Journalist: One reason many people

Answer choices

1. A

   Out of Scope: personal attack5% picked this

   uses an irrelevant personal attack on the integrity

   There aren't any personal attacks in this paragraph. The author factually states that a prominent researcher has admitted to falsifying data.

   5%
2. B

   Bad Evidence Match2% picked this

   infers that something must be a myth from the fact that the general

   This answer has the structure, infers X from the fact that Y so we need to verify that X matches the conclusion (or an assumption made en route to the conclusion) and that Y matches the evidence. Did the author conclude/assume that something must be a myth? Yes, definitely. The conclusion says "ESP is a myth". Did the evidence say, "The general public believes in ESP?" Not quite. It mentions as a background fact that "many people" believe in ESP, but "many people ? the general public". Also, this isn't the author's evidence. This isn't the reason she's calling ESP a myth. Her support (indicated by FABS = for, after all, because, since) is the final claim about an "ESP researcher" admitting to falsifying data.

   2%
3. C

   Not Assumed / Too Strong: only3% picked this

   presupposes that, in general, only evidence from experiments can

   Since this answer begins with takes for granted / presumes / presupposes, we want to ask ourselves whether the author really made such an assumption. This is a very strong idea, so it's unlikely to correctly describe an assumption. Since it could be written as a conditional, we can ask ourselves whether the author ever made this reasoning move: If it's not evidence ? then it can't from an experiment support beliefs That doesn't sound like the premise to conclusion move at all, which was more like this: If a researcher in field X ? then field X is falsifying data is a myth

   3%
4. D

   Too Strong: all2% picked this

   implies that all scientists who depend on grants to support their

   Does this argument ever imply that 100% of scientists who depend on grants are unreliable? Definitely not. The author is just saying that this researcher, who depends on grants, is unreliable, and then our author assumes that this researcher's subject of inquiry (ESP / psychic phenomena) is therefore not a legitimate phenomenon.

   2%
5. E

   Correct88% picked this

   overgeneralizes from the example of one

   Why this is right

   This captures the fact that the evidence is super weak support. The author goes from, "there's this one researcher in the ESP space who falsified data. Thus, ESP is a myth and anyone attempting to show it exists is deluding the public." That is way too drastic a conclusion to infer from one data point of a deceptive researcher. The verb "overgeneralizes" is synonymous with the Famous Flaw called Sampling, in which the author's argument relies on sample data that is either too small, unrepresentative, self-selecting, biased, or troubling in some other way.

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

   88%