Logical Reasoning

PT106 · S1 · Q24 We ought to pay attention only

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We ought to pay attention only to the intrinsic properties of a work of art.

Conclusion

What is really aesthetically relevant is not what a painting symbolizes, but what it directly presents to experience.

Evidence

What is really aesthetically relevant is not its extrinsic properties, but its intrinsic properties (i.e. what it directly presents to experience)

Evaluate

With my cleaned up version, where I arrange the Conclusion and Evidence in parallel, it's easier to see that the author seems to be assuming .

How did we get there?

Both the premises and the conclusion are saying,

"Look at this, not that"

intrinsic properties extrinsic properties

what it directly what a painting presents to experience symbolizes

aesthetically relevant irrelevant to our aesthetic interactions

Goal

When we're doing Sufficient Assumption, and there's a New Term in the conclusion (i.e. a term that was never discussed or defined in the Evidence), then that New Term must be in the correct answer, in order for us to get a closed circuit of logic.

24.

The conclusion follows logically if which one of the following is added to the premises?

  1. Correct

    What an artwork symbolizes involves

    Why this is right

    Since "what an artwork symbolizes" involves only extrinsic properties of the work, and since extrinsic properties are irrelevant to our aesthetic interactions with it, we would know that what an artwork symbolizes is irrelevant to our aesthetic interactions with it. So, the first half of the conclusion is fully proved. The second half was already established because the second sentence already told us that we should consider only what is directly presented in our experience of it.

    Skill tested: Sufficient Assumption · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

    48% picked this

  2. There are certain properties of

    Unclear Impact

    Until we learn whether symbolic stuff is intrinsic or extrinsic, we won't know whether it's "aesthetically relevant" or not, according to the author's definition where only intrinsic is relevant. When we look at a painting, we directly experience its colors, shapes, shading, and the image it depicts (if it's representational art). What a painting symbolizes involves internal mental activity -- "Klaus is painting this toaster because in 1970s East Germany, a toaster was hard to come by and so it's a symbol of wealth and prosperity". The open question of this argument is whether we consider those thoughts, which are certain properties of our experience of viewing Klaus's Toaster at Sunset, to be intrinsic stuff directly presented or extrinsic stuff.

    4% picked this

  3. Only an artwork’s intrinsic properties

    Nothing New Unrelated to Goal

    This isn't adding anything to the existing argument, because the author had already established this. By saying we ought to pay attention only to the intrinsic properties, the author is saying only the intrinsic properties are relevant. Furthermore, this answer couldn't possibly "close the loop" and give us an airtight argument because we still have this New Term "what a painting symbolizes" in the conclusion, and the argument hasn't provided any evidence that tells us how to think about "what a painting symbolizes".

    43% picked this

  4. It is possible in theory

    Too Weak

    "It is possible in theory" does not resemble anything like the 100% guarantee we want out of a Sufficient Assumption answer choice. We also don't care whether all paintings symbolize something, most of them do, none of them do. We only care about proving the claim that "IF the painting symbolizes something, it's aesthetically irrelevant".

    1% picked this

  5. An intrinsic property of an

    Nothing New Unrelated to Goal

    We already have a solid sense of intrinsic properties: they are what we ought to pay attention to they are what is directly presented in our experience We're lacking a sense of how to classify "what a painting symbolizes", and this answer isn't helping us with that at all.

    4% picked this

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