Prize Winning Essays

• 2023 “What Makes an Argument Strong? Contrastivism in the New Rhetoric,” by Blake Scott. Honourable mention: Yanlin Liao & Zihan Niu, “On the Legitimacy Problem of Visual Arguments”.
• 2022 “A Particularist Theory of Arguments by Analogy”, by José Alhambra Delgado. Honourable mention: Alan Liao Yanlin, “The Distinctiveness Problem of Analogical Arguments” and Cassie Finley, “Virtue Argumentation, Virtue Dialogue, & Aristotle”.
• 2021 “Identifying linked and convergent argument structures: a problem unsolved“, by Shiyang Yu & Frank Zenker
• 2020 “Argumentative Bullshit“, by José Gascón. Honourable mention: Shiyang Yu, Frank Zenker, “A Dialectical View on Conduction: Reasons, Warrants, and Normal Suasory Inclinations”. A longer version of this essay was published in Informal Logic, vol 39(1), 2019.
• 2019 “Fantastic Visual Argument and the Food and Drug Administration’s The Real Cost Campaign” by Jacob Justice, Department of Communication Studies, the University of Kansas.
• 2018 No award made.
• 2017 “Informal Logic’s Infinite Regress” by Gilbert Plumer. A longer version is “Carroll’s Regress Times Three”, published in Acta Analytica.
• 2016  “Conductive argument as a mode of strategic maneuvering” by Yun Xie, Institute of Logic and Cognition, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.
• 2015 No award made.
• 2014 “Virtues, Evidence, and Ad Hominem Arguments” by Patrick Bondy. Honourable mentions: José Gascón: “Arguing as a virtuous arguer would argue,” and Gilbert Plumer: “On novels as arguments.”
• 2013 “Critical thinking and debiasing” by Tim Kenyon, Department of Philosophy, University of Waterloo, ON, and Guillaume Beaulac, Rotman Institute of Philosophy, University of Western Ontario, London, ON.
• 2012 “Libri ad nauseam: The critical thinking textbook glut” Ben Hamby, Department of Philosophy, McMaster University, Hamilton ON [Paideusis version]
• 2011 “What a real argument is” Ben Hamby, Department of Philosophy, McMaster University, Hamilton ON [Informal Logic version]
• 2010 “Is ‘Argument’ subject to the process/product ambiguity?” Geoff Goddu, Department of Philosophy, University of Richmond, Richmond, VA. [Informal Logic version]
• (2010 Honourable mention: “Toulmin’s ‘Analytic Arguments’.” Ben Hamby, Department of Philosophy, McMaster University, Hamilton ON.) [Informal Logic version]
• 2009 “Truth and Argument Evaluation” Patrick Bondy, Department of Philosophy, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON [Informal Logic version]
• 2009 “The importance of belief in argumentation” David M. Godden, Department of Philosophy, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA [Synthese version]
• 2008 No award made.
• 2007 “What is a ‘Real’ Argument?” Geoff Goddu, Department of Philosophy, University of Richmond, Richmond, VA [Informal Logicversion]
• 2006 “Generic Critical Thinking Infusion and Course Content Learning in Introductory Psychology” Tom Solon, Department of Psychology & Philosophy, Danville Area Community College [Journal of Instructional Psychology version]
• 2005 “Formal Logic for Informal Logicians“ David Sherry, Department of Philosophy, Northern Arizona University [Informal Logic version]
• 2004 “A Defence of Non-deductive Reconstruction of Analogical Arguments” Marcello Guarini, Department of Philosophy, University of Windsor [Informal Logic version]