In a scene in an ancient Greek play

Answer choices

1. A

   Out of Scope13% picked this

   In ancient Greek plays, characters are presumed to know how to read unless their illiteracy

   Out of Scope: presumed to be literate Nothing in this paragraph talks about the audience's expectations regarding characters' literacy, so we wouldn't be able to contradict an answer dealing with that.

   13%
2. B

   Out of Scope: historical figure7% picked this

   The character of Demosthenes in Knights is not based on a

   We have no idea what the character of Demosthenes was based on, so we have no ammunition to contradict this claim.

   7%
3. C

   Too Weak17% picked this

   In ancient Greek plays, the reading aloud of written texts commonly occurred as part of

   This is worth keeping on a first pass, since we have an example in which Demosthenes did not initially read aloud the written text on the tablet (we know this because his buddy had to ask him, "What does it say?!") But this answer choice only says "commonly", not "always". If someone says "Professional violinists commonly took lessons when they're in elementary school", we're not contradicting them by saying "Not Marissa! She's a pro and didn't take lessons until college". Our ammunition for pushing back on this claim is weak, because saying "X didn't happen in this case" is not a strong way to argue "X doesn't commonly occur".

   17%
4. D

   Correct55% picked this

   In ancient Greece, people did not read silently

   Why this is right

   Since this is categorical, it's easier to contradict (you only need one example). Do we have at least one example of someone in Ancient Greece who did read silently to themselves? Yes, when Demosthenes first reads the tablet, it's silently to himself. Otherwise, his buddy wouldn't need to ask "What is it? What is it?" The one weird thing about picking this answer is that we're contradicting an answer choice that's about actual Ancient Greece, not about characters in ancient Greek plays. However, it's not a true must be false question stem, just a most justifiably rejected stem, so we're allowed a little fuzziness.

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

   55%
5. E

   Too Weak7% picked this

   Only rarely in ancient Greece were prophecies written down on

   Similar to (C), we have an example that goes against this trend, but a counterexample does not invalidate a soft generalization. We're making a weak counterargument if we say, "What do you mean rarely? Prophecies were commonly written down on writing tablets! After all, I have one example from a play where that happened." We might know someone didn't meet his biological mother until he was in his 50s. That wouldn't prove that "people commonly don't meet their biological mothers until they're in their 50s."

   7%