#8 - Numerous studies suggest that when scientific evidence

[Adam Tyson]

I'll have to disagree with you there, racoonprinter - this is not about facts at all! The jury is treating the exact same scientific information differently in two contexts. It's not that the info is actually more credible in the courtroom, because it is THE SAME info they could have gotten outside the courtroom. So the author thinks the difference has to be based on juries trusting the opinion of the judge that the information presented is credible. To evaluate that, we need to know whether juries know that judges are screening the info first, because if juries don't know that, they could not have been swayed by that.

[bearcats123]

Hello,

Can someone explain to me how to exactly approach these question types. I've realized after doing this question that I approach these types of questions in a way that do not lead me to the correct answer choice. For example, with this question I thought B was the correct answer because if that were true, it would break the argument apart and the theorists hypothesis would not hold to be true. I thought if answer choice B was not true after evaluating it, then the hypothesis could be true,which is why I thought this would be the answer choice. I understand how A can be the correct answer choice, I just don't understand the reasoning to get to the answer. Are the answers to evaluate questions Must Be True or Can Be True type of questions? Can someone please help my approach to these question types and if this is a valid way to approach the question or not!
Thank you!!!

[Adam Tyson]

I discussed the process earlier in this thread, bearcats123, and hope you'll look that over again rather than having me repeat it here. But here's another way to think about these questions that is perhaps a little shorter: the correct answer will ask the question that you should be asking. What is the missing piece of information that you need in order to determine if the argument is good or not? What question, once answered, would either strengthen or else weaken the argument, depending on which answer is correct?

Simple example: "Terriers make good pets, so my dog Lulu is a good pet." Now, what do you want to know? You want to know if Lulu is a terrier, of course. If she is, they my argument is strengthened, as it looks like Lulu might indeed be a good pet. If she is not a terrier, on the other hand, the argument is weakened because there is no evidence to tell me whether Lulu is a good pet or not. That's what you want from a good Evaluate the Argument answer choice - a question that you yourself should be asking, because the answer will either help or hurt the argument.

[fork4k]

I'm a bit confused as to why this is A and not B. A doesn't really make sense to me since it's entirely possible that jurors find the evidence more credible because it just *is* more credible and so the fact that the judge pre-selected credible evidence just means that both the jurors and the judge *independently* arrived at the assessment that the evidence is credible (even if the jurors had no idea the judge preselected it this way).

B also felt more right to me since if the jurors were influencing each other, then this suggests some other feature of the courtroom (i.e. people having the opportunity to influence each other) is responsible for their assessments of the credibility of the evidence, which has nothing to do with the judge's preselection.

[Dana D]

Hey Fork4k,

This is an evaluate the argument question, so we need to evaluate the actual argument the legal theorists' are presenting here. Their conclusion is that jurors find the evidence in court as more credible than they would the same evidence outside the court because the judges are prescreening evidence. However, this reasoning requires the jurors to know that judges are prescreening evidence - otherwise, there must be some other factor influencing the jurors. Maybe other members of the jury are influencing the jurors decisions, but we don't need to know that in order to assess the argument presented.

The stimulus specifically says the jury would react this way to the same evidence inside or out of the court, so there is no chance the jury is making this decision based on the credibility of the evidence alone.

Hope that helps!

[fork4k]

Hey Fork4k,

This is an evaluate the argument question, so we need to evaluate the actual argument the legal theorists' are presenting here. Their conclusion is that jurors find the evidence in court as more credible than they would the same evidence outside the court because the judges are prescreening evidence. However, this reasoning requires the jurors to know that judges are prescreening evidence - otherwise, there must be some other factor influencing the jurors. Maybe other members of the jury are influencing the jurors decisions, but we don't need to know that in order to assess the argument presented.

The stimulus specifically says the jury would react this way to the same evidence inside or out of the court, so there is no chance the jury is making this decision based on the credibility of the evidence alone.

Hope that helps!

OOOOH that makes perfect sense. I completely missed the expression "the same" in the prompt despite re-reading it a bunch of times