#23- A professor of business placed a case-study assignment

[Capetowner]

Hi Capetowner,

Analogies can be good or bad. A good analogy occurs when the two things being compared are similar in the relevant ways so that what is true of one would also be true of the other based on the same underlying reasons. A bad (or false) analogy occurs when the two things being compared are not similar in the relevant ways so that what is true of one would not necessarily be true of the other.

In order for an answer to strengthen an argument by analogy, the analogy would have to good/relevant/applicable to the argument.

Nothing in Answer E is directly relevant to the underlying reasons of why books on computer will not make printed books obsolete.

That sums things up nicely, thanks! I have a question I'm not sure where to post:
How would you diagram this sentence:

Dogs can be found in every house with a kennel

I would say Kennel ---> At least 1 dog

I guess I'm confused as to how "at least one" is not diagrammed instead at the receiving end of a 'some' arrow:

Kennel <--> Dog

[Jeff Wren]

Hi Capetowner,

You can post general LR related questions (that aren't about specific individual LR test questions) such as your last question under the "General Logical Reasoning Questions" section on the forum. I'll have the forum administrator move this question and my answer there. (We generally try to keep general questions separate from specific LR questions so that they are easier for other students to find and so that the forum threads for each individual question stays focused on that individual question.)

As for your question, I'd diagram this sentence:

Dogs can be found in every house with a kennel

in a similar way to how you diagrammed it.

I'd probably diagram it:

HWK -> D

"HWK" for "House with Kennel" and "D" for "dogs."

The word "every" in the sentence indicates a conditional relationship.

Based on the way that the original sentence is worded, I would not diagram "dogs" as "at least one dog" because it states that dogs plural can be found in every house with a kennel. However, if the sentence had stated "Some dogs can be found in every house with a kennel," then "at least one dog" would be fine, since the word "some" basically means "at least one."

Now inherent within the statement that "all (i.e. every) houses with kennels have dogs" is the statement that "some houses with kennels have dogs," so you could certainly diagram:

HWK <- some -> D

However, that diagram, while true, is an inherent inference contained within the stronger statement "all houses with kennels have dogs." "Some" statements and "most" statements are discussed under formal logic, and these types of inherent inferences are discussed under a concept that we call The Logic Ladder. For more information on formal logic, including a discussion on The Logic Ladder, I'd recommend reading chapter 13 of "The Logical Reasoning Bible."