Conditional Rule Reversal

[Mmjd12]

Hi,

I always run into this thought when I'm doing practice questions and I wanted to ask about it:

Conditional rule reversal is one of the ways to avoid making false inferences. For example;

When M is shown first, then O is shown sixth.

Diagrammed: M1 ------> O6

This does not mean that one should assume if O is the sixth position, that M must be always be first. That would be a mistaken reversal.

However I commonly see on List, Global questions, answer choices that are wrong only because O in 6th position while M is not first. I eliminate them anyway, but am I wrong in thinking that it's not "technically" wrong?

How do you know when it's a violation of a conditional rule, and when it's a false inference? To be fair, this only comes up on List, Global questions. I haven't really seen this come up on any Local question.

[Adam Tyson]

I commonly see on List, Global questions, answer choices that are wrong only because O in 6th position while M is not first.

That does not make that answer wrong. Full stop. There is nothing wrong with that. So if that answer is wrong, it's wrong for some other reason, and you need to see what that other reason is.

How do you know when it's a violation of a conditional rule, and when it's a false inference?

A violation of a conditional rule occurs when the Sufficient Condition occurs and the Necessary Condition does not occur. That's not a false inference.

A false inference is when you infer from the absence of the Sufficient Condition that the Necessary Condition cannot occur, or when you infer from the presence of the Necessary Condition that the Sufficient Condition must occur. In either case, those false inferences will be things that you do while evaluating those answer choices, rather than mistakes in the answers. In your example, if O is 6th and M is not 1st, that's not a problem, because it is not a violation of the conditional rule. But if you treat it as a mistake, then you are the one who is making a false inference. You'll want to avoid that, because you'll end up eliminating a perfectly good answer that way!