3) normative/evaluative. 
    
    
    
    
  
  
  • Explain what the author means by the two main concepts, that is, provide a detailed understanding of how the author defines the concepts in chart or list form, following the model taught in lecture. = 5 marks
  
  
  
  

Step 3:

Assess the arguments and Use of Concepts

• Evaluate the argument by answering the following four questions: Taught in Session 17.
  
  
  
  • Does the argument violate any of the three conditions for a good argument? = 5 marks
    
    
    
    • Must define what it means to violate this condition for a good argument in any argument.
    
    
    • Must back up claims by explaining how or why this condition for a good argument is violated.
    
    
    • Must refer directly to the premises in the passage when supporting your answer.
    
    
    • Discuss the violation of only one condition; not two or all three, however, discuss all occurrences of the violation in your diagram. Example, if you choose to discuss the “relevancy” condition for a good argument, must discuss all violations of the “relevancy” condition.
    
    
    • Refer to premise numbers of the premises from your argument diagram that violate the condition for a good argument.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  

• Are there any clear and serious fallacies? Find one fallacy and neutralize it using the 5-step process. = 18 marks
  
  
  
  • Name only one fallacy that occurs in the passage.
  
  
  • Must neutralize it using all 5 steps of the 5-step process taught in Module 1.
  
  
  
  

• Can some of the arguments be made stronger (i.e., positively criticized)? = 5 marks
  
  
  
  • Format answer as follows: “Weakness” then “How to Strengthen.”
  
  
  • List “weakness” in argument first, then state how to strengthen it directly beneath the “weakness.”
  
  
  • Use “weakness” and “how to strengthen” as sub-headings.
  
  
  
  

• Evaluate the author’s use of concepts by answer the following four questions: Taught in Session 17.
  
  
  
  • Must explain and support answers in some detail and with direct reference to the passage, even if the answer to the question is “no.”
  
  
  • In answers, need to draw on course material from the slides that accompanies these questions as they were taught in class.
  
  
  
  


• Are they clearly defined? = 5 marks


• Are they used in a sense that it too narrow or too wide? = 5 marks


• Are they used consistently, or do they shift in meaning throughout the article? = 5 marks


• Can their weaknesses be strengthened (i.e., positively criticized)? = 5 marks

(2) Essay = out of 34 marks

Grading Criteria for Essay:

• Maximum 500 words – 5 marks will be deducted, if go over page limit.


• Double-spaced


• Any quoting from passage, use paragraph numbers; example; (Par. 2).


• No bibliography or citations.


• 1” margins


• “Argumentative Essay”


• No outside research


• Must be structured in the following way: Introduction, Topic Sentence #1, support for Topic Sentence #1, Topic Sentence #2, support for Topic Sentence #2, and conclusion.


• Uses lots of signal words and logical indicator words

Introduction: = out of 4 marks

• Does the essay have an introduction?


• Is the introduction no more than approximately 4 sentences?


• Does the introduction begin by stating the topic?


• Does the introduction attempt to get the reader’s attention?


• Does the introduction give a brief overview of the approach in the essay?


• Does the introduction end with a substantive thesis statement?


• Does the introduction do the 3 main things any good introduction should do:
  
  
  
  • In the first sentence, identify the topic of your essay and the context of your approach as specifically as possible. If your first sentence contains a key word from your thesis, your introduction is not likely to be too general or too specific.
  
  
  • In the next two or three sentences, guide your reader to your thesis by defining the most important aspects of your approach to your topic in more detail. In these sentences, you are gradually narrowing down to your thesis.
  
  
  • End with your thesis.
  
  
  • Does your introduction avoid these common pitfalls?
    
    
    
    • Don’t provide dictionary definitions, especially of words your audience already knows.
    
    
    • Don’t repeat the assignment specifications using the professor’s wording.
    
    
    • Don’t give details and in-depth explanations that really belong in your body paragraphs. You can usually postpone background material to the body of the essay.
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  

Thesis Statement: See Session 19 Slides 16 – 33 = out of 5 marks

• Does the essay have substantive thesis statement?


