#13 - Brooks: I'm unhappy in my job, but I don't know

[Brook Miscoski]

Mo wan,

Your position is partly defensible. Morgenstern is assuming that all unhappiness is equal (which is why the answer is A). However, that's not his conclusion. Morgenstern's conclusion is that Brooks should quit. So, the assumption is not the same as the conclusion.

[cascott15]

I still really don't understand why E is wrong.

M concludes "The only risk in quitting is that of not finding another job." Why? Because Brooks will be unhappy either way.

It's completely unreasonable to reach the conclusion that there's no risk in quitting simply because Brooks will be unhappy either way. Thus, his argument is flawed in that he reached a generalized principle based on a single consideration.

Having written that, I could understand why A is correct, but I still don't see how E is incorrect.

[James Finch]

Hi Cascott,

The issue with (E) is that it describes a part-to-whole fallacy (composition fallacy) where one example of a type of thing is then used to invalidly infer that all things of that type have the same characteristic(s). An example would be:

Vons is a grocery store. My local Vons has a parking lot. Therefore all grocery stores have a parking lot.

In the stimulus here, we don't have anything like that. Instead, Morgenstern is assuming that unhappiness is a binary thing, either you're unhappy or not, rather than a spectrum; Brooks is unhappy, but would probably be even more unhappy without a job/income.

Hope this clears things up!

[cascott15]

James Finch, I see what you're saying. I'll have to be more conscious of the principle underlying flaw answer choices moving forward.

I appreciate your patience answering my questions from yesterday. Thank you!

[kwcflynn]

Hello!

In regards to the main explanation for this question, it states that Answer (D) could be expressed as “equivocation with respect to the central concept of unhappiness." I noticed that this particular phrase is a common answer choice that describes "Uncertain Use of Term/Concept" in Flawed Reasoning in the LR Bible on page 520.

Does that mean that if (D) read "conflates two different types of happiness," then would (D) be correct? I am asking because I am practicing on recognizing common flaws in the stimulus AND answer choices to avoid any traps.

Thank you very much,

Kevin

[Jeremy Press]

Hi Kevin,

To your question, the answer is yes. You've correctly identified the flaw that the original post is describing in answer choice D (the "Uncertain Use of a Term or Concept"). You've also correctly read the implication of the original post: if answer choice D were changed to read "conflates two different types of unhappiness," then it would be the correct answer. Conflating two different types of a thing (merging them and thereby treating them as the same) is a form of equivocation, and therefore falls within the PowerScore discussion of "Uncertain Use of a Term or Concept."

I hope this helps!

Jeremy

[