Logical Reasoning

PT122 · S4 · Q2 Eating garlic reduces the levels

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Eating garlic reduces the levels of cholesterol and triglycerides in the blood and so helps reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease.

Conclusion

Eating garlic reduces cholesterol and triglycerides, helping reduce cardiovascular disease risk.

Evidence

Patients on daily garlic tablets for four months showed 12% cholesterol reduction and 17% triglyceride reduction; a similar group on inert tablets showed only 2-3% reductions.

Evaluate

The most common pattern on Str / Wkn / Eval is Explain Curious Fact, where the author presents comparative evidence and then provides a causal conclusion. That seems to be what we have here.

CURIOUS FACT: why did the people taking the garlic tablet have double digit reduction in cholesterol / triglycerides, while the people taking a placebo had only a small single digit reduction?

EXPLANATION: eating the garlic tablet caused the cholesterol and triglyceride levels to go down.

We always evaluate these arguments by looking at the same two pressure points: 1. Alternate Explanations for the curious fact 2. the Plausibility of the author's explanation

Goal

We can treat Evaluate question like Weaken questions, so we're looking for an answer that would either suggest an Alternate Explanation for why the garlic tablet group had bigger reductions in chol / triglyc, or we're looking for an answer that hurts the plausibility of the storyline that the tablet could have lowered their chol / triglyc.

It would be most important to determine which one of the following in evaluating the argument?

whether the garlic tablets are
Out of Scope
Whether the garlic tablets are available to the public has nothing to do with whether they actually work. Availability is a separate question. The argument is about whether garlic causes the reductions, not whether people can buy it.
0% picked this
Correct
what the diets of the
Why this is right
This creates an opening for an Alternate Explanation. We might be able to say that, "the people who were eating the garlic tablet were also increasing their vegetables and reducing their red meat, and it's because of those OTHER changes that their cholesterol and triglyceride levels went down. Meanwhile, the people getting the placebo were eating fast food every night." It's a very open ended question, but because other dietary factors could explain a change in cholesterol / triglycerides, we need to control for the other stuff these people are eating. In fact, the group getting the placebo might have actually been the group consuming MORE garlic (which would weaken the argument), if the placebo group is eating lots of garlic at every meal and the garlic tablet group is otherwise not eating garlic.
Skill tested: Evaluate · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
92% picked this
what effect taking the garlic
No Impact
If we said, "taking these tablets for a period of less than four months had ZERO effect on cholesterol and triglycerides", that feels like maybe it would weaken? However, the author could just say, "Sure, the effect isn't immediate. It takes a while for garlic to have an effect on the chemical composition of the blood. I never said that eating garlic immediately reduces your levels." To fight the argument, we need to say that "eating garlic doesn't reduce these levels". The author thinks he has evidence that at some point, garlic reduces these levels, so we need a way to explain the results of the study .
6% picked this
whether large amounts of garlic
Out of Scope
The most weakening answer here would be, "Hey, author --- not all patients can tolerate a large amount of garlic well." But that doesn't actually weaken. First of all, we don't even know if the garlic tablet consists of "a large amount" of garlic. More importantly, the author never claimed that people should consume large amounts of garlic, so the potential downsides of eating garlic are irrelevant. The author is only claiming that eating garlic has these specific effects, so we can only fight the argument by arguing that "no, eating garlic doesn't have those effects".
1% picked this
whether the manufacturer of the
Out of Scope
The manufacturer's marketing practices have no bearing on whether the garlic actually worked in the study. If we say, "The manufacturer doesn't cite the study in its advertising", it doesn't cast doubt on the argument. We don't have to assume that if garlic does have these effects, the manufacturer would definitely be touting them in its ads.
0% picked this

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