Logical Reasoning

PT147 · S1 · Q16 University president: When a faculty

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University president: When a faculty member's falsification of research was uncovered, the media treated it as evidence of the university's low standards, even though in truth it was a mere case of dishonesty.

Opposing Idea

When a faculty member's falsification of research was uncovered, the media treated it as evidence of the university's low standards, even though in truth it was a mere case of dishonesty.

Evidence (since)

Vigilance with respect to academic standards is always necessary

Conclusion

It's good that standards have become a topic of discussion.

Evaluate

When evaluating arguments in LR, we can often pretty much ignore any Opposing Idea that's presented. With question types like Assumption questions, Flaw, Strengthen, and Weaken, once we've identified the evidence and the conclusion we usually focus our attention there.

In this question, we need to understand the principle that's illustrated by the argument. The correct answer choice will illustrate the same principle. In this case it helps to keep a more big-picture view, and notice exactly how the evidence and conclusion relate to the opposing idea. Here's how we might describe the argument as a whole:

If we think about the principle being illustrated, we might describe it this way:

A core feature of this principle is the conclusion that it's good for this discussion to happen.

Goal

We'll look for an answer which matches this same overall pattern. Beware of answers that describe a different type of background scenario / opposing idea, or ones which draw a very different type of conclusion.

16.

Which one of the following conforms most closely to the principle illustrated above?

  1. The latest government scandal was

    Bad Outcome Match

    This answer concludes that X should not be the only topic of discussion. The original states that it's good to talk about X, and doesn't address whether or not it should be the only topic of discussion.

    2% picked this

  2. Correct

    The latest government scandal has

    Why this is right

    We could abstractly describe this answer choice like this: People blamed a situation on X, but the true cause was Y. But X is important, so it's good that X is being discussed. This is a good match for the original, illustrating the same type of principle.

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

    91% picked this

  3. The latest government scandal has

    Bad Outcome Match

    This answer concludes that it's good for a certain situation to have occurred. The original concludes that it's good to talk about a topic which was brought to light by a certain situation. It doesn't conclude that the situation itself was good.

    4% picked this

  4. The latest government scandal has

    Bad Outcome Match

    This answer choice concludes that something was harmful. The original concludes that something was good.

    1% picked this

  5. The latest government scandal has

    Bad Trigger Match

    We could say that the original has two triggers. First, there was the background situation / opposing idea, where something was blamed on low academic standards when that wasn't really the cause. Second, there was the trigger in the evidence: academic standards are still important. In this answer, the background situation describes "oversight" as something that wasn't addressed at all. The original never claims that dishonesty was never mentioned. The evidence in this answer also states that corruption played the largest role in the scandal. This is the opposite of our original, which claimed that academic standards are important in spite of the fact that it didn't really play a role in the falsification of research.

    2% picked this

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