Logical Reasoning

PT154 · S1 · Q26 Philosopher: A person is morally responsible

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Philosopher: A person is morally responsible for an action only if that action is performed freely.

Statements

conditionals (only if - necessary / right)

Morally → action performed responsible freely

action performed → alternative action that's freely genuinely open to person

alternative action → performing that action genuinely open is not morally wrong

Evaluate

Whenever we see conditionals in Inference questions, we want to ask ourselves two things: 1. Are there any other conditionals I could chain this up with? 2. Are there any facts I could apply this to (via contrapositive usually)

It seems like all three of these claims could chain together since the 1st and 2nd sentences both mention free actions, and the 2nd and 3rd both mention an alternative action that's genuinely open.

Morally action alt. action alt. action is responsible → freely → genuinely → not morally for action performed open wrong

Let's put this front to back in conversational times. If you're morally responsible for action X, then you freely performed X, which means you had a morally acceptable action Y that was an alternative action genuinely open to you.

Meanwhile, if there's no other morally acceptable action available to you when you do action X, then you're not morally responsible for X.

Goal

Look for anything provable, but expect the correct answer to reward us for linking together that chain, and look for trap answers that do illegal reversals or negations.

26.

If the philosopher's statements are true, which one of the following must also be true?

  1. An alternative action is not

    Illegal Reversal

    This is our chain. Morally action alt. action alt. action responsible → freely → genuinely → action for action performed open wrong This answer says alt action morally genuinely → responsible open for action It's going backwards from our 3rd ingredient to our 1st one.

    7% picked this

  2. People are not morally responsible

    Out of Scope: most actions

    We can never derive a claim about "most X" if the stimulus never had a claim about "most X". This answer is saying, "Most performed actions are ones that people aren't morally responsible for". To prove that we'd need to know that in most cases that actions are performed, people aren't performing it freely / don't have a morally acceptable option open to them.

    1% picked this

  3. A person is morally responsible

    Illegal Reversal

    This is our chain. Morally action alt. action alt. action responsible → freely → genuinely → action for action performed open wrong This answer says alt action morally genuinely → responsible open for action "If" indicates the sufficient / left-side condition. It's going backwards from our 3rd ingredient to our 1st one. It's also identical to (A), so it's guaranteed that both are wrong.

    26% picked this

  4. If it would be morally

    Unsupported Relationship

    This was our chain Morally action alt. action alt. act responsible → freely → genuinely → action for action performed open wrong This answer says morally action is wrong → genuinely action open That doesn't match anything. We only talked about whether an "alternative action is genuinely open", not about whether "an action is genuinely open".

    5% picked this

  5. Correct

    An action is not free

    Why this is right

    This is our chain. Morally action alt. action alt. action responsible → freely → genuinely → action for action performed open wrong This answer says action alt. action freely → not morally performed wrong That's going from the 2nd to the 4th ingredient in the chain. An action is not free unless there's an alternate action that is genuinely open to the person (i.e. genuinely open = an alternative that is not morally wrong).

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

    61% picked this

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