#19 - Educator: It has been argued that our professional

[eober]

Hi,

In this question educator seems to be supporting voting for an officer to make a decision instead of everyone individually voting to make a decision. But answer choice E is supporting maximizing power of each member (so individually voting on a single issue). I am very confused, could you clarify this??

Thanks!

[Robert Carroll]

eober,

There is nothing inherent about directly voting that maximizes the power of the individual. People may actually maximize their influence by voting for other people (perhaps more knowledgeable and motivated about the issues) to represent them. Indeed, the educator claims that an individual's vote will have more impact on organizational policy by electing an officer than directly voting on an issue. So the educator is already committed to the idea that this is the best means of maximizing an individual's influence.

What we lack is a reason why we should choose any means at all to maximize an individual's impact. The educator concludes that the opposite, direct voting "would not, however, be the right way to decide these matters," because it would not allow the individual to have as much influence, but we don't know that we want that in the first place! So answer choice (E) provides us with just such a principle - the goal should be to do whatever maximizes the power of each individual to influence the decisions made.

Robert Carroll

[eober]

Thank you so much for all your explanations, they were very clear and helped tremendously!

[jonwg5121]

I was completely lost with number 19. How do you approach this problem?

[Nikki Siclunov]

Hi Jon,

The trick to a question like this is to simplify the stimulus. The educator argues that members of an organization, rather than voting on issues directly, should instead vote to elect officers who then vote on the members' behalf. Why? Because the latter approach is more likely to empower individual members in determining organizational policy.

The question is asking us to identify a principle that strengthens the argument. My immediate prephrase is this: it is important for individual members to be able to influence organizational policy. After all, the author is proposing a strategy that is supposed to maximize that power, and we need to ensure, at the very least, that this is a good thing. My prephrase, while not exact, immediately pointed me to answer choice (E).

Does that make sense? Let me know.

Thanks!

[jessicamorehead]

Can someone explain why each answer choice is wrong? I understand why E is right, but I want to understand why A, B, C and D are all wrong. Thanks!

[Adam Tyson]

Happy to help, Jessica, but to an extent you have already answered the question of why the other answers are wrong. If you get why E is correct, then you know that it's the best answer, and since we are supposed to select the best answer, that's all you need to know to select it! The others don't have to be "wrong", they just have to be "not the best". Don't ever get hung up on why an answer is good or bad, right or wrong, but only on whether one answer is better than or worse than another.

That said, it's good to understand what the problems are with the other answer choices. Not understanding an answer might lead us to pick it out of confusion, so understanding, while optional, is better than not understanding. So, here goes!

We are asked to strengthen the argument, and that means we need to make the conclusion more likely to be true. The conclusion here is that a direct vote on issues would not be the right way to decide matters. The evidence is the claim that voting for officers is better, somehow making one's vote more likely to influence policy. So, we need an answer that adds some additional support for the claim that direct voting is not the right way.

Answer A does nothing to help that, as there is nothing in the stimulus about making any one vote count more than any other one vote. It's just irrelevant. Even if we interpret it to mean that having officers vote instead of direct voting is somehow giving those officers' votes extra weight, that would actually weaken the argument, suggesting that direct voting might be better after all.

Answer B is likewise irrelevant. What does fairness or outcome have anything to do with the argument? The argument is strictly about maximizing the value of your vote by selecting officers rather than voting directly, with that maximization apparently being better. Evaluating outcomes has nothing to do with which method is right.

Answer C might appear to strengthen the argument a little, but only if you offer it a little help. If important issues should be decided by those who can devote full time to them, does that mean it should be done by officers rather than by direct vote? Only if you assume that officers have that kind of time on their hands and non-officers don't. But don't assume anything that isn't given to you! Maybe officers are very busy people who cannot devote their full time to the issues, but non-officers might include a bunch of retired people with nothing but time on their hands? We just can't know from this stimulus that "devote their full time" means officers, so we can't pick this answer. Don't help the answers out - they need to stand or fall on their own.

Answer D gives no help to the "direct voting isn't right" argument, and might even weaken that claim by indicating that officers really can't exercise their own judgment all that much. We want to strengthen the idea that direct voting isn't right, and telling us that officers may have their hands a little bit tied does nothing to add to that.

That leaves our winner, answer E, which is the only one that tells us that maximizing influence is an important organizational goal. If that's true, and if direct voting doesn't accomplish that goal while another method does, then it supports the claim that direct voting is not the right way.

