* “It’s hard to understand Caleb’s injuries”
This is an evaluative claim, claiming that Caleb’s injuries are hard to understand. I wanted to include “Caleb’s injuries” as its own separate claim but I was unsure what kind of claim it would be. But it is claiming that Caleb has injuries and that they are his but I was worried I was over-evaluating.
* “Even Doctors can’t say for sure why he has flashbacks”
This claim is a credibility claim because it uses a doctors credentials and ideas to help describe the difficulty surrounding Caleb’s condition.
* “Why he could be standing in a bookstore when all of a sudden he’s sure he’s in Ramadi, the pictures in his brain disorienting him among
the stacks, which could turn from stacks to rows of rooftops that need to be scanned
for snipers”
This is an illustrative claim used to evoke emotion in us by describing a troubling event Caleb went through.
* “They don’t know exactly why”
This is an attributive claim using somebody else(doctors) to express the idea.
* “why especially that time he picked up the pieces of Baghdad bombing victims and that
lady who appeared to have thrown herself on top of her child to save him only to find the child dead underneath torments him when he’s sleeping, and sometimes awake.”
This is another illustrative claim used to make us sympathetic for Caleb and his situation. It describes a scene no one wants to see in order to do this.
* “They don’t know”
This is another attributive claim used to describe a comparative idea”
* “why some other guys in his unit who did and saw the same stuff that Caleb did and saw are fine but Caleb is so sensitive to light”
This is a comparative claim that takes into account the experiences and mental states of other soldiers compared to Caleb.
Counterintuitive Fall 2024 
You’ve come to the wrong person if you want support for the idea that a text can be “over-evaluated,” PlaneFan. 🙂
“Caleb’s injuries” is indeed a claim of a sort we haven’t named specifically, but we surely could, and you’re invited to. It’s definitional in that it defines Caleb as someone with an injury. It also characterizes the injuries as his. It places Caleb in the category of “injured veterans.” And so on. All diagnoses are definitional and categorical in this way, these ways. Especially disputed diagnoses. I say he has PTSD. You say he doesn’t. I say he suffers from PTSD. You say he may suffer, but certainly not from PTSD because PTSD isn’t even a legitimate diagnosis.
Similarly, your citation of:
Yes, it’s a credibility claim, but it’s also comparative and evaluative. It suggests that two groups of people, doctors and non-doctors agree they can’t explain his flashbacks. But further, it states in just one word that one group should be able to explain while the other could be forgiven for being indecisive. And so on.
You seem to relish finding claims in tiny bits of text. I do, too. Want to take another stab at it?
Provisionally graded. Revisions are always encouraged and Regrades are always possible. Put the post into Feedback Please if you elect to revise.