PhilosophyThe ProfessorBeginner
Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work, a free philosophy course on Tomo

Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work

Learn to break everyday arguments down to their real bones, spot flawed reasoning before you get misled, and construct points that hold up under pressure.

Like Duolingo, but for Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.

21 levels across 4 sections, about 42 minutes end to end, roughly 8 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Dissecting Everyday Arguments, Spotting Where Reasoning Breaks, Building Bulletproof Arguments, and The Foundations of Clear Thought. It starts from scratch.

21 bite-size levelsAbout 5 minutes each

Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android

Otto the Owl, the guide who teaches the Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work course
Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work
with Otto the Owl
21
Levels
4
Sections
5
Min/day
What you'll learn

Key ideas in Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work

  • In logic, an argument must offer evidence or reasons to justify a point, not just state a preference
  • Flat contradictions or emotional outbursts lack logical support and therefore are not arguments
  • A statement of belief only becomes an argument when paired with a reason backing it up
  • Premises are the supporting facts, observations, or reasons provided in an argument
  • The conclusion is the main claim or inference that the premises are intended to prove
  • Logic requires separating what is taken as support from what is being claimed
  • Everyday arguments routinely leave their central connecting premise unspoken
  • In logic, finding the hidden assumption means asking what bridge is required between the stated premise and the final claim
  • If the bridge premise is false or unstated, the entire argument's logical support is incomplete
  • In logic, 'because' introduces a supporting premise, while 'therefore' introduces a conclusion
  • Testing an argument involves slotting these connectors in to see if one idea genuinely justifies the other
  • Two related statements placed together do not form a logical inference unless one justifies the other
  • An explanation takes the event as already accepted and clarifies why it occurred
  • An argument attempts to persuade the listener that a contested claim is true
  • The word 'because' can serve either causal explanations or logical justifications depending on whether the conclusion is already accepted
  • Validity is purely about structure: if the premises were true, the conclusion would be forced to follow
Why not just Google it

You've tried the other tabs

Wikipedia

Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.

YouTube

You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.

ChatGPT

One answer, then back to scrolling.

Online courses

Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.

Tomo gives Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.

Try a question

Here's what playing it feels like

A real question from this course. Take your best guess.

What Makes an Argument

Imagine two people disagreeing. Which of these shows an emotional outburst rather than a logical argument?

Get it right to open this lesson and 20 more in the app.

Course map

Where Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work takes you

  1. 1

    Dissecting Everyday Arguments

    • Finding the Hidden Bones of an Argument
    • Testing Structure: Validity Versus Truth
  2. 2

    Spotting Where Reasoning Breaks

    • Fallacies of Relevance: Dodging the Point
    • Fallacies of Evidence: Leaping to Conclusions
  3. 3

    Building Bulletproof Arguments

    • Making Conditional and Causal Claims
    • The Logic of Comparison and Analogy
  4. 4

    The Foundations of Clear Thought

    • The Core Axioms of Coherent Thought

4 sections · 7 units · 21 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.

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This course
The Professor

Everyday Logic: How Arguments Work is taught in the Professor style: clear, structured, thorough. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.

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