Logical Reasoning

PT126 · S4 · Q19 Professor: It has been argued

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Professor: It has been argued that freedom of thought is a precondition for intellectual progress, because freedom of thought allows thinkers to pursue their ideas, regardless of whom these ideas offend, in whatever direction they lead.

Conclusion

This argument for freedom of thought fails: We can't say that because freedom of thought lets people pursue their ideas wherever that takes them, "intellectual progress requires freedom of thought".

Evidence

Intellectual progress requires "mining the full implications of interrelated ideas", and that requires intellectual discipline.

Evaluate

Are we sure we want to go back to school, if this is how professors talk?

It's a little unspecific what our conclusion means. An argument can fail because a premise is false, the conclusion is false, or simply because the conclusion doesn't follow from the premises.

But since the author's evidence talks about "intellectual progress", let's focus on the intellectual progress part of the conclusion and assume our author wants to argue that,

intellectual progress does not require freedom of thought.

"Freedom of thought" doesn't show up in the evidence, so it needs to show up in the correct answer.

What do we know about intellectual progress from the evidence?

Intellectual Mining full Intellectual progress → implications of → discipline interrelated ideas

Let's just think about how this argument would work on a basic level. Conclusion: X doesn't require A. Premise: X requires B which requires C.

It looks like we're missing . We'd also accept .

Goal

We need an answer that helps us make either of these moves:

If we need intellectual discipline, then we don't need freedom of thought. If we need to mine full implications of ideas, then we don't need freedom of thought.

19.

The conclusion drawn by the professor follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?

  1. Thinkers who limit their line

    Out of Scope: particular orthodoxy

    Correct answers on Sufficient Assumption almost never bring up anything new. We never talked about "particular orthodoxy". We also were only talking about intellectual progress in absolute terms (yes/no), whereas this is switching to talking about it in relative terms (hindered progress).

    7% picked this

  2. Thinkers can mine the full

    Out of Scope

    Out of Scope: a society that values Correct answers on Sufficient Assumption almost never contain new ideas. We never talked about societies that do or don't value intellectual progress. We just need to connect "the need for intellectual discipline" to "not needing freedom of thought".

    5% picked this

  3. Correct

    In societies that protect freedom

    Why this is right

    We were hoping to get from "If you need intellectual discipline, then you don't need freedom of thought". This answer convinces us we can make that move, because this tells us that if you protect freedom of thought, you won't have intellectual discipline. Having intellectual disciplines —requires→ not protecting freedom of thought. Our author can now say, "your argument fails. How can freedom of thought be required from intellectual progress, when intellectual progress requires intellectual discipline, and freedom of thought and intellectual discipline are mutually exclusive?"

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

    59% picked this

  4. Freedom of thought engenders creativity,

    Out of Scope: creativity / discover truth

    Correct answers to Sufficient Assumption almost never have new ideas. We never talked about creativity or discovering truth. Also this sounds like a positive idea about freedom of thought, whereas the general gist of our author's argument is to be a bit negative towards freedom of thought, and argue that it's not required for intellectual progress.

    0% picked this

  5. Without intellectual discipline, thinkers can

    Opposite

    We were looking for a way to get from if you need Intellectual Discipline, then you don't need Freedom of Thought. A contrapositive of that move would sound like if you need Freedom of Thought, then you don't need Intellectual Discipline This answer seemingly contradicts that: Freedom of Thought requires Intellectual Discipline If we came to the answers with a fuzzy sense of "I want intellectual discipline to sound like a mismatch for freedom of thought", we would have only considered (C) and (E) and seen (E) as sounding more like Intellectual Discipline and Freedom of Thought are a match.

    28% picked this

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