The true scientific significance of

Answer choices

1. A

   Correct69% picked this

   It draws conclusions about the merit of a position and about the content of that position from evidence

   Why this is right

   Since this answer takes the form of "concludes X from evidence about Y", our customary reaction would be to see if X matches the conclusion and Y matches the evidence. Here, it says that we draw multiple conclusions: 1. the merit of W's position (his classification) 2. the content of W's position (how he classified it) The main conclusion is about the merit of W's position, saying that it's less likely to reveal the true significance than is some other interpretation. And the intermediate conclusion is about the content of W's position, assuming that the way W classified it is the same as how established science would classify it. And the evidence is about who Walcott is (i.e. the source of the position). Simply because he's a prominent member of the scientific community, our author thinks she automatically knows how he classified these fossils and that his classification is not as good as someone else's. This answer is a variation on the famous Ad Hominem flaw, where an author dismisses someone's view because of who they are, not by addressing the ideas themselves.

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

   69%
2. B

   Bad Evidence Match6% picked this

   It cites two pieces of evidence, each of which is both questionable and unverifiable, and uses this evidence

   There's really only one piece of evidence cited, the fact that Walcott was a prominent member of the scientific establishment. And it's hard for us to say that such evidence is both questionable and unverifiable. It seems like we could ask other scientists to verify whether or not Walcott was a prominent member of the establishment. This answer choice would be a very unlikely correct answer ever, since Flaw questions are testing reasoning flaws, and this answer is just criticizing the evidence itself, not the reasoning.

   6%
3. C

   Bad Evidence Match13% picked this

   It bases a conclusion on two premises that contradict each other and minimizes this contradiction by the vagueness

   There's really only one premise in this argument, (Walcott was a prominent member of the scientific establishment). Even if we counted the intermediate conclusion as a second premise, it certainly does not contradict the premise at all. This answer alludes to two famous flaws, Self-Contradiction and Equivocation (using vague terms or using a term in two different ways).

   13%
4. D

   Not Unproven vs. Proven False10% picked this

   It attempts to establish the validity of a claim, which is otherwise unsupported, by denying the truth of

   This alludes to one of the 10 Famous Flaws, Unproven vs. Proven False. Does our author's conclusion attempt to "establish the validity of a claim"? Not really. Our author is saying that the recent classification is probably better than Walcott's, so if we wanted to stretch this, we could say that our author is establishing the validity of "recent classification is better". According to this answer, the evidence took on the opposite claim "the recent classification is not better" and tried to deny the truth of that. The evidence had nothing to do with the recent classification, so we know this doesn't match.

   10%
5. E

   Out of Scope: social / political categories3% picked this

   It analyzes the past on the basis of social and political categories that properly apply only to the present and uses the results of

   It analyzes the past? No. We can stop there. It just mentions that Walcott was a prominent member of the scientific establishment. That's not analyzing the past based on certain social and political categories.

   3%