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Rating: 
Summary: The Perfect Introduction to Logic
Review: Although I originally learned logic using Hardegree's _Symbolic Logic_, Kelley's book is a vastly superior text for teaching logic to students and inspiring interest in the subject. Many academics complain that you can't teach Critical Reasoning without covering Aristotelian & symbolic logic; they then complain that Aristotelian & symbolic logic is of no importance or interest to non-philosophy majors, and so that it would be preferable to teach Critical Reasoning. David Kelley accomplishes something incredible in this book: he teaches BOTH, and he shows how they are connected. He starts the reader off with a general discussion of concepts, definitions, and propositions. Then he shows the reader how to analyze the basic structure of arguments, using op-eds and Supreme Court decisions as illustrations. He then moves into Aristotelian logic, venn diagrams, and the informal Fallacies. After this, he discusses sentential logic and the canonical patterns of inference. In the next section, he introduces the Russell/Frege predicate calculus (and Fred Sommers' term logic) and shows how it expands the precision of argumentative analysis. Finally, he discusses inductive logic, including how to generalize correctly, how to evaluate arguments by analogy, and how to form and test hypotheses. This is a perfect introduction to logic because it teaches one how to think clearly ("in a straight line," as Flew once put it) about issues that one encounters in ordinary life. At the same time, it equips the student who wants to go further in philosophy with the powerful (Russell/Frege) analytic techniques appropriate to that task. There is NO CHANCE that a student who reads this book will be left wondering about the importance of logic. In addition, Kelley is an expert communicator, and he explains away many of the confusions that people have about reason and logic in our "postmodern" age.
Rating:
Summary: Superb Critical Thinking Text
Review: An outstanding book by an outstanding teacher! Five stars (*****) for his treatment of concepts, classification and definitions. Even though I'm familiar with the material, I expect to reread Kelley's book many times. I especially enjoy his
simple, down-to-earth language
excellent examples
concise discussion of essentials
coverage of every important topic
Every reader will benefit from his
highlighting
summary boxes
chapter summaries
minimum of technical jargon
Rating:
Summary: Superb Critical Thinking Text
Review: This is an excellent introduction to non-symbolic logic, with interesting and intelligent exercises for students. Kelley's textbook is well-organized and lucidly written. It's one of the very best books on critical thinking. And contrary to what a previous reviewer has said, Kelley's personal Randian philosophy does not intrude on his pedagogy. He chooses his examples from all across the political spectrum and makes a strenuous effort to be fair and impartial in his analyses. What more can one ask of a philosopher?
Rating: 
Summary: Ideal for the self-instruction
Review: This is really a wonderful introductory text on reasoning. I believe that it is particularly noteworthy in two key areas: breadth and accessibility. The only plausible criticism to offer would be to say that this book lacks depth. But to make an issue out of that is rather silly because this book is an introductory text. The first few chapters introduce some useful ideas about thinking. The chapters on classification, definitions, and propositions prepare the reader by introducing them to the basic tools of critical thinking. This is extremely important and useful because from the beginning Kelley has the reader thinking very carefully about words. And when it comes down to it, the study of arguments is the study of what we mean by the words we use and what can be inferred from how we put string them together. The later chapters on classical and modern deductive logic offer what should be the center of any introductory course in logic. There's little sense in me listing all that is covered, as you can easily take a look at the table of contents of this book and see what the book covers. In essence, all the topics are here that should be covered in an introductory logic class. While there are other books that I prefer for some of these topics I don't believe there is anything necessarily lacking in Kelley's presentation. The contents that I most enjoy in this book are found in Part V, Inductive Logic. This section covers the "critical thinking" skills that I believe are really the most needed by students. These are issues such as causality (and distinguishing it from correlation), as well as the proper use of analogies and statistics in arguments. This is all very practical stuff and the topics from logic that I wish more people had some familiarity with. In political debates there are all sorts of improper uses of statistics and analogies; very rarely are there improper uses of Venn diagrams and truth tables. The most noteworthy quality of this book is its accessibility. This is a book from which the motivated student can teach himself to become a better thinker. While this book is intended to be a textbook for a college level class my guess is that if you're reading this review on Amazon you're probably not a college instructor (if you are, just contact the publisher and obtain a review copy!), but rather someone who is looking to improve his or her thinking skills. More than any other introductory book on logic or critical thinking that I've seen, this book excels at being one that a motivated learner can use to learn from on their own. Are there "better" books on logic available? If by better you are referring to depth, the answer is "sure!" You can find all sorts of books on logic that are more rigorous. Logic has many sub-fields and obviously more specialized books can offer more depth on symbolic logic or Aristotelian logic, for example. It's simply unfair to try to compare this book with those books. This is a book that will open the doors to all sorts of more advanced books, and I believe it does it better than any other introductory text that I've come across.
Rating:
Summary: Ideal for the self-instruction
Review: This is really a wonderful introductory text on reasoning. I believe that it is particularly noteworthy in two key areas: breadth and accessibility. The only plausible criticism to offer would be to say that this book lacks depth. But to make an issue out of that is rather silly because this book is an introductory text. The first few chapters introduce some useful ideas about thinking. The chapters on classification, definitions, and propositions prepare the reader by introducing them to the basic tools of critical thinking. This is extremely important and useful because from the beginning Kelley has the reader thinking very carefully about words. And when it comes down to it, the study of arguments is the study of what we mean by the words we use and what can be inferred from how we put string them together. The later chapters on classical and modern deductive logic offer what should be the center of any introductory course in logic. There's little sense in me listing all that is covered, as you can easily take a look at the table of contents of this book and see what the book covers. In essence, all the topics are here that should be covered in an introductory logic class. While there are other books that I prefer for some of these topics I don't believe there is anything necessarily lacking in Kelley's presentation. The contents that I most enjoy in this book are found in Part V, Inductive Logic. This section covers the "critical thinking" skills that I believe are really the most needed by students. These are issues such as causality (and distinguishing it from correlation), as well as the proper use of analogies and statistics in arguments. This is all very practical stuff and the topics from logic that I wish more people had some familiarity with. In political debates there are all sorts of improper uses of statistics and analogies; very rarely are there improper uses of Venn diagrams and truth tables. The most noteworthy quality of this book is its accessibility. This is a book from which the motivated student can teach himself to become a better thinker. While this book is intended to be a textbook for a college level class my guess is that if you're reading this review on Amazon you're probably not a college instructor (if you are, just contact the publisher and obtain a review copy!), but rather someone who is looking to improve his or her thinking skills. More than any other introductory book on logic or critical thinking that I've seen, this book excels at being one that a motivated learner can use to learn from on their own. Are there "better" books on logic available? If by better you are referring to depth, the answer is "sure!" You can find all sorts of books on logic that are more rigorous. Logic has many sub-fields and obviously more specialized books can offer more depth on symbolic logic or Aristotelian logic, for example. It's simply unfair to try to compare this book with those books. This is a book that will open the doors to all sorts of more advanced books, and I believe it does it better than any other introductory text that I've come across.
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