#23- Editorial: This political party has repeatedly

[persde]

I chose answer choice (E) on this one. After negating the terms in choice (D) I have a better sense of why it is the correct answer, but can you please explain why choice (E) is incorrect? Is it because the answer talks about "members" of a political party instead of the party as a whole? After using the negation technique on choice (E) I can see it's not the best choice but I'd like further clarification.

Thank you!

[Jennifer Janowsky]

"(E) Members of one political party never have inconsistent views on how to best approach a political issue."

The answer choice (E) is arguing that in order to be a member of a political party you cannot have inconsistent views. However, no part of the stimulus argues what includes or excludes a person from being a member of a party. In this case, they are talking about policies and goals, both of which are further connected in answer choice (D). Hope this helps you!

[lilleb]

Hi!
I grasp the use of the Negation Technique here, but there's multiple negatives in the correct answer choice.

Would you negate all the negatives to arrive at what would be used to attempt to weaken the stimulus? What would be the negated form of Answer Choice D?

Thank you!

[Poonam Agrawal]

Hi lilleb!

The negated version of answer choice (D) would be: A consistent political policy does hold that an action that comprises a worthy goal should not be performed.

You only need to negate one part of the answer choice, because negating multiple parts changes the meaning of the original statement.

Remember that with the Assumption Negation Technique, if your negated answer attacks the original conclusion, it is the correct answer. Here, when answer choice (D) is negated, we can say that the political party is consistent because consistent policy holds that education spending should not be increased. Therefore, it directly attacks the original conclusion which states that the party's policy is inconsistent.

I hope this helps! Let us know if you have any other questions.

[hope0922]

Poonam Agrawal wrote:
> Hi lilleb!
>
> The negated version of answer choice (D) would be: [b]A consistent political policy
> [u]does hold[/u] that an action that comprises a worthy goal should not be performed.[/b]
>
> You only need to negate one part of the answer choice, because negating multiple
> parts changes the meaning of the original statement.
>
> Remember that with the Assumption Negation Technique, if your negated answer attacks
> the original conclusion, it is the correct answer. Here, when answer choice (D)
> is negated, we can say that the political party is consistent because consistent
> policy holds that education spending should not be increased. Therefore, it directly
> attacks the original conclusion which states that the party's policy is [u]inconsistent[/u].
>
>
> I hope this helps! Let us know if you have any other questions.


Hi! I'm looking at this question now and still having trouble grasping it. Here is my rundown:

Conclusion: party policy is inconsistent.
premise: spending money on education worthy goal
premise: The party claimed that the government should not increase spending on education

I need to find an AC dependent on this: I initially picked E), but I now realize that it brought up the idea of other members, which is irrelevant to the stimulus.

But I still don't understand what makes D correct, even after negating it, which I initially thought included negating both, not statements. Is that incorrect? I thought negating consisted of turning everything into the opposite?

I could really use some help, please and thank you

[Jeff Wren]

Hi hope,

Your rundown of the argument looks pretty good, although I'd change the first premise to include:

premise: spending money on education worthy goal according to the party

With that change, we get:

Conclusion: party policy is inconsistent.
premise: spending money on education worthy goal according to the party
premise: The party claimed that the government should not increase spending on education

In other words, it's the fact that the party makes a recommendation that goes against a goal that the party itself believes is worthy that makes the party inconsistent.

Notice that the conclusion contains a new idea/term of "inconsistent." Since this is an Assumption question, you're likely looking for a Supporter assumption that links the new information in the conclusion back to the premises.

A reasonable prephrase might be:

A party that advocates a position that undermines a goal that the party considers worthy is inconsistent.

Since this is exactly what happens in the premises, this prephrase bridges the gap in logic in the argument.

Answer D is basically expressing the same general idea of this prephrase.

Stating that "a consistent political party does not hold ..." is equivalent to stating "it would be inconsistent for a political party to hold...."

As for negating answer choices, it's critical to learn how to properly negate answer choices to correctly use The Assumption Negation Technique. When an answer has more than one negative or positive term in the statement, you do not simply flip each one. That can completely alter the meaning of the sentence to something other than the negation, and, in some cases, the two negatives cancel each other out, leaving you with the same meaning as the original answer choice.

Instead, you want to think about the meaning of the sentence and decide what the logical opposite of that statement is. Often, the easiest way to negate an answer is to add "it is not the case that" before the answer choice and think about what that would mean.

For more information on negating statements (including drills on negating statements) check out the chapter on Assumption questions in "The Logical Reasoning Bible."