Logical Reasoning

PT119 · S2 · Q24 It is now clear that the

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It is now clear that the ancient Egyptians were the first society to produce alcoholic beverages.

Conclusion

The ancient Egyptians were the first society to produce alcoholic beverages.

Evidence

An Egyptian cup dating from 2000 B.C. depicts a brewery and contains residue of alcoholic beer — older than the Babylonian fermentation evidence from 1500 B.C.

Evaluate

"First known" and "first ever" are different. The Egyptian cup is the earliest archaeological evidence of alcoholic beverage production we have found, but other societies — including the Egyptians themselves earlier or some entirely different civilization — could have produced alcohol earlier without leaving evidence behind, or with evidence we have not yet found.

Goal

Find an answer that points out the gap between "earliest evidence we have" and "first ever."

24.

The reasoning above is most vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds?

  1. It makes a generalization about

    Bad Description

    This describes a sampling flaw — generalizing about Egyptian society from a tiny, unrepresentative sample. The argument is not making a claim about Egyptian society in general; it is making a single claim about whether any earlier society produced alcohol. The cup is offered as one piece of evidence, not as a sample from which a generalization is drawn. This is the wrong flaw.

    12% picked this

  2. It uses the term “alcoholic

    Equivocation

    The argument uses "alcoholic beverage" the same way throughout — including beer in Egypt and wine in Babylon. Both are alcoholic beverages by the same definition. There is no shift in meaning between premise and conclusion.

    3% picked this

  3. It presumes, without providing justification,

    Bad Description

    The argument never claims Babylonian alcohol production depended on Egyptian alcohol production. It just says Egyptians came first. There is no claim of causal influence between the two societies, so there is no flaw of presuming such dependence.

    4% picked this

  4. Correct

    It ignores the possibility that

    Why this is right

    This nails the gap. The Egyptian cup is the first known instance of alcohol production, but the conclusion claims the Egyptians were the first ever to produce alcohol. Those are not the same. Some other society — or earlier Egyptians — could have produced alcohol before 2000 B.C. without leaving (or having yet found) archaeological evidence. The argument simply assumes "earliest known" equals "earliest, period," which is exactly the criticism this answer raises.

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

    80% picked this

  5. It provides no evidence for

    Bad Description

    The argument does not need to defend the claim that Babylonians produced wine in 1500 B.C. — that is the existing view the argument is overturning, and even if we accept it, the argument still works the way it does (the Egyptian evidence is older). The flaw is not in failing to support the Babylonian date.

    1% picked this

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