Refuting an Expert

I’m going to guess that Simon’s reference to Serbian pig-farming in his last post means that one of the books he read in 2014 was From Voting to Violence by Jack Snyder (W.W. Norton & Company, 2000). For several years I used this book for an assignment in comparative politics that I called Refuting an Expert.

The student’s job in this assignment was to select one of the forty-two different claims Snyder makes in the book and analyze why the claim was incorrect. I’ve put the complete list of claims here. A few highlights:

• Serbia gained its independence in the early 1800s because of the interests of Serbian pig merchants.
• Russian president Boris Yeltsin launched the war in Chechnya to save his administration.
• Israeli Arabs tolerate discrimination because of the economic opportunities that Israel affords them.

To help students do a credible job of challenging Snyder, a supposed expert on the subject of the book, I gave students these instructions:

All quality scholarship is based upon the creation and analysis of arguments. A person asks a question, gathers information, and proposes an answer to the question that is based on that information. The quality of the answer depends on both the accuracy of the information gathered and how well that information has been organized into an argument. In more technical terms, the validity of any truth claim rests upon empirical evidence and logical consistency.

When analyzing the quality of your and others’ research:

• The first step is to identify what question is being investigated. What is the puzzle that the author is trying to explain?
• The second step is to identify what the author claims is the cause and effect of this puzzle.
• The third step is to identify how the author links cause to effect. What does the author claim is the relationship between the two?
• The fourth step is to identify how the author measures changes in whatever is being used to indicate cause and effect. Are numerical data being used? Do the data actually signify what the author says they signify? Should the author be using some other kind of data?

Authors often use certain words that provide clues that will help you find all of this information. These words are:

• Main, primary, only
• Not, cannot, no, never, seldom, rarely
• None, neither, nor
• All, any, entire, most, each
• Must, always, generally, often, will
• But (especially if combined with “only” or “must”)
• However, although, in contrast, contrary, instead, unless, despite
• False, incorrect, contradict, fail
• True, correct
• Should, ought, shall
• Cause, effect, reason, depends, because, imply
• Assumes, assumption
• Claim, argument, argue, contend
• Proof, prove, evidence, empirical
• In fact, thus, therefore, of course, thereby, similarly
• Tend, tendency
• Conclude, conclusion, result