Linking Evidence and Claims

1. Linking Evidence and Claims Writing Analytically

2. The Function of Evidence • A common assumption about evidence is that it is “the stuff that proves I’m right.” • Although this way of thinking about evidence is not wrong, it is much too limited. • Corroboration (proving the validity of a claim) is one of the functions of evidence, but not the only one.

3. Prove • The word prove actually comes from a Latin verb meaning “to test”. • The noun form of proof has two meanings: (1) evidence sufficient to establish a thing as true or believable, (2) the act of testing for truth or believability. • Operating on the first definition alone leads to closed down thinking.

4. Fallacy: facts can speak for themselves. • Evidence rarely, if ever, can be left to speak for itself. • The word evident comes from a Latin verb meaning “to see.” • When a writer leaves evidence to speak for itself, he or she is assuming that it can be interpreted in only one way, and that readers will think as the writer does.

5. Make the implicit explicit • The thought connections that have occurred to you will not automatically occur to others • In science, writers present evidence and then interpret it. • In the humanities, writers interpret the evidence as it is presented. • AVOID unsubstantiated claims and pointless evidence

6. Linking Evidence and Claims

7. evidence vs. claimsfacts vs. judgments • The owners are ruining baseball in America. Although they claim they are losing money, they are really just being greedy. A few years ago, they fired the commissioner, Fay Vincent, because he took the players’ side. Baseball is a sport, not a business, and it is a sad fact that it is being threatened by greedy businessmen.

8. Give Evidence a Point • Problem: Presenting a mass of evidence without explaining how it relates to the claim • Solution: Make details speak. Explain how evidence confirms and qualifies the claim.

9. Nothing but evidence • Baseball is a sport, not a business, and it is sad that it is threatened by greedy businessmen. For example, Eli Jacobs, the previous owner of the Baltimore Orioles, recently sold the team to Peter Angelos for one hundred million dollars more than he spent ten years earlier. Also, new generation baseball stadiums have been built that are enormously expensive and luxurious. The average baseball player meanwhile, earns more that a million dollars a year, and they all have agents.

10. The function of Conclusions Readers want 3 things: a judgment, a culmination, and a send-off. Judgment: final judgment on the claim that is the focus of the paper. Often repeats some key terms from first paragraph. Explicitly revisits the claim for why it matters. Culmination: to culminate is the reach the highest point, and it implies a mountain of information that you have scaled. Bring things together and ascend to one final statement. Send-off: both social and conceptual, an opening outward of the topic that leads the reader out of the paper with something further to think about, often a universal theme.