• Is the thesis statement the main point, main idea, central message, or main conclusion of the essay?


• Is the thesis statement the last sentence or last two sentences of the introduction?


• Is your thesis statement specific?


• Is your thesis statement too general?


• Is your thesis statement clear?


• Does your thesis include a comment about your position on the issue at hand?


• Is your thesis statement original?


• Does your thesis merely announce the topic?


• Does your thesis statement make extreme, universal statements that are difficult to defend?


• Does the thesis statement merely report a fact or facts?

Body of the Essay:

Topic sentence #1 = out of 5 marks

Support of Topic sentence #1 = out of 5 marks

Topic sentence #2 = out of 5 marks

Support of Topic sentence #2 = out of 5 marks

• Does the body of your essay have 2 topic sentences?


• Has each topic sentence been explained and supported?


• Do the topic sentences states the main point of the supporting paragraphs that follow it?


• Do the topic sentences serve as a mini-thesis for the supporting paragraphs that follow?


• Are the topic sentences clear signposts for your readers—or a headline—something that alerts them to the most important, interpretive points in your essay?


• When read in sequence, do your essay’s topic sentences will provide a sketch of the essay’s argument?


• Do your topics sentences help protect your readers from confusion by guiding them through the argument?

Conclusion: = out of 5 marks

• Does your conclusion do the 3 main things that any good conclusion should do:
  
  
  
  • Restate your thesis using different words.
  
  
  • Summarize your main points.
  
  
  • Suggest the broader context of your thesis.
  
  
  • Does your conclusion avoid merely repeating your thesis by:
    
    
    
    • Making your thesis more specific by referring to material in your middle paragraphs.
    
    
    • Using synonyms for some key terms and repeating others.
    
    
    • Changing the structure of the thesis sentence.
    
    
    • Beginning with a transitional phrase that links your middle paragraphs to your thesis.
    
    
    • Does your conclusion avoid simply repeating your topic sentences by:
      
      
      
      • Combining several points into one or two sentences.
      
      
      • Emphasizing the common principle that ties the separate points together.
      
      
      
      
    
    
    
    
  
  
  
  

Choose one of the passages below.

TOPIC #1

The Case for Torture

Michael Levin

It is generally assumed that torture is impermissible, a throwback to a more brutal age. Enlightened societies reject it outright, and regimes suspected of using it risk the wrath of the United States.

I believe this attitude is unwise. There are situations in which torture is not merely permissible but morally mandatory. Moreover, these situations are moving from the realm of imagination to fact.

Death: Suppose a terrorist has hidden an atomic bomb on Manhattan Island which will detonate at noon on July 4 unless ... here follow the usual demands for money and release of his friends from jail. Suppose, further, that he is caught at 10 a.m on the fateful day, but preferring death to failure, won't disclose where the bomb is. What do we do? If we follow due process, wait for his lawyer, arraign him, millions of people will die. If the only way to save those lives is to subject the terrorist to the most excruciating possible pain, what grounds can there be for not doing so? I suggest there are none. In any case, I ask you to face the question with an open mind.

Torturing the terrorist is unconstitutional? Probably. But millions of lives surely outweigh constitutionality. Torture is barbaric? Mass murder is far more barbaric. Indeed, letting millions of innocents die in deference to one who flaunts his guilt is moral cowardice, an unwillingness to dirty one's hands. If you caught the terrorist, could you sleep nights knowing that millions died because you couldn't bring yourself to apply the electrodes?

Once you concede that torture is justified in extreme cases, you have admitted that the decision to use torture is a matter of balancing innocent lives against the means needed to save them. You must now face more realistic cases involving more modest numbers. Someone plants a bomb on a jumbo jet. I He alone can disarm it, and his demands cannot be met (or they can, we refuse to set a precedent by yielding to his threats). Surely, we can, we must, do anything to the extortionist to save the passengers. How can we tell 300, or 100, or 10 people who never asked to be put in danger, "I'm sorry you'll have to die in agony, we just couldn't bring ourselves to . . . "

Here are the results of an informal poll about a third, hypothetical, case. Suppose a terrorist group kidnapped a newborn baby from a hospital. I asked four mothers if they would approve of torturing kidnappers if that were necessary to get their own newborns back. All said yes, the most "liberal" adding that she would like to administer it herself.

