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#32353
Complete Question Explanation
Weaken. The correct answer choice is (A)
The Politician concludes that Thompson is the best person to lead the nation. There are two premises provided to support that claim so let's analyze each:
Overall then, we have an argument that has a conclusion that doesn't have much support. The question stem then asks you to attack the argument, and you can see that there are several angles they could choose for an answer. Let's see what they do:
Answer choice (A): This is the correct answer choice. This answer choice addresses the weakness between the premises and the conclusion, and makes clear that opposing taxes isn't connected to the qualities of leadership. If that's the case, then Thompson opposing taxes and people believing that makes a person a better leader is irrelevant to whether Thompson is the best person to lead this nation.
One concern in this answer is the use of "good" in describing leadership. Where does that come from? Since that's not in the conclusion doesn't that make this answer wrong? No. As Adam Tyson explains below, this is not the problematic issue it might at first appear to be:
Answer choice (B): This was a very popular incorrect answer. Part of the issue is the similarity in language to answer choice (A). They both sound like they are saying similar things, which is both annoying and confusing. answer choice (B) is a bit more specific than (A), however ("not a factor" vs "not a sufficient condition"), so we can examine (B) through a conditional lens and see whether it being true would hurt the argument.
However, the argument makes no claim that opposition to higher taxes is itself sufficient to guarantee good leadership. In fact, the premises (such as they are) only make a comparison between possible degrees of good leadership. Perhaps other conditions are also required to make a good leader. Even if this were the case, the argument emerges more or less the same.
Or, as Rachael Wilkenfeld states below, "One of the big issues with answer choice (B) is that it references a conditional that was never really proposed. It doesn't say that opposing higher taxes is sufficient to make a good leader. It doesn't even say that many people believe that opposing higher taxes is sufficient to make a good leader. It just says that many people think that those who oppose higher taxes are better than those who support them, but that's different than being an objectively good leader. It's also different than saying that opposing higher taxes is sufficient for good leadership. "
Answer choice (C): This opinion does nothing to illustrate the flaw between our premises and our conclusion. The argument seems to rest on the opinion that anyone who opposes taxes will be better than anyone in favor thereof--an single-issue litmus test of sorts. This choice does nothing to illustrate the weakness in this assumption and in fact would be irrelevant were the assumption in fact true.
Put differently, Rachael Wilkenfeld says below, "Here's the problem with answer choice (C). You don't know anything about any opinions by any candidate about non-tax issues. Answer choice (C) says that Thompson's opinions on non-tax issues are questionable, but it seems possible that that was already considered. On it's own, it doesn't impact the argument because of the premise that "many would agree that anyone who opposes higher taxes would be a better leader than someone who supports them." Everyone has positives and negatives, but that premise seems to say that for many people, taxes alone are decisive. Answer choice (A) on the other hand directly addressed taxes and how they impact leadership."
Answer choice (D): Again, here we are only concerned with degrees of how good a leader will be, not whether the leadership of these politicians is by some absolute metric "adequate." In fact, if we are to accept the assumption about opposing taxes indicating better leadership than supporting taxes, we can only conclude, if anything, that Thompson will be a better than adequate leader!
Answer choice (E): Here we see another example of how saying something nice about the other leader does nothing to attack the validity of the argument. It is essential that we confront the flawed assumption head-on. This choice is more or less irrelevant.
Please note that this question generated a number of student questions, and so the responses that follow below often address more nuanced aspects of the answer choices, especially (A), (B), and (C).
Weaken. The correct answer choice is (A)
The Politician concludes that Thompson is the best person to lead the nation. There are two premises provided to support that claim so let's analyze each:
- 1. Thompson opposes higher taxes while the opponent supports them.
This is a factual claim, but notice how this premise is about taxes whereas the conclusion is about leadership. If you were to simply use this premise and the conclusion and reverse the order, this relationship would appear much clearer and weaker:
- Thompson opposes higher taxes while the opponent supports them. Therefore Thompson is the best person to lead the nation.
With the conclusion now appearing last, you can see the issue switch quite clearly. Interestingly, especially for Americans, this argument is programmed to sound strong simply because you hear the "higher taxes is bad" language so often in the news. But examined closely, the issue of taxes is just one factor in deciding who the best leader would be, and making the claim above turns this into a single issue decision that is not supported.
2. Many people think someone who is against higher taxes would make a better leader than anyone who is in favor of higher taxes.
This second premise makes an appeal to popular opinion, which is a classic fallacy. Just because a large group of people believe something does not make it true. For example, there's a flat earth society out there with many members who presumably believe the earth is flat. That doesn't make the claim valid.
