#22 - Food co-ops are a type of consumer cooperative.

[Administrator]

Question #22: Parallel Flaw. The correct answer choice is (C).

The argument is structured as follows:

• Premise—Food co-ops are a type of consumer cooperative.
  
  Premise—Shopping at consumer cooperatives is generally cheaper than shopping at other stores.
  
  Conclusion—It’s cheaper to shop at a food co-op than at a supermarket.

This line of reasoning only makes sense if you assume that food co-ops are just another name for consumer cooperatives. They are not. Food co-ops are a type of consumer cooperative. Just because consumer cooperatives are generally cheaper than other stores does not mean that food co-ops are cheaper than supermarkets. This is an Error of Division, where the author assumes that just because something is true of the whole (consumer cooperatives are cheaper) it is also true of its parts (food co-ops are cheaper).

To answer the Parallel Flaw question, you need to examine the argumentative structure of each answer choice and select the one that commits a similar Error of Division.

Answer choice (A): This answer choice contains a valid argument: if sports cars use more gasoline per mile than most other cars do, then owners of sports cars probably use more gasoline than do owners of other types of cars.

Answer choice (B): This argument describes a purchasing decision, whereby the lower price and durability of frozen vegetables are offered as a reason to buy frozen, rather than fresh, vegetables. There is no Error of Division here, making this answer choice easy to eliminate.

Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice. Just because private means of transportation cause more pollution per mile traveled than does mass transit does not mean that biking—a private means of transportation—causes more pollution than riding the bus. This argument makes the same Error of Division, assigning a property of the whole (the pollutive nature of private transportation) to a part of that whole (i.e. biking).

Answer choice (D): Just because healthful food today is better tasting than ever does not mean that it tastes at least as good as unhealthful food (which is the necessary condition for people to choose healthful food over unhealthful food). This is not an Error of Division, but an improper comparison.

Answer choice (E): The fact that artificially sweetened foods have fewer calories than foods sweetened with sugar does not mean that increasing one’s consumption of the former is the best way to lose weight. “Fewer calories” does not mean “no calories.” This is a Relativity flaw, whereby a comparative advantage is used to support an absolute claim.

[mN2mmvf]

Why is (A) a valid argument? We have no information as to how far/often sports cars are driven compared to other cars, and so we cannot possibly conclude that "people who own sports cars use much more gasoline."

[James Finch]

Hi M,

You're right, answer choice (A) is flawed in that we only know that sports cars have lower MPG than other cars, but not that they are driven as much as other cars, so we cannot conclude that owners of sports cars use much more gas than owners of other types of cars. This is an example of the insufficient evidence fallacy.

This is still an incorrect answer choice, however, as it doesn't match up with the error of composition and division flaw that we have in the stimulus.

Hope this clears things up!

[snowy]

Because the flaw in the stimulus centered around “usually,” I focused on answer choices that had similar language - which ended up being C and D they had “tend,” while all the other answer choices had more concrete language. I then compared the actual content of C and D and chose C since it fit the distribution error. Is that a fair process for me to have used?

[Erik Shum]

Hi Snowy,

That is a fine heuristic to apply in order to narrow down the answer choices you want to focus on as the correct answer choice had to confuse a probable characteristic with a definite characteristic, as was more fully explained in the original post. That process should save you time on Parallel Flaw, Parallel Reasoning and Method of Reasoning questions in particular as the answer choices for those questions can be lengthy or otherwise time consuming.

[lolaSur]

Wow! I arrived at the correct answer by focusing on the shift of certainty. I thought the shift of certainty was the error here. I didn't think about the whole/parts argumentative flaw.

Stimulus says: "consumer cooperatives...usually more cheaply" and "it is therefore more economical to shop at a food co-op than at a supermarket.

Answer C states : "private means of transportation tend to generate..."a person who rides a bicycle causes more pollution"

Is it incorrect to analyze the argument in this way? Please let me know.

Thank you!


For mg reference (PT 75, LR1, Q22)

[James Finch]

Hi Lola,

The shift in certainty is part of what makes this a whole-to-part flaw in the stimulus, and is a big clue, but even if the certainty were the same ("usually" in both premise in both premise and conclusion), there would still be the issue of whether the something that is usually true of a comparison between two groups would also hold true of a comparison between sub-groups of the two larger groups. Food sales might just be an exception to the general relationship between consumer coops and other stores, and the uncertain "usually" allows for such an exception to exist. If we knew that all coops are cheaper than other stores, then the conclusion would be correct. But "usually" allows for unusual cases to exist, creating the logical possibility for it to be untrue and thus making the argument flawed. What is true in the aggregate is not necessarily true of individual parts, unless we're explicitly told otherwise.

Hope this clears things up!

[blaisebayno]

Ok, I cannot believe that we are supposed to know that consumer cooperative is NOT the same thing as co-op!!! This question seems extremely unfair for that reason. There is no explanation for this distinction and requires extraneous cultural knowledge.

[katehos]

Hi blaisebayno, thank you for you question!

I totally understand where you're coming from - the flaw in this question is a bit difficult to spot at first! It may help to consider how the first sentence only establishes food co-ops as a type of consumer cooperative. This tells us that, while all food co-ops are consumer cooperatives, not all consumer cooperatives are necessarily food co-ops (there may be other types). The reason I bring this up is because it helps demonstrate how the question does not require you to know consumer cooperatives and co-ops are not the same thing (in fact, I think they are), but rather, the first sentence provides us with the necessary knowledge that food co-ops are just one type of consumer cooperative.

With the knowledge that food co-ops are only one type of cooperative in mind, we can see the flaw contained in the stimulus. The stimulus moves from one part (food co-op) to the whole (all consumer cooperatives) and then makes a conclusion about the part from the evidence about the whole. Immediately, we know this is an Error of Division. Just because consumer cooperatives usually offer the same products at a cheaper price does not mean food co-ops specifically do that. Perhaps every other type of consumer cooperative does, but food co-ops are actually the only type that does not? Once we are able to see that this argument is invalid because of the Error of Division, we can move into the answer choices to find that (C) has the same flaw.

I hope this helps!
Kate

[CJ12345:]

Hi, Powerscore,
I understand that Choice C exhibits the same part versus whole error as the stimulus. However, since Choice C's conclusion compares one person who rides to another person who takes the bus, it is possible that the person who rides cycles many miles, whereas the person who takes the bus travels only a few miles. This seems like a new error, which makes me hesitant to choose it. Is my reasoning correct? If there is a new error in the answer choice compared to the stimulus, can we still safely choose it?