Spring Quarter 2004. UCSD.
Time: M-W 10:00-10:50
Room: Center 101
Instructor: Rick Grush (rick$mind.ucsd.edu -- http://mind.ucsd.edu)
Office Hours: M 11:30- 1:30 HSS 7038
Office Phone: 822-4440 (note that email is a much more reliable way to contact
me)
[ Schedule
]
[ Grades ]
[ Score Sheets ]
[ Email list ]
[ For some information
about this course, including CAPE comments, exam length, and academic integrity,
click here ]
| TAs | Sections | Office Hours | Office |
Victor
Atkins |
A01
M11-11:50 U413-2 |
W12-2 |
HSS 8089 |
Lisa
Damm |
A02 M12-12:50 U413-2 |
W12-1; W4-5 | HSS 8073 |
| Jason
Thibodeau jthibode$ucsd.edu |
A05
F12-12:50 U413-2 |
F2-4 | HSS 8056 |
Grades sheets
TBA
Short Description:
Content.
This course consists of two parts. In the first part (about 2/3 of the course) we will cover the basics of formal sentential logic, including transaltions into formal notation, truth tables, and proofs. In the second part (about 1/3 of the course), we will study informal reasoning, focusing on ways that it can commonly go wrong. Note that students in this class are expected to complete their own work, both problem sets and exams should represent the student's own work, and not be copied from other students or any other source. Violation of this is plagiarism and constitutes a violation of class and University policy.
Structure.
There are two lectures per week, and one discussion section. Grades are based on exams given in class, and problem sets assigned and collected in sections.
Text and other materials.
The text for the course is Basic Sentential Logic and Informal Fallacies (BSLIF), which is available at UCSD bookstore. This text is brief, containing the minimal basics. It is possible that some students might like more extended discussion of some topics, or more examples. To this end, copies of Patrick Hurley's A Concise Introduction to Logic, as well as the study giude and instructor's manula for Hurley's text, are on reserve in HSS.
In addition to these text, there is a logic website for this course, that has additional exercises with solutions, practice exams with solutions, and other things that might be useful. I highly recommend that you take advantage of the practice exams before you take the real exam.
Schedule:
Each session number is followed by the date of the lecture, and then the sections of the text that correspond to the lectures. Some sessions have a 'PS##' listed, which indicates the rough due date of problem sets. The problem sets will be collected in section, and so your section leader will tell you exactly when they are due.
Session 01 (03.29): BSLIF 1.1
Session 02 (03.31): BSLIF 1.1, 1.2. PS01.
Session 03 (04.05): BSLIF 2.1. PS02.
Session 04 (04.07): BSLIF 2.2, 2.3.
Session 05 (04.12): BSLIF 2.4. PS03.
Session 06 (04.14): BSLIF 2.5.
Session 07 (04.19): Midterm One
Session 08 (04.21): BSLIF 3.1. PS04.
Session 09 (04.26): BSLIF 3.2.
Session 10 (04.28): BSLIF 3.3. PS05.
Session 11 (05.03): BSLIF 3.4. PS06.
Session 12 (05.05): BSLIF 3.5.
Session 13 (05.10): Midterm Two
Session 14 (05.12): BSLIF 4.1 - 4.4
Session 15 (05.17): BSLIF 4.5 - 5.2.
Session 16 (05.19): BSLIF 5.3 - 5.6. PS07.
Session 17 (05.24): BSLIF 5.7 - 6.2.
Session 18 (05.26): BSLIF 6.3 - 6.4. PS08.
Memorial Day 05.31
Session 19 (06.02): ???
Final Exam: Tuesday 06.08, 8-11am, Normal lecture room (Center
101).
Grades:
There are 1000 points possible for the course. This is broken down as follows: 200 for each of two midterms exams, for a total of 400. The final is worth 500 points. And the section grade, based on homework, is worth 100 points.
The final exam's 500 points are broken down as follows. 125 will correspond to material from Midterm One. 125 will correspond to material from Midterm 2. The reamining 250 points will cover material covered in the last third of the course: everything after Midterm Two.
No make-up exams will be given. If you miss a midterm exam for a legitimate reason, such as serious medical injury or illness, then the points will be made up in the following way: The final exam has sections that correspond to material from Midterm One and Midterm Two -- each worth 125 points. If a student misses a midterm exam for a legitimate reason, then the points that the student earns on that section of the final that corresponds to the missed exam will be multiplied by 1.6, and that number used for the student's exam score (because 125 x 1.6 = 200). Legitimate reasons include serious illness with a doctor's note. Personal travel plans that conflict with the schedule are not a legitimate excuse.
