People are usually interested in

Answer choices

1. A

   No Impact3% picked this

   Statistical information tends to obscure the characteristics

   Since people aren't paying attention to statistical information, we don't really care what it does. We want to know how these people have fairly accurate beliefs about society, given that they're not using statistical information.

   3%
2. B

   Correct65% picked this

   Most people recognize that anecdotes tend to be about

   Why this is right

   This somewhat unsatisfying answer explains that, "even though people listen more to anecdotes, which are misleading outlier cases, they still have fairly accurate beliefs about society, because they realize that anecdotes are outlier exceptional cases." This answer is good at explaining why their beliefs aren't turned into wrong beliefs, despite how much they like listening to misleading anecdotes. It doesn't do anything to explain why their beliefs are fairly correct in the first place, though. That may irk some people, but an answer doesn't have to be perfect to be the best available.

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

   65%
3. C

   Deepens Paradox, if anything5% picked this

   The more emotionally compelling an anecdote is, the more likely it is to change

   We're trying to explain how people tend to have fairly accurate beliefs. Anecdotes aren't going to provide them with accurate beliefs, since anecdotes tend to be misleading cases. This answer is talking about the prospect of anecdotes changing our beliefs, but since anecdotes are misleading cases, they would change our beliefs in inaccurate ways. So this is going in the opposite direction of anything that helps us.

   5%
4. D

   Unclear Impact19% picked this

   Statistical information is made more comprehensible when illustrated

   It sounds like if someone were to illustrate statistical information with an apt anecdote, that would be ideal. We'd get the accuracy of the statistical information with the compelling interest of the anecdote. People could learn accurate stats via their favorite thing, anecdotes. But ... it doesn't sound like this happens too much. After all, we know that people rarely pay attention to statistical information. So given that people aren't paying attention to stats, but are paying attention to generally misleading anecdotes, how do they still have fairly accurate beliefs?

   19%
5. E

   No Impact8% picked this

   People tend to base their beliefs about other people on their emotional response

   We're trying to explain how people have accurate beliefs about society. This says that people base their beliefs about other people on their emotional response to those people. Do we care what people believe of about other people? No, we're trying to deal with whether people have fairly accurate beliefs about society. Moreover, there's no common sense link between "basing beliefs on your emotional response" and "tending to have accurate beliefs".

   8%