PrepTest 128, Section 3, Question 24
Historian: The revolutionary party has been accused of(50 more words not shown)
The reasoning in the historian's(6 more words not shown)
- Agives mutually inconsistent(5 more words not shown)
- Bfails to establish(7 more words not shown)
- Cfails to establish(11 more words not shown)
- Dprovides no evidence(8 more words not shown)
- Efails to consider(7 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The historian answers two accusations, so check each answer separately.
First, most of the party's goals were quickly achieved. That is some evidence against calling the goals overambitious, but what about the goals that weren't achieved? Imagine seven goals: five are accomplished quickly, while two involve something wildly ambitious, such as colonizing the moon. Most goals would have been achieved, yet some overambitious goals would still have existed.
Second, the party lacked the power to cause the suffering its critics attribute to it. Accept that limitation. It still doesn't mean the party caused no suffering at all. Perhaps it caused a smaller amount than the critics allege.
What we’re looking for
The conclusion overreaches in both places: from success with most goals to rejecting overambition altogether, and from inability to cause the alleged suffering to causing none. The flaw question could address either gap. A correct answer only needs to identify a real flaw; it needn't list both.
Working the answers
- A
The two responses aren't mutually inconsistent. A party could achieve most of its goals and also lack the power to cause the alleged suffering. Both statements can be true together. Their failure to establish the whole conclusion is different from their contradicting each other.
- BCorrect
Lacking enough power to cause the suffering alleged by the critics leaves open causing some lesser suffering. The historian hasn't established the conclusion's absolute claim of no suffering. B identifies the second of the two gaps we noticed.
- C
The historian doesn't need to show that critics underestimated the party's power. The defense concerning suffering suggests the critics attributed more harmful capacity to the party than it had, which points toward overestimation. C's proposed omission isn't something the conclusion requires the historian to establish.
- D
There is evidence: most goals were achieved quickly. The problem is that this doesn't rule out other, overambitious goals. D says there is no evidence at all, confusing incomplete support with an absence of support. That distinction matters even though we did identify a weakness in this part of the argument.
- E
Other criticisms might be valid, but the historian's conclusion concerns overambition and suffering. The author needn't resolve every criticism of the party to address those two subjects. E doesn't identify the overstatement in either part of the stated conclusion.
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