I am not advocating torture as punishment. Punishment is addressed to deeds irrevocably past. Rather, I am advocating torture as an acceptable measure for preventing future evils. So understood, it is far less objectionable than many extant punishments. Opponents of the death penalty, for example, are forever insisting that executing a murderer will not bring back his victim (as if the purpose of capital punishment were supposed to be resurrection, not deterrence or retribution). But torture, in the cases described, is intended not to bring anyone back but to keep innocents from being dispatched. The most powerful argument against using torture as a punishment or to secure confessions is that such practices disregard the rights of the individual. Well, if the individual is all that important, and he is, it is correspondingly important to protect the rights of individuals threatened by terrorists. If life is so valuable that it must never be taken, the lives of the innocents must be saved even at the price of hurting the one who endangers them.

Better precedents for torture are assassination and pre-emptive attack. No Allied leader would have flinched at assassinating Hitler, had that been possible. (The Allies did assassinate Heydrich.) Americans would be angered to learn that Roosevelt could have had Hitler killed in 1943, thereby shortening the war and saving millions of lives, but refused on moral grounds. Similarly, if nation A learns that nation B is about to launch an unprovoked attack, A has a right to save itself by destroying B's military capability first. In the same way, if the police can by torture save those who would otherwise die at the hands of kidnappers or terrorists, they must.

Idealism: There is an important difference between terrorists and their victims that should mute talk of the terrorists' "rights." The terrorist's victims are at risk unintentionally, not having asked to be endangered. But the terrorist knowingly initiated his actions. Unlike his victims, he volunteered for the risks of his deed. By threatening to kill for profit or idealism, he renounces civilized standards, and he can have no complaint if civilization tries to thwart him by whatever means necessary.

Just as torture is justified only to save lives (not extort confessions or incantations), it is justifiably administered only to those known to hold innocent lives in their hands. Ah, but how call the authorities ever be sure they have the right malefactor? Isn't there a danger of error and abuse? won't "WE" turn into "THEM?" Questions like these are disingenuous in a world in which terrorists proclaim themselves and perform for television. The name of their game is public recognition. After all, you can't very well intimidate a government into releasing your freedom fighters unless you announce that it is your group that has seized its embassy. "Clear guilt" is difficult to define, but when 40 million people see a group of masked gunmen seize an airplane on the evening news, there is not much question about who the perpetrators are. There will be hard cases where the situation is murkier. Nonetheless, a line demarcating the legitimate use of torture can be drawn. Torture only the obviously guilty, and only for the sake of saving innocents, and the line between "US" and "THEM" will remain clear.

There is little danger that the Western democracies will lose their way if they choose to inflict pain as one way of preserving order. Paralysis in the face of evil is the greater danger. Someday soon a terrorist will threaten tens of thousands of lives, and torture will be the only way to save them. We had better start thinking about this.

TOPIC #2

The Case Against Facebook

Matthew Yglesias

Excerpted from:

 https://www(dot)vox(dot)com/policy-and-politics/2018/3/21/17144748/case-against-facebook

Facebook is bad. The association between Facebook and fake news is by now well-known, but the stark facts are worth repeating — according to Craig Silverman’s path-breaking analysis for BuzzFeed, the 20 highest-performing fake news stories of the closing days of the 2016 campaign did better on Facebook than the 20 highest-performing real ones.

Rumors, misinformation, and bad reporting can and do exist in any medium. But Facebook created a medium that is optimized for fakeness, not as an algorithmic quirk but due to the core conception of the platform. By turning news consumption and news discovery into a performative social process, Facebook turns itself into a confirmation bias machine — a machine that can best be fed through deliberate engineering.

