Editorial: It is usually desirable

Answer choices

1. A

   Weakens, if anything3% picked this

   It is never possible to regulate misinformation without restricting people's access

   The author's goal, in proposing that we regulate information on the Internet, is to prune away the misinformation, so that the accurate information can be useful again. This answer is saying that doing so will inevitably shrink our access to accurate information. Since it presents a new downside of regulation, it would either do nothing or weaken.

   3%
2. B

   Weakens1% picked this

   Even if information is regulated, accurate information is often indistinguishable

   This makes it seem like the author's proposed Plan (regulation) wouldn't achieve its Goal (make sure it's easy to distinguish accurate information from misinformation). It says that regulation often fails to produce clearly distinguishable lines between accurate info and misinformation.

   1%
3. C

   Correct92% picked this

   Regulation of information makes it easy for people to distinguish between accurate

   Why this is right

   This answer is saying that the Plan will achieve the Goal. Our author is worried that on the unregulated internet, people can't easily distinguish accurate information from misinformation, and so the accurate information is useless. She's proposing regulation as her Plan for fixing that. This answer is saying that regulation makes it easy to distinguish, so now the accurate information can be useful.

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

   92%
4. D

   Unrelated to Goal4% picked this

   It is acceptable for people to have access to a vast array of misinformation only if accurate information is

   This answer choice isn't talking about regulation at all, so it's not going to be able to help us strengthen the idea of "we should regulate". Also, the conversation was never about whether or not it's acceptable for people to have access, and we never discussed whether or not people were overlooking accurate info (we were talking about whether people could distinguish between accurate and inaccurate information).

   4%
5. E

   Weakens1% picked this

   It is usually more desirable for people to have access to useless, unregulated misinformation than it is for them to have access

   This addresses the whole weighing tradeoffs issue, but it says it in the opposite direction of the author. The author prefers accurate but regulated, so that accurate will be useful. This answer prefers inaccurate but unregulated, even if accurate is useless.

   1%