#5 - Jenkins maintains that the movie Firepower was

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Flaw in the Reasoning. The correct answer choice is (E)

The author of this stimulus opens by using the “some people say...” rhetorical device, by which the
author introduces another’s view and then immediately rejects it. In this case, the author presents
Jenkins’ view about the movie Firepower. Jenkins believes that it was not in the interest of the
movie’s director for it to provoke antisocial behavior, and that the movie was not intended to provoke
antisocial behavior. The stimulus author says that Jenkins’ conclusion that Firepower was not
intended to provoke antisocial behavior must be rejected. As evidence, the author points out that the
movie has caused antisocial behavior by many of its viewers.

The author’s argument is flawed, because it is treating evidence of the effect of the movie as evidence
of the intent of those who made the movie. Just because the movie caused antisocial behavior among
its viewers does not prove that the filmmaker intended for that result to occur.

This is a Flaw in the Reasoning question. Our prephrase is that the correct answer choice will
describe the author’s assumption that the filmmaker must have intended the result that actually
occurred.

Answer choice (A): This answer choice describes a Source Argument. However, the author did not
mention Jenkins’ bias, so this answer choice is incorrect.

Answer choice (B): The conclusion to this argument was not causal, although causality was present
in the stimulus. The author’s view is that the movie caused antisocial behavior. But the conclusion
was about the filmmaker’s intent, and was not causal.

Answer choice (C): Here, the answer choice describes an Error of Composition. This choice is also
incorrect, because the argument did not ascribe a characteristic of one member of a group to the
entire group.

Answer choice (D): This is an attractive incorrect answer choice, because it addresses the issue of
intent. However, the point of the argument is to infer the filmmaker’s intent, while this answer choice
talks about an expressed intent.

Answer choice (E): This is the correct answer choice, because it describes the author’s error
in assuming that the filmmaker must have intended antisocial behavior because his work caused
antisocial behavior.

[Cking14]

Hi,

Can someone please explain why answer choice (E) is correct over answer choice (B)? To me, there is correlation, not causation. Answer choice (E) seems to be stating that "the person" is "performing" an action...but I don't see an action being performed, only a statement being made.

Please help!

Thanks!
Chris

[Dave Killoran]

Hi Chris!

Thanks for the question. First, both (B) and (E) deal in causality, and the good news is that you were in the right area in thinking that causality was the key issue here. So, you were quite close to getting this right, and now we want to look at the details so that next time you can successfully avoid answer choices like (B).

To separate those two answer choices, let's take a look at the argument again. Paraphrased and reordered, the argument looks like this:

• Premise: Jenkins says that the movie wasn't meant to cause antisocial behavior because it wasn't in the director's interest.
  
  Premise: The movie caused antisocial behavior.
  
  Conclusion: Jenkins is wrong.

This is actually a cool argument because it's like a two-speaker stimulus combined into one (that first premise I listed above is really a one-sentence premise-and-conclusion argument made by Jenkins; the test makers could have easily separated that out and I suspect they didn't do that because it's harder to understand as one big stimulus).

Now, one of the interesting things here is that the causality appears in the premises, and, especially in the case of the second premise, is stated in a factual manner. This isn't a case where A happened, B happened, and then someone says that A caused B (that's what answer choice (B) suggests). Instead, when we analyze the premises, the relationship looks like this:

• Jenkins: Hey, it wasn't intended to cause that.
  
  Author: But it did, so you are wrong about the intent.

So, the argument isn't about a correlation then being said to be causal, and thus answer choice (B) is incorrect. Instead, it's about confusing the idea of what occurred with what the original intent was.

An analogous argument would be something very roughly like:

• Speaker 1: Hey, I didn't mean to get a speeding ticket, because that wouldn't be in my best interest.
  
  Speaker 2: But you did get a speeding ticket, so you are wrong about not meaning to get one.

Please let me know if that helps. Thanks!

[Cking14]

It does! Thank you!