Logical Reasoning

PT127 · S2 · Q2 Denise: Crime will be reduced only when

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Denise: Crime will be reduced only when punishment is certain and is sufficiently severe to give anyone considering committing a crime reason to decide against doing so.

Denise

The only way to reduce crime is to make punishment strong and certain, so that people will be deterred from committing a crime.

Reshmi

The best way to reduce crime is to make educational opportunities more widespread, so people see that they can choose a non-crime lifestyle and still secure comfort.

Evaluation

Denise only makes one claim. Does Reshmi agree with that claim? No, he disagrees. Given that he thinks some other way to deal with crime is more effective than Denise's strategy, he definitely doesn't think that Denise's strategy is the only way to reduce crime.

When there are no explicit statements upon which the two people agree (or disagree, if we're doing a Disagree question), then we should start asking ourselves about any assumptions the people might be making. Is there anything they're both assuming?

Goal

It seems like the overlap is something like,

2.

Their dialogue provides the most support for the claim that Denise and Reshmi agree that

  1. Correct

    people are capable of choosing

    Why this is right

    Denise is hoping people will "decide against committing a crime" and Reshmi is hoping people will "choose a different path", so both people are assuming that people are capable of choosing to commit a crime vs. not commit a crime.

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

    80% picked this

  2. crime is the most important

    Too Strong

    Too Strong: "most important" / Out of Scope: "modern society" We wouldn't be able to infer what either person thinks is the most important issue facing modern society. The fact they are both talking about crime at the moment certainly doesn't convey that they think it's the most important issue facing modern society.

    0% picked this

  3. reducing crime requires fair and

    Too Strong

    Too Strong: "requires" / Out of Scope: "fair" Reshmi doesn't say anything about what is required to reduce crime, so that's the easiest way to eliminate. But even Denise, who speaks about what is required, doesn't talk about "fair responses". She wants punishment that is severe enough to be a deterrent. That's not necessarily a fair sentence. In fact, severe enough to deter might mean that it's quite harsh.

    7% picked this

  4. crimes are committed in response

    Half Scope: "why crimes are committed"

    We can assume that Reshmi probably agrees at least partially with this, but Denise hasn't given us any insight into what she thinks people commit crimes in response to.

    1% picked this

  5. reducing crime requires focusing on

    Half Scope: "requires assured punishments"

    Reshmi is only talking about the most effective way to reduce crime. We can't infer anything about what she thinks is required to reduce crime.

    12% picked this

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