Logical Reasoning

PT133 · S2 · Q22 Food that is very high

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Food that is very high in fat tends to be unhealthy.

Conclusion

The fat-free brownies are healthier than the cookies.

Evidence

The brownies have no fat, while the cookies are high in fat. And food that is very high in fat tends to be unhealthy.

Evaluation

How could we possibly say that the fat-free brownies are not healthier than the cookies? We’d have to point out some other ingredients in the brownies that make them less healthy: lots of sugar, lots of sodium, too much arsenic? J

The author is thinking that because the brownies are healthier when it comes to fat, they’re healthier overall. This fallacious move is called the Part vs. Whole flaw.

Goal

We need a situation in which because X beats Y on one specific level, the author thinks that X wins out overall.

22.

Which one of the following exhibits flawed reasoning most similar to the flawed reasoning exhibited by the argument above?

  1. Canned foods always contain more

    Not a Flaw / Bad Premise Match

    This seems like legit logic. It’s also missing a 2nd premise.

    3% picked this

  2. Correct

    Vegetables that are overcooked generally

    Why this is right

    Even if the peas seem more vitamin-packed because they aren’t overcooked, the overcooked carrots might still have more vitamins because maybe carrots start off with way more vitamins than peas do. Even though we’re overcooking the carrots, they might still win the vitamin comparison. Similarly, maybe brownies start off with may more unhealthy ingredients than cookies do, so even though we aren’t using sugar in the brownies, they still lose. This also contains the absolute vs. relative switch found in the original (it went from talking about whether something was unhealthy in the evidence to whether it is less healthy in the conclusion). Here we go from talking about few vitamins in the evidence to talking about having fewer vitamins in the conclusion.

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

    74% picked this

  3. The human body needs certain

    Bad Premise Match / Bad Conclusion Match

    The original is a comparison between two things. This argument is just about whether one thing is / isn’t healthy. This answer is re-using the idea of “healthy” from the original, which is often the sign of a trap answer. We want to re-use the logic of the original, but using the same topic or language is often how they craft trap answers.

    4% picked this

  4. Some types of nuts make

    Bad Premise Match

    This seems close, but it has a different flaw farther upstream than the original argument did. Some types of nuts affect Roy’s throat, but we don’t know if those types of nuts are being used in the cookie or the pie. Our objection to this could be, “Maybe neither of them use the nuts he’s allergic to. Maybe the pie has the bad nuts and the cookie has harmless nuts.” If the first sentence said “Nuts tend to make Roy’s throat itch” it would be a better match.

    13% picked this

  5. Eating at a restaurant costs

    Not a Flaw

    This seems like fairly legit logic, so it can’t mirror our flawed original.

    6% picked this

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