Logical Reasoning

PT143 · S4 · Q10 Economist: If the belief were to become widespread

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Economist: If the belief were to become widespread that losing one’s job is not a sign of personal shortcomings but instead an effect of impersonal social forces (which is surely correct), there would be growth in the societal demand for more government control of the economy to protect individuals from these forces, just as the government now protects them from military invasion.

Facts

conditional: Everyone believed that growth in societal losing job wasn't your → demand for govt. fault, but society's to fix this

conditional: govt tried to fix this → economic disaster job loss situation

Evaluation

We have multiple conditionals. Do they chain together? Kind of. There is some overlap between the two ideas, since both involve "the government controlling the economy".

The first conditional deals with people wanting that, the second conditional deals with that actually happening.

Goal

We can still see the gist is that people thought society was to blame for job losses, they'd turn to the government to intervene. And if the government intervened, then we'd get an economic disaster.

The contrapositive of that whole chain of events would feel something like,

Since it's not a perfect chain, we should be careful with the wording of the answer choices if they're too strong or too sure of themselves.

10.

The economist's statements, if true, most strongly support which one of the following?

Correct
Increased knowledge of the causes
Why this is right
This rewards us for understanding the causal chain being laid out, but it has the soft language of could that acknowledges the loose ends. Increased knowledge ? widespread belief People wanting govt intervention ? govt intervention But the gist is there and it's safely worded.
Skill tested: Most Supported · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
81% picked this
An individual’s belief in his
Too Strong
Too Strong: "only" Out Of Scope: "own abilities" This is trying to bait people into making a move from "the govt trying to protect the economy would lead to disaster", so ..... "the only protection is believing in ourselves?" That is far too extreme and speculative a jump to make. There might be other forms of protection besides the government and oneself.
3% picked this
Governments should never interfere with
Out Of Scope
Out Of Scope: "should" Too Strong: "never" This author just describes the result of the government trying to control the economy. He doesn't editorialize and say anything about what we should / shouldn't do, and there are probably many forms of government "interfering" with economic forces that wouldn't count as the trigger of trying to control the economy.
6% picked this
Societal demand for government control
Actual vs. Hypothetical
The information was about connections between hypothetical events. We don't have any information about whether demand for control is / isn't actually growing.
3% picked this
In general, people should feel
Out Of Scope
Out Of Scope: should Unsupported Comparison: more responsible Too Strong: in general None of this information talked about whether or not people should feel responsible for economic disaster or for military invasions. It only talked about whether mainstream perception of someone losing a job was that the fired person was responsible or whether society was responsible.
7% picked this

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