ABSTRACT
We could make the argument valid by adding the premise, ‘Everyone in Inverness owns at least one woollen item of clothing’. Thus:
But this argument, though valid, is probably not sound, since P2 is probably false. Yet the original argument is surely a good argument, in some sense. The truth of the premise would be a good reason for expecting the conclusion to be true; it would be surprising to find it was false. Certainly if you had to bet on whether or not the conclusion is true, then, given no relevant information except for P1, you would bet that it is true, not that it is false. It would be reasonable to infer the truth of C from P1, and unreasonable to infer its falsity.