In order to help accomodate students with scheduling issues, an early version of the final will be given, usually 4 - 7 days before the normally scheduled exam, depending on the final exam schedule. Exact place and time willl be annonced in class and on the email lists.
Score Sheets
Scores are listed by a coded version of your student ID in order to protect privacy, as per University regulations. In order to determine what your coded ID number is, do the following. Take your student ID number. This will be something like a letter followed by 8 digits, like "A01234567". Remove the letter and the first digit, and you're left with a string of 7 digits, like "1234567". Take the first four digits, and treat this as a 4 digit number (something between 0000 and 9999); and take the last four digits and treat this like another 4-digit number. In the example above, they would be "1234" and "4567". Add these two numbers together, for example: 1234 + 4567 = 5801. If the number you get is 5 digits, remove the first digit to make it 4 digits long; if it is 4, then keep it at 4 digits. This is your coded ID number. To see another example: If your student ID is "A05367921", you drop the first letter and number: "5367921"; then take the first 4 digits: "5367"; and the last 4 digits "7921"; add them together: 5367+7921=13288. If the result is 5 digits, remove the first digit: "3288".
Section
a01
Section a02
Section a03
Section a04
Section a05
Section a06
IMPORTANT: All of the email addresses on this page have been altered to keep them from being spammed. Replace the dollar sign with an ampersand '@' to get the real email address in all cases. I.e. if the address listed is joe$hotmail.com this really means joe@hotmail.com.
Email List: There are email distribution lists for this course, one for each section:
logic-a01$mind.ucsd.edu - logic-a02$mind.ucsd.edu
logic-a03$mind.ucsd.edu - logic-a04$mind.ucsd.edu
logic-a05$mind.ucsd.edu - logic-a06$mind.ucsd.edu
It is required that you subscribe to the list for your discussions section. Do it IMMEDIATELY. You can always unsubscribe later if you drop the course or change sections. The purpose of the list is to allow me and the TAs to distribute information regarding due dates for assignments, changes of schedule, etc. Some of this information is crucial, and some of it will be distributed early on. To subscribe, you simply need to send a message to the following address (the message must be sent from the account that you want to be subscribed) NOTE that the address to which you send an email in order to subscribe is NOT the same as the address of the list to which you will be subscribed -- the address to subscribe has a sub in it:
To subscribe to logic-a01$mind.ucsd.edu, send
a message to
logic-a01-sub$mind.ucsd.edu
To subscribe to logic-a02$mind.ucsd.edu, send
a message to
logic-a02-sub$mind.ucsd.edu
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a message to
logic-a03-sub$mind.ucsd.edu
To subscribe to logic-a04$mind.ucsd.edu, send
a message to
logic-a04-sub$mind.ucsd.edu
To subscribe to logic-a05$mind.ucsd.edu, send
a message to
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To subscribe to logic-a06$mind.ucsd.edu, send
a message to
logic-a06-sub$mind.ucsd.edu
The subject line and any content in the message
are ignored. You only need to send the message to the appropriate address from
the account that you want to be subscribed.
How to do well in this course:
Attend the lectures, and read the corresponding chapters of the text before the lecture. Attend the discussion sections, and do all homework assigned by the TA. Use the homework, and other non-assigned exercises (in the text or on the website) to determine for yourself how well you have mastered the material. If you need additional help, ask your TA or myself. We have office hours. The earilier you get clear on some issue that is giving you trouble, the better it will be for everybody. You can also make use of the texts on reserve at HSS, which have more examples and more discussion.
For each exam, I will provide 2 practice axams available from this website. I recommend that before the actual exam, you administer one of the exams to yourself, giving yourself only 45 minutes. Then grade your exam (answers are also provided on this website). This will allow you to find what material, if any, you need to work on some more. Consult myself or the TA, or simply do more excercises of the type you need to improve on until you feel you have mastered this material. Repeat the proceedure with the second practice exam.
This will be a very manageable class IF you simply keep up with the material, regularly practice by doing exercises, and ask for help as soon as you need it.
Many students end up getting grades much worse than they expect because they do not follow the above advice. The material looks easy when you read through it or watch someone else work a proof or truth table, and many students then think "That looks easy, I'll be able to do that on a test." But as some students learn the hard way, watching someone do it is a lot easier than doing it yourself. Furthermore, the exams are long. Purposefully long. Most students do not finish them. The only way to get to the point where you can do the problems quickly and accurately is to do a lot of practice. [Amazingly, I give people this advice every time I teach this class, and every time a large chunk of students still fall into exactly these traps.]