Logical Reasoning

PT18 · S2 · Q10 Most people are indignant at the suggestion

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Most people are indignant at the suggestion that they are not reliable authorities about their real wants.

Conclusion

Being self-aware about your real wants is not an easy type of knowledge to acquire.

Evidence

Acquiring it requires hard and even risky work, so people avoid doing so by unconsciously convincing themselves that they want what society says they should want.

Evaluate

When we're doing Main Conclusion, the conclusion is almost always - the first sentence - some sort of "but/yet/however" rebuttal

In almost all cases the Conclusion is found earlier than the Support. Knowing these tendencies helps us to more easily locate the conclusion. Ultimately, though, we know we have the Conclusion if it's the Author's Opinion and other claims are there to Support it.

Goal

We just need a good meaning match for the 2nd sentence.

10.

The main point of the argument is that

  1. acquiring self-knowledge can be risky

    Premise

    Why can it be risky? The argument never said. Since it's not Supported, it's not a Conclusion.

    15% picked this

  2. knowledge of what one really

    Never Stated: not as desirable

    The author never brings up "how desirable people usually think knowing your own wants will be", nor does she say, "But, no! It's actually less desirable than we think".

    7% picked this

  3. people cannot really want what

    Never Stated Too Strong: cannot want

    Nothing in this argument is as strong as "cannot want" what they should want.

    2% picked this

  4. people usually avoid making difficult

    Never Stated

    It's never stated or implied that people usually avoid tough decisions.

    2% picked this

  5. Correct

    people are not necessarily reliable

    Why this is right

    This is a little different from what we identified as the Conclusion, but part of that relates to the twist that this is a Main Point (not Main Conclusion) question stem. Main Point stems are very rare, but the correct answer sometimes goes beyond an explicit conclusion. It might give us an implied conclusion or an answer that packages together the conclusion and premise. At any rate, this answer is an implied conclusion set up by the "many people don't like to think that X is true. However .... " structure. That sort of structure implies that the author is arguing that X is true. In this argument, many people don't like to think "they're not reliable authorities on what they want. However ... ", so the author is implicitly arguing that "they're not reliable authorities on what they want." Why should we believe people aren't necessarily authorities on what they want (i.e. is there Support)? - it's hard knowledge to acquire a sense of what you really want - it can be risky - people often choose otherwise to just adopt the standards of society says they should want.

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

    75% picked this

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