Logical Reasoning

PT18 · S2 · Q21 It is very difficult to prove today

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It is very difficult to prove today that a painting done two or three hundred years ago, especially one without a signature or with a questionably authentic signature, is indubitably the work of this or that particular artist.

Background

You can't really prove (from analyzing the style / techniques / pigments / etc) that a painting was done by Person X vs. Person Y.

So if there is an attribution already attached to a painting, it is given special weight, since we assume that the attribution has been consistently carried down from when it was first added 2 or 3 centuries ago to today.

Position

Traditional attributions shouldn't have special weight.

Evaluate / Goal

We're just strengthening a position, not an argument, so we can really just head to the answers and think,

21.

Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports the position that the traditional attribution of a disputed painting should not have special weight?

Correct
Art dealers have always been
Why this is right
This has lovable strong language ("always been led by"). It's saying that any art dealer over the past 2 or 3 centuries who came across an unsigned painting would have attributed it to Picasso or Rembrandt, rather than to some obscure artist, since it would be easier to sell it for a lot of money if someone thought it was painted by a famous master. If art dealers have been slapping (often) fake attributions on unsigned painting, that attribution now becomes the "traditional attribution". A crooked art dealer, 250 years ago, had an unsigned painting, called it a Renoir, and now whoever has that painting assumes it's a Renoir. Why should we give traditional attributions special weight if there is likely to be a lot of fraudulent traditional attributions?
Skill tested: Weaken · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
51% picked this
When a painting is originally
Opposite
This strengthens the legitimacy of traditional attributions, by making it seem like they can't be falsified, since there are always some eyewitnesses around.
7% picked this
There are not always clearly
Strengthens, if Anything
This reinforces why it's so hard, centuries later, to conclusively determine who painted something. The fact that it's so hard nowadays to ascertain who the painter was somewhat reinforces why we would lean on the traditional attribution, since we're so otherwise in doubt.
12% picked this
Attribution can shape perception inasmuch
No Impact
This answer doesn't have anything to do with how trustworthy traditional attributions are, or how much weight should be given to them. It's about attributions in general.
27% picked this
Even though some masters had
Strengthens, if Anything
This feels like a small, unimportant matter we're zooming in on, but the end of this answer feels like a stamp of approval to the attribution process, so it has the opposite feel of what we want, which is impugn the trustworthiness of traditional attributions.
4% picked this

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