Kostman’s original painting of Rosati

Answer choices

1. A

   Correct53% picked this

   George’s speech was filled with half-truths and misquotes. So the tape recording made of it cannot be

   Why this is right

   Almost none of us will like this on a first pass, but we end up having to look at it with fresh eyes once all the other answers let us down. Our objection to the original argument may have sounded like, "Even though K drew a very inaccurate rendering of R (he made R's eyes look too far apart and R's nose look way too small), our reproduction of K's painting could still be an accurate reproduction (i.e. it could accurately preserve that the eyes are too far apart and the nose looks way too small)." Our objection to this answer choice's argument could sound like, "Even though George's speech was an inaccurate rendering of reality (it had half-truths and misquotes), this tape recording could still be an accurate rendering of George's speech (i.e. it could accurately preserve his half-truths and misquotes)." It's very surprising and level 5 of this question to replicate the same flaw but not use a verbatim recycling like the original -- ("Since X was not very accurate, Y will not be very accurate") The version in (A) is more poetic / symbolic, since we have to insert our own language to come up with a recycled idea: since the speech was a distorted version of the truth, this tape recording will be a distorted version of the speech.

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

   53%
2. B

   Topic Trap Not an Argument7% picked this

   An artist who paints a picture of an ugly scene must necessarily paint an ugly picture, unless the picture is a

   As soon as we see that this is about painting, we should be assuming it's almost definitely wrong (correct answers on Analogy or Parallel will almost never re-use the same topic). This also isn't an argument. It's just one complex, nested-conditional claim: paint an ugly scene and not distorted → paint an ugly picture representation of that scene

   7%
3. C

   Valid Logic14% picked this

   If a child’s eyes resemble her mother’s, then if the mother’s eyes are brown the child’s eyes

   It's questionable whether we call this an argument, either, because we could just interpret it again as a nested conditional. But if we play along and act like the "If" condition is a premise, and the "Then" condition is the conclusion, then we get a pretty valid argument. Premise -- child's eyes resemble her mother's Premise -- the mother's eyes are brown Conclusion -- the child's eyes must also be brown There's nothing flawed about that logic, unless we want to split hairs that "eyes could resemble each other without necessarily being the same color". In either case, we wouldn't be replicating the original flaw: if X's rendering of Y has trait A, then a reproduction of X's rendering of Y will also have trait A.

   14%
4. D

   Bad Premise Match11% picked this

   Jo imitated Layne. But Jo is different from Layne, so Jo could not have imitated

   The original argument's premise was that K's original was not a very accurate rendering of Rosati. We would expect, given this answer choice talking about one person imitating another, that we'd find a matching premise like, "Jo's imitation of Layne was not a very good imitation". (we could then make a matching conclusion like, "Thus Bob's will do a poor job imitating Jo's imitation.") But we don't have a premise that looks like "Jo's imitation of Layne was not good". In fact, that's our conclusion. Our premises say - Jo imitated Layne - Jo is different from Layne The original argument did not have two premises. And the original argument had a concept ("not very accurate") that carried through from premise to conclusion. This argument doesn't have a concept from the evidence that carries through. That would sound more like, "Jo is different from Layne. Thus, Jo's impression of Obama will be different from Layne's impression of Obama."

   11%
5. E

   Different Flaw15% picked this

   Harold’s second novel is similar to his first. Therefore, his second novel must be enthralling, because his first novel

   This argument tries to go from some things that were true of this first novel to a conclusion about his second. Does it recycle some trait? No. The first novel won a prestigious literary prize, so an analogous conclusion to the original argument could have been something like, "Thus, the movie that will be made based on this novel will win a prestigious cinema prize". Instead, this goes from "first one won a prize" to "second one will be enthralling", which is a term shift for sure, but it's not the same flaw of trying to carryover the same trait from one to the other. This argument also has two premises (2nd novel is similar to 1st / 1st novel won a prize), whereas the original argument only had one premise.

   15%