Logical Reasoning

PT5 · S1 · Q11 No one who lacks knowledge

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No one who lacks knowledge of a subject is competent to pass judgment on that subject.

Conclusion

Only seasoned politicians are competent to judge whether a particular political policy is fair to all.

Evidence (since)

No one who lacks knowledge of a subject is competent to pass judgment on that subject.

Political know-how is a matter insight and style learned through apprenticeship and experience.

Evaluate

If we're coming at this from the anti-conclusion position, we're arguing,

The author will cite his rule for who is "competent to judge": in order to be competent to judge, you must have knowledge of the subject!

Okay, we're talking about whether someone would be competent to judge the fairness of a political policy, so, in this case knowledge of the subject would probably mean something like knowledge of the policy details and knowledge of what is fair?

Do we think that only seasoned politicians have knowledge of the policy details? Of course not, any politician or anyone who gets a copy of the proposed legislation can have knowledge of the policy details.

Do we think that only seasoned politicians have knowledge of what is fair? Of course not. That's something we all have knowledge of.

The other premise is trying to establish that only seasoned politicians will have political know how, because political know how requires experience. "Seasoned" is a synonym for "experienced".

So the evidence has established that only seasoned politicians have political know how, but it hasn't established that only seasoned politicians have knowledge of what is in this particular policy or whether that policy would be fair.

Goal

Let's look for an answer addressing that disconnect, or look for an answer that helps us argue that other people would also be competent to judge whether a policy is fair.

11.

A major weakness of the argument is that it

  1. Relies on a generalization about

    Bad Description

    "Relies on" just means "used as evidence". The first claim of the argument is a generalization about something required for someone to be competent to past judgment. This answer says that it's a generalization about something that is sufficient to make you competent to pass judgment. Again, the argument said that knowledge is required to be competent, whereas this answer is saying that knowledge makes you competent. Those mean two different things. Even if (A) were correctly describing that first claim, we still wouldn't pick this as an answer, because there's nothing inherently wrong about relying on a generalization. Correct answers on Flaw must be both descriptively true and objectionable. At worst, this answer would be saying something true but not objectionable.

    28% picked this

  2. Fails to give specific examples

    Bad Description

    Here we have an answer that is telling us something true but not objectionable. The author definitely did not provide specific examples of how seasoned politicians get their political know-how, but that has nothing to do with why he was wrong to say that only seasoned politicians can judge the fairness of a policy. He was wrong to say his conclusion because he failed to rule out the possibility that other types of people would also have knowledge of that policy and whether or not it's fair.

    2% picked this

  3. Uses the term “apprenticeship” to

    Bad Description

    It doesn't matter to this argument whether the apprenticeships that helped to give these seasoned politicians some of their experience were formalized relationships or casual, informal arrangements. Either way, the internship would provide some experience. That's the only role that the word apprenticeship is playing in the argument. It's part of where a politician's experience comes from.

    1% picked this

  4. Correct

    Equates political know-how with understanding

    Why this is right

    If a flaw answer choice is saying the author equated X with Y, then we're basically asking our brain whether there was some missing link between those two concepts, whether the author was acting like if you have one you have the other. The evidence established that only season politicians have political know how. The conclusion assumes that only season politicians have knowledge of whether a policy is fair. So this answer is pointing out the missing link between political knowhow and knowledge of whether a particular policy is fair. The language of "social implications of the policy" is new, but it basically means an awareness of what that policy would do once it is implemented into society. For us to have knowledge of whether a particular policy is fair, we would be judging the effects that policy will have. So possessing understanding of the policy's social implications is essentially synonymous with possessing knowledge of whether the policy is fair to all.

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

    67% picked this

  5. Assumes that when inexperienced politicians

    Bad Assumption

    The argument doesn't need to believe that inexperienced politicians are guided by experienced ones. The argument is about who is competent to judge a policy's fairness, not about the process by which inexperienced politicians craft the policy. Whether inexperienced politicians get help from experienced politicians, or just do it on their own, doesn't matter. The argument is about who is competent to judge the fairness of that policy once it is written, regardless of how it was written.

    2% picked this

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