So, in this case, you should recognize that just because many people believe this does about taxes not make the conclusion about Thompson being the best person to lead the nation true.
Overall then, we have an argument that has a conclusion that doesn't have much support. The question stem then asks you to attack the argument, and you can see that there are several angles they could choose for an answer. Let's see what they do:
Answer choice (A): This is the correct answer choice. This answer choice addresses the weakness between the premises and the conclusion, and makes clear that opposing taxes isn't connected to the qualities of leadership. If that's the case, then Thompson opposing taxes and people believing that makes a person a better leader is irrelevant to whether Thompson is the best person to lead this nation.
One concern in this answer is the use of "good" in describing leadership. Where does that come from? Since that's not in the conclusion doesn't that make this answer wrong? No. As Adam Tyson explains below, this is not the problematic issue it might at first appear to be:
- Student question: "Upon review, I really actually wanted to remove both of these answer choices (A and B) because they both referenced the idea of "good leadership" which was not ever discussed in the stimulus. What if Thompson and all the other candidates are actually all terrible leaders, but out of them all Thompson is just the least bad one?"
Adam Tyson reply: "You're correct that "good" and "better" are not the same thing, and that's an important distinction in this and many other questions. Good job for remaining alert to that "relativity" issue, where an author takes a relative claim (X is better than Y) and then makes an absolute claim (X is therefore good).
In this case, though, the relativity issue isn't a problem for answer A. If it's true that, despite what many people think, opposing higher taxes is not a factor in contributing to good leadership, doesn't that also mean it cannot be a factor in making one leader better than another? That is, if opposing higher taxes doesn't matter in determining whether you are any good, then it cannot be a differentiating factor between two candidates, can it? For that reason, the relativity issue is a non-issue here."
Answer choice (B): This was a very popular incorrect answer. Part of the issue is the similarity in language to answer choice (A). They both sound like they are saying similar things, which is both annoying and confusing. answer choice (B) is a bit more specific than (A), however ("not a factor" vs "not a sufficient condition"), so we can examine (B) through a conditional lens and see whether it being true would hurt the argument.
However, the argument makes no claim that opposition to higher taxes is itself sufficient to guarantee good leadership. In fact, the premises (such as they are) only make a comparison between possible degrees of good leadership. Perhaps other conditions are also required to make a good leader. Even if this were the case, the argument emerges more or less the same.
Or, as Rachael Wilkenfeld states below, "One of the big issues with answer choice (B) is that it references a conditional that was never really proposed. It doesn't say that opposing higher taxes is sufficient to make a good leader. It doesn't even say that many people believe that opposing higher taxes is sufficient to make a good leader. It just says that many people think that those who oppose higher taxes are better than those who support them, but that's different than being an objectively good leader. It's also different than saying that opposing higher taxes is sufficient for good leadership. "
Answer choice (C): This opinion does nothing to illustrate the flaw between our premises and our conclusion. The argument seems to rest on the opinion that anyone who opposes taxes will be better than anyone in favor thereof--an single-issue litmus test of sorts. This choice does nothing to illustrate the weakness in this assumption and in fact would be irrelevant were the assumption in fact true.
Put differently, Rachael Wilkenfeld says below, "Here's the problem with answer choice (C). You don't know anything about any opinions by any candidate about non-tax issues. Answer choice (C) says that Thompson's opinions on non-tax issues are questionable, but it seems possible that that was already considered. On it's own, it doesn't impact the argument because of the premise that "many would agree that anyone who opposes higher taxes would be a better leader than someone who supports them." Everyone has positives and negatives, but that premise seems to say that for many people, taxes alone are decisive. Answer choice (A) on the other hand directly addressed taxes and how they impact leadership."
Answer choice (D): Again, here we are only concerned with degrees of how good a leader will be, not whether the leadership of these politicians is by some absolute metric "adequate." In fact, if we are to accept the assumption about opposing taxes indicating better leadership than supporting taxes, we can only conclude, if anything, that Thompson will be a better than adequate leader!
Answer choice (E): Here we see another example of how saying something nice about the other leader does nothing to attack the validity of the argument. It is essential that we confront the flawed assumption head-on. This choice is more or less irrelevant.
Please note that this question generated a number of student questions, and so the responses that follow below often address more nuanced aspects of the answer choices, especially (A), (B), and (C).
. In my review, I diagrammed the premise: opposes higher taxes 
good leader... Answer choice B states that being opposed to higher taxes is not a sufficient condition for good leadership. So, this would just strike out the sufficient condition and therefore the person in question (Thompson) could still be a good leader? And since striking out the sufficient doesn't allow us to know anything about the necessary we can therefore go with A? Is my reasoning sound?