Joyce Wu

Professor Harrison
Philosophy 025
30 September 2016
An inductive argument supports the possible truth of a conclusion. In many public
opinion survey, it is in the form of an inductive argument so using a strong premise, one can find
a strong argument if the premise is true and then it would be unlikely for the conclusion to be
false as well. A public opinion survey shows the public opinion in which a population scrutinize
a specific sample and using the confidence interval, one can conclude a strong survey rather than
a week one. In the premise, there would be a sample and a property in question in which there
contains a bit of doubt and leap of faith. A strong survey must include a balance without being
bias and a random sampling with an enormous sample size. The confidence interval must consist
of the bigger population part where it has the highest amount of opinions and generalizes a
sample (Moore and Parker 339). A weak poll will probably not include the main materials
needed compared to the strong poll especially if the survey was skewed meaning biased or
conducting a survey with an insignificant amount of people. For this analyzing inductive
arguments assignment, a strong survey poll which will be analyzed first and then a weak survey
which will also be analyzed as well second. This will show the contrast between a strong and
weak survey based upon the sample that is chosen.
In the strong survey, the property in question is whether the population is in favor of or
against abortion. The population were given a choice where they choose if they thought abortion
should be legal or illegal. The sample size was large enough to avoid a hastiness considering they
survey was conducted through a single Pew Research Center poll (Mitchell). The people that

were part of the sample population that was taken from were by peoples views on abortion,
religious affiliations, political party and ideology, gender, age, race and ethnicity, and level of
education. The methodology that was used is not random selection considering the population
were by groups such as age or race. There were no opportunities for being bias considering it
was a survey that was taken online through an electronic poll. The survey was conducted on
March 17-27 in 2016. The polls were from a computer program called AP-Ipsos poll.
In my opinion, I thought the poll was a 9 out of 10 considering it was an online poll, the
website did not provide an exact number of the population. I did not think anyone who were
apart of the poll were being biased considering the people did it electronically and could not
communicate or convince others to be for or against abortion. The target population is mostly
people who were afflicted with religion. In the PEW Research Center, people identified
themselves under a certain category, yet it is considered a random sampling were the poll was
opened to anyone in the United States. It is mainly among people who are in the United States
that who are scrutinizing the sample of abortion. There is a strong confidence interval where
under each category, there were more than half who chose either sides. This survey shows a data
chart of the public opinion on abortion.
In the weak survey, the property in question is about the opinions on gun control whether
they were for or against the gun policy of owning a gun. The gun policy proposal is that if people
thought guns should be regulated by people who are mentally ill or selling it illegally. The
question is asking the public whether they think guns should be controlled by people who were
mentally ill, and should check for private gun sellers if they were conspicuous of any illegal
handling, or the people who were creating a federal database [that] track gun sales (Fingerhut).
The sample size given is 2,010 adults including 1,567 people that were registered voters so there

is a sample size that is large enough to avoid a hastiness. The types of people who were
opinionated in the survey is Clinton or Trump supporters or political viewers. The population
were by people of the United States that were in support or were not in support of controlling
guns. The selection of sampling is random sampling since the selection were by mail from the
PEW Research Center. The people who were included were from a population of many race.
I think this survey is at fault considering it was bias because the majorities of the voters
were either Democrats or Republicans who for on either Hilary Clintons side or Donald Trumps
side. The supporters on gun control were half and half meaning the people who voted believes
gun should be owned by the people or either not in favor of the public owning a gun put
peoples safety at risk (Fingerhut). I think that this survey is a 6 considering although they did
provide a sample population greater than 1000 people. There were opportunities for bias to creep
into the sample. The target population that I have found is mainly people of different political
views such as if they were Clinton or Trump supporters. I valued this poll low since it mainly
talked about the Democrats or Republicans view on the gun policy proposal.
Overall, public surveys based on an inductive argument shows how if a survey is strong
or weak. In the strong survey, it included the main components of showing a great amount of
people that were involved with the poll and is larger than 1000. However, in the weak survey,
there was a lot of room for bias to creep in. Within the stronger survey, it provided a balance and
was not bias so the confidence level was around 95 percent where it should be so it did not create
any skew to the interval. The weaker survey showed how Trump supporters were in favor of a
harsher background check over Clintons supporters.

Works Cited
Fingerhut, Hannah. Opinions on Gun Policy and the 2016 Campaign. Pew Research Center for
the People and the Press RSS. N.p., 26 Aug. 2016. Wed. 03 Oct. 2016.
Mitchell, Travis. "Public Opinion on Abortion." Pew Research Centers Religion Public Life
Project RSS. N.p., 08 Apr. 2016. Web. 03 Oct. 2016.