Logical Reasoning

PT107 · S1 · Q22 Editorial: The government claims

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Editorial: The government claims that the country’s nuclear power plants are entirely safe and hence that the public’s fear of nuclear accidents at these plants is groundless.

Conclusion

The public's fear (of nuclear power plants creating some safety concerns) is well founded.

Evidence

The government recently acted to limit the nuclear industry's financial liability in the case of a nuclear accident, so that in that even the nuclear industry wouldn't go bankrupt.

They say that unlimited liability would pose a threat only if injury claims can be sustained against the nuclear industry, and injury claims can only be sustained if there's a nuclear accident.

Evaluate

This is a tough paragraph to digest, but essentially the author is saying that the government's actions make it look like they think a nuclear accident is a real possibility. Even if it's just a remote possibility, the government is taking actions to limit the nuclear industry's liability so that it wouldn't go bankrupt in the event of a nuclear accident at a power plant.

Since the conclusion is just trying to establish "well founded public fear", we're just trying to strengthen the idea that .

Goal

We need an answer that sounds something like

the government is doing stuff to protect against → fear of X occurring certain ramifications of is well founded event X occurring

22.

Which one of the following principles, if valid, most helps to justify the editorial's argumentation?

  1. If the government claims that

    Bad Trigger Match

    This doesn't apply to the conversation at hand, because the government has not claimed that nuclear power is unsafe. They've done the opposite.

    5% picked this

  2. Fear that a certain kind

    Bad Trigger Match

    The outcome of this rule, fear that a certain event will occur is well founded, is a perfect match for our conclusion, so we just need to see if the trigger was established. Who has control over the occurrence of a nuclear accident event? Presumably, it's the nuclear power plants. Do they stand to benefit financially from a nuclear accident? No. The government is acting to protect the nuclear industry from going totally bankrupt should such an accident occur, but the industry would still owe lots of money in liability damages.

    20% picked this

  3. If a potentially dangerous thing

    Bad Conclusion Match

    The outcome of this rule is "eliminating dependence [on nuclear power] is not in the best interest of the public". That is nowhere close to our actual conclusion, "the public's fear of a nuclear accident is well founded". If we contraposed this rule, then the outcome would say, "thus, a potentially dangerous thing is safe for reasons beyond the fact that the financial security of the nuclear industry depends on its being safe", which also is nowhere near the conclusion.

    24% picked this

  4. Correct

    The government sometimes makes unsupported

    Why this is right

    Let's focus on the second half of this sentence first, since "there is a real danger such a situation will arise" is how we'd match our conclusion about "well-founded fear". That second half of the sentence says the government is acting there is a real to prevent a certain kind of → danger that situation from arising situation will arise The government is acting to prevent the kind of situation where there's a nuclear accident and the nuclear industry goes bankrupt, so according to this rule, there is a real danger that a nuclear accident could happen, causing bankruptcy for the nuclear industry. So this answer successfully takes us from Premise language to Conclusion language. What about that first part -- the government sometimes makes unsupported claims about what situations will arise? This matches up with the first sentence, in which the government makes a claim that the public's fear of nuclear accidents at these plants is groundless. It's not needed to make our answer good and it's not really doing anything to strengthen the effectiveness of our answer, but it's acknowledging the potential counterevidence in the first sentence.

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

    48% picked this

  5. If a real financial threat

    Bad Conclusion Match

    This answer would help us strengthen the idea that "the government is correct to try to limit the nuclear industry's liability in the event of a nuclear accident", which has nothing to do with the conclusion we're trying to strengthen: the public's fear of a nuclear accident is well-founded.

    2% picked this

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