Hope that helps!

[jessicamorehead]

Happy to help, Jessica, but to an extent you have already answered the question of why the other answers are wrong. If you get why E is correct, then you know that it's the best answer, and since we are supposed to select the best answer, that's all you need to know to select it! The others don't have to be "wrong", they just have to be "not the best". Don't ever get hung up on why an answer is good or bad, right or wrong, but only on whether one answer is better than or worse than another.

That said, it's good to understand what the problems are with the other answer choices. Not understanding an answer might lead us to pick it out of confusion, so understanding, while optional, is better than not understanding. So, here goes!

We are asked to strengthen the argument, and that means we need to make the conclusion more likely to be true. The conclusion here is that a direct vote on issues would not be the right way to decide matters. The evidence is the claim that voting for officers is better, somehow making one's vote more likely to influence policy. So, we need an answer that adds some additional support for the claim that direct voting is not the right way.

Answer A does nothing to help that, as there is nothing in the stimulus about making any one vote count more than any other one vote. It's just irrelevant. Even if we interpret it to mean that having officers vote instead of direct voting is somehow giving those officers' votes extra weight, that would actually weaken the argument, suggesting that direct voting might be better after all.

Answer B is likewise irrelevant. What does fairness or outcome have anything to do with the argument? The argument is strictly about maximizing the value of your vote by selecting officers rather than voting directly, with that maximization apparently being better. Evaluating outcomes has nothing to do with which method is right.

Answer C might appear to strengthen the argument a little, but only if you offer it a little help. If important issues should be decided by those who can devote full time to them, does that mean it should be done by officers rather than by direct vote? Only if you assume that officers have that kind of time on their hands and non-officers don't. But don't assume anything that isn't given to you! Maybe officers are very busy people who cannot devote their full time to the issues, but non-officers might include a bunch of retired people with nothing but time on their hands? We just can't know from this stimulus that "devote their full time" means officers, so we can't pick this answer. Don't help the answers out - they need to stand or fall on their own.

Answer D gives no help to the "direct voting isn't right" argument, and might even weaken that claim by indicating that officers really can't exercise their own judgment all that much. We want to strengthen the idea that direct voting isn't right, and telling us that officers may have their hands a little bit tied does nothing to add to that.

That leaves our winner, answer E, which is the only one that tells us that maximizing influence is an important organizational goal. If that's true, and if direct voting doesn't accomplish that goal while another method does, then it supports the claim that direct voting is not the right way.

Hope that helps!

You just cleared that up so much Adam! Thank you so much for taking the time to explain each answer choice. I feel like I get so hung up on making 4 answers wrong and 1 answer right, when I really just need to focus on picking the 1 BEST answer. Thank you!!!

[hangryhippo]

Why is this considered a "strengthen" question and not a "Justify the Conclusion" question? I thought it would be a Justify question, since there is a gap between the premise and the conclusion that needs to be bridged.

[Adam Tyson]

Love that user name, hangryhippo! What makes this a Strengthen question, rather than a Justify the Conclusion question, is the words "most helps" in the question stem. A true Justify question is one where the correct answer proves the conclusion completely. There is no "most" or "helps" about it, nothing to lessen the amount of justification to anything other than 100%. As soon as they say "does most to justify" or "helps to justify", you are no longer looking at a Justify question, because the degree of help is only relative, not absolute. Something that helps a little does more than something that doesn't help at all, right? At that point, all you need is the answer that helps the most, and that is the essential quality of a Strengthen question.

Note that gaps in arguments appear all the time on this test, not just in Justify questions! They are common in Strengthen, Assumption, Flaw, Weaken, Main Point, Method of Reasoning, and so on, and so on... Just because you see a gap, don't assume that you know what the question will be! Instead, analyze the question stem on its own merits, and then prephrase accordingly. Some Strengthen answers will be just as strong as a Justify answer would be, but many (most) are weaker than that. Same thing with some Assumption answers - if the argument is simple enough, an Assumption could be the same as a Justify. Still, pay close attention to how they ask the question, and that will help you prepare a proper prephrase and sort losers from contenders.

Again, a true Justify stem will say that the correct answer will justify the conclusion, or that the conclusion will be property drawn or follow logically or must be true if that answer is true. No hedging, no reducing that by saying "most helps". Good luck with that, keep your eyes open and read carefully!