Most people hear "argument" and picture a fight. In logic, the word means something different. An argument gives reasons to back up a claim.
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Which of these is an argument? Sort each one.
Tap an item, then a bucket
An argument
Just a fight
Sources
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, “Validity and Soundness”
Reasoning for the Digital Age
Bertrand Russell, 'Is There a God?' (1952)
Critical Thinking, TRU Pressbooks
Messerli (2012), New England Journal of Medicine
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, “Validity and Soundness” — https://iep.utm.edu/val-snd/ (read; confirms the quoted line and the basketball/Earth example verbatim)
Matthew McKeon, “Argument,” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy — https://iep.utm.edu/argument/ (read; source of the replacement enthymeme quotation)
Karl Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, ch. 1 §1, p. 4 (English ed. 1959; German original Logik der Forschung, 1934) — quotation verified via https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Karl_Popper
Brendan Shea, “Karl Popper: Philosophy of Science,” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy — https://iep.utm.edu/pop-sci/ (read; does NOT contain the sentence currently attributed to it)
Willem de Vlamingh — voyage 1696–1697, black swans on the Swan River 10 January 1697 — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_de_Vlamingh (tertiary; worth re-anchoring to the Western Australian Museum or the Vlamingh Plate record before publishing)
Franz H. Messerli, “Chocolate Consumption, Cognitive Function, and Nobel Laureates,” N Engl J Med 2012;367(16):1562–1564, DOI 10.1056/NEJMon1211064 — https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23050509/ (citation confirmed; full text paywalled)
Pierre Maurage, Alexandre Heeren, Mauro Pesenti, “Does Chocolate Consumption Really Boost Nobel Award Chances? The Peril of Over-Interpreting Correlations in Health Studies,” Journal of Nutrition, 2013 — https://doi.org/10.3945/jn.113.174813 (the published rebuttal; abstract read)
Bertrand Russell, “Is There a God?” (1952) — quotation wording confirmed (18 full-text book matches for “the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas”); the essay was commissioned in 1952 and first printed in Collected Papers vol. 11 (1997)
REMOVE: “Reasoning for the Digital Age” — no such work found in Open Library, Internet Archive, Crossref or OpenAlex
Read end to end and corrected: August 10, 2026. Numbers checked: August 10, 2026.