In reputable newsrooms, that’s engineering that focuses on graphic selection, headlines, and story angles while maintaining a commitment to accuracy and basic integrity. But relaxing the constraint that the story has to be accurate is a big leg up — it lets you generate stories that are well-designed to be psychologically pleasing, like telling Trump-friendly white Catholics that the pope endorsed their man, while also guaranteeing that your outlet gets a scoop.

The sophisticates’ defense of Facebook is to question whether having half the country marinate in a cesspool of misinformation for an hour or two a day really swung any votes. And I suppose the answer may well be no.

But it certainly doesn’t help. And if you look at a society where Facebook plays a larger role in the information ecology, like Myanmar, you see a clear disaster emerging where United Nations human rights investigators say Facebook has been a clear dissemination channel for hate speech and propaganda that are driving an ethnic cleansing campaign that’s displaced more than 600,000 Rohingya people to Bangladesh and killed thousands.

“Connecting the world isn’t always going to be a good thing,” Facebook’s newsfeed chief Adam Mosseri told Slate’s April Glaser and Will Oremus on their podcast, acknowledging the disastrous reality. “We lose some sleep over this.”

I also lose sleep over a work screw-up sometimes, but I’m confident that I’ve never accidentally contributed to unleashing a genocide. But more to the point, while Facebook is now, thankfully, taking some steps to address the worst outlier behavior taking place on its platform in Myanmar, the core problem is that even non-extreme cases of heavy Facebook use seem harmful.

A large and growing body of research confirms what probably ought to be obvious: Spending a lot of time alone, disengaged from other human beings, staring at your phone, and clicking on little buttons on a platform obsessively engineered by some of the smartest people on the planet to keep you staring and clicking is not good for you.

Holly Shakya and Nicholas Christakis conducted one of the best studies on this, partnering with Gallup to use a sample of thousands of people across three waves and looking at self-reported physical health, self-reported mental health, self-reported life satisfaction, and body mass index.

They find that “overall, the use of Facebook was negatively associated with well-being,” whereas networking socially in the real world was positively associated with well-being and “the negative associations of Facebook use were comparable to or greater in magnitude than the positive impact of offline interactions.”

A smaller study showed that when people spend time comparing their real lives to the idealized versions of themselves that others present on Facebook, it leads to depression.

A separate study showed that Facebook use — but not general internet browsing — leads to negative mood driven by “a feeling of having wasted time.” The study also finds that users make a systematic “forecasting error” and predict that logging on will improve their mood when, more often than not, it does the reverse. By December of 2017, even Facebook’s in-house research team was admitting that using Facebook the way Facebook is generally used in reality is harmful to users’ mental health and well-being.

The Facebook internal team’s fig leaf rationalization was to point out that using Facebook to have meaningful interactions with close friends and family makes people happier. It’s of course true that such meaningful interactions are valuable, and also true that Facebook contains some functionality that facilitates them.

But lots of technology companies offer messaging services — Facebook’s unique value proposition is its ability to “connect the world” and push you into endless cycles of interacting with strangers, quasi-strangers, and brands.

TOPIC #3

Yes, Video Games are Good...for Your Mind and Body

Vince

https://www(dot)idtech(dot)com/blog/video-games-are-good-for-you

Believe it not, scientific research confirms video games are good for you (video games are sports, after all). In fact, several studies (which we'll get to in a second) support the findings. I know, it’s hard to wrap your head around such a fact after years of listening to “don’t sit too close to the TV, you’ll ruin your eyes,” or “stop wasting your time playing video games—go outside!” But yes, real research from credible sources has shown that playing video games actually does have health benefits—both for the brain and the body.

To start, recent studies completed by several noted research and scientific organizations have proven that playing video games could help improve the quality of life for the disabled and mentally ill. The main study, conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and Charité University Medicine St. Hedwig-Krankenhaus in Berlin, Germany, found that playing video increases grey matter (basically, the size of your brain) and helps refine learned and hardwired skills. In layman’s terms, playing video games directly affects and impacts regions of the brain responsible for memory, spatial orientation, information organizations, and fine motor skills. The study also reinforces the claim that, like exercise, playing games for as little as 30 minutes a day, can improve your life.

Games can also teach problem solving and strategy, making them valuable tools for kids and teens. For instance, Minecraft offers a number of educational benefits, like teaching kids how to use objects to explore environments and solve problems, while games like Civilization and SimCity teach problem solving on a more “global” level. (View our entire list of best video games for kids.) In SimCity, players lay out and plan a city, and must think ahead to consider how something like the tax rate may help or hurt the growth of their city, or how street planning and certain zones may impact growth. The game also teaches resource management and planning on a basic level, and it does a nice job of explaining these concepts to younger gamers. Learning and developing these types of strategies can be directly applicable to life as well.

Last, an indirect benefit is the fact that several video games are based on real historical events and can encourage kids to find out more about the world that came before them through research and reading.

From a physical perspective, video games can improve your eyesight. A study by the University of Rochester proved video games improve vision by making gamers more responsive to different shades of color. The same study, funded by the National Eye Institute and the Office of Naval Research, found that players of action games - like first-person shooters - had better perception of color contrast.

Additionally, video games have been proven to improve fine-motor skills in preschoolers, and a study published in the medical journal PLOS One found that surgeons who played video games - more specifically, the Nintendo Wii - became better surgeons! By playing games, they improved their hand-eye coordination and precise muscle movement—both essential skills for their practice.

So yes, video games are actually good for you on many levels.

MODULE 3 - PASSAGE ANALYSIS STEPS

Adapted from Saindon & Krek, Critical Thinking, p. 213, Table 8.1

1. 1.      Read, annotate and clarify the passage.


2. 2.      Portray the basic argument structure and meaning of concepts in the passage.


3. 3.      Assess the arguments and use of concepts.

Step 1:

Read, annotate and clarify the passage

• Skim for meaning, purpose, and conclusion. 


• Read the passage over once from beginning to end without marking it up.

Read for detail and annotate the article

• Draw a line separating each paragraph of the article.


• Number each paragraph.


• Underline or highlight the main point (topic sentence) of each paragraph. Do not over highlight. Indicate only the most main points.


• Indicate the main or central concepts by circling, underlining, highlighting.


• Clarify the meaning of key concepts, phrases and claims. Highlight, circle or underline any words that you do not know the meaning of.  Look these words up in the dictionary.  Write the definition in the margin of the article or insert definition in body of the text.


• Put boxes around “logical indicator words.”


• Underline or highlight “signal words.”


• Make notes in the margins about your response to the article; for example, your thoughts, emotional reaction, questions, confusions, interesting points, and so on.

Create a Summary of the Passage

• Type out each of the main points for each numbered paragraph.

Step 2:

Portray the basic argument and conceptual structure in the passage.

• Identify the main conclusion of the passage.


• State the two most main concepts around which the passage turns.


• Formulate the most main conceptual question with which the passage is concerned.


• Explain what the author means by the two main concepts, that is, provide a detailed understanding of how the author defines the concepts in chart or list form, following the model taught in lecture.


• Diagram the argument in Standard Argument Form; include: (1) most main stated premises; (2) any stated reasons the author has given for believing these most main premises.

Step 3:

Assess the arguments and Use of Concepts

• Evaluate the author’s use of concepts by answer the following four questions:
  
  
  
  • Are they clearly defined?
  
  
  • Are they used in a sense that it too narrow or too wide?
  
  
  • Are they used consistently or do they shift in meaning throughout the article?
  
  
  • Can their weaknesses be strengthened (i.e., positively criticized)?
  
  
  
  

• Evaluate the argument by answering the following four questions:
  
  
  
  • Does the argument violate any of the criteria for a good argument?
  
  
  • Are there any clear and serious fallacies? Find one fallacy and neutralize it using the 5-step process.
  
  
  • Can some of the arguments be made stronger (i.e., positively criticized)?