PSC482G, Spring 2000
Assignment 3, due Wednesday 26 January 2000
Critical thinking 3
Read: "Why Is It so Important to Begin with Only the Strongest Evidence?" and "Which Types of Evidence are Strong?"
Answer these questions:
Categorize each of these 25 pieces of evidence as inherently strong or weak with respect to two standpoints: (a) its inherent properties; and (b)the topic listed in brackets after it.
1. Three spent cartridges were found in the sniper’s nest on the sixth floor of the Depository [three shots fired that day].
2. One entrance wound was found in the rear of JFK’s head; one in his back [both hits from the rear, no conspiracy].
3. The Zapruder film shows that Kennedy’s head moved forward, then back [two shooters, therefore conspiracy].
4. Immediately after the shooting, police and the crowd rushed up the grass toward the picket fence [shooter behind the picket fence, therefore conspiracy].
5. Many witnesses recalled hearing shots from the direction of the grassy knoll [shooter on the grassy knoll, therefore conspiracy].
6. Many witnesses heard shots from the direction of the Depository [shooter in the Depository].
7. Howard Brennan saw a sniper fire the last shot from the Depository [fatal head shot came from the Depository].
8. Metal fragments in JFK’s head formed a cone opening from the small rear wound to the large missing area of skull on the right side [Kennedy’s head hit from the rear].
9. The area of the limousine in front of the Kennedys was covered with blood and tissue [Kennedy’s head hit from the rear].
10. Most witnesses heard between two and five shots [between two and five shots fired].
11. At least two persons in Dealey Plaza smelled gunpowder at ground level [a shooter at ground level, therefore conspiracy].
12. Extreme enlargement of Mary Moorman’s Polaroid photo shows two or three figures behind the picket fence on the knoll [a shooter behind the picket fence, therefore conspiracy].
13. As William Morrow wrote in his two books, he bought three identical Mannlicher-Carcano rifles for use in the assassination [conspiracy].
14. Of the three large bullet fragments recovered, two were traceable ballistically to Oswald’s rifle to the exclusion of all other rifles [only Oswald shot the President].
15. The bullet recovered from the stretcher in Parkland Hospital is both traceable to Oswald’s rifle and pristine [the bullet was shot earlier from Oswald’s rifle and planted at the scene].
16. Between the hits to Kennedy and Connally’s bodies, there was insufficient time for a shooter using Oswald’s rifle to refire [second shooter needed, therefore conspiracy].
17. The diffuse cloud of fragments from JFK’s head moved forward, upward, and to the sides [JFK’s head hit from the rear].
18. A motorcycle policeman to the left rear of the limousine was hit on his right side by fast-moving fragments from JFK’s head [JFK’s head hit from the right front, therefore conspiracy].
19. One witness saw a man carry a rifle up the grassy knoll shortly before the assassination [shooter on the grassy knoll, therefore conspiracy].
20. As Oswald said, he was eating lunch in the second-floor lunchroom at the time of the shooting [Oswald fired no shots].
21. A photo of the Depository, when greatly enlarged, shows a human figure in another sixth-floor window [two shooter in Depository, therefore conspiracy].
22. A number of witnesses saw a man behind the picket fence break down a rifle immediately after the shooting, put it into a case, hand the case to another person, and stride rapidly away from the scene [shooter behind the fence, therefore conspiracy].
23. Footprints were found in a muddy area behind the grassy knoll [shooter behind the fence, therefore conspiracy].
24. Beverly Oliver, the “babushka lady” who was just to the left of the president’s limousine at the time of the head shot, looked right down the barrel of a rifle being fired from the top of the knoll [conspiracy].
25. Nearly all the medical personnel at Parkland Hospital saw the fatal wound in Kennedy’s head at the rear, not on the right side as the autopsy photos show [autopsy photos tampered with, therefore conspiracy].