PrepTest 150, Section 2, Question 1
Philosopher: I have been told that most university(41 more words not shown)
The reasoning in the philosopher's(7 more words not shown)
- Auses the term(15 more words not shown)
- Btreats a group(15 more words not shown)
- Cappeals to the(14 more words not shown)
- Dtakes for granted(17 more words not shown)
- Etakes for granted(24 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The people who show up to a philosophy talk are interested in philosophy. What about everyone who stayed home?
That's the problem with the philosopher's experience. It may tell us a great deal about students who choose to attend these talks. But the claim being challenged concerns university students generally. Students with no interest in the subject are precisely the people we'd be less likely to meet at an optional philosophy event.
Imagine a rugby coach saying, 'I've heard most people around here don't like rugby, but everyone I know loves it.' If the coach mostly talks to the rugby team, that experience wouldn't settle what the wider community likes. The players could all be enthusiastic while most other people had no interest at all.
What we’re looking for
The philosopher's students are like those players. Their enthusiasm doesn't establish that most students share it, or even rule out most students lacking it. For the flaw, look for the jump from a group selected for its likely interest to the much larger student population.
Working the answers
- A
'Interest' keeps the same meaning: caring about philosophical issues. We aren't switching between curiosity about a subject and, say, interest earned on money. The problem concerns whose interest is being observed, not a change in what the word means.
- BCorrect
The small group is the students who attend the philosopher's talks. The larger group is university students in general. The reason to doubt the group's representativeness is how it was selected: students interested in philosophy are more likely to turn up. We can accept the philosopher's report about the audience without accepting the conclusion about the broader population.
- C
The philosopher is arguing about how widespread interest in philosophy is, not whether philosophy is valuable. A field could be worthwhile and unpopular, or popular without being worthwhile. The argument doesn't use popularity to establish worth; popularity is closer to the thing it is trying to establish.
- D
There is no comparison of interest over time. The philosopher doesn't say that because nobody has shown interest is declining, it must be growing. The stated evidence is the enthusiasm of current audiences. D describes a different inference from missing evidence.
- E
The philosopher doesn't conclude that students should care about philosophy or that their interest is good. The claim is that the report of widespread disinterest is false. E adds a value judgment and a justification based on the philosopher's own preferences, neither of which is the reasoning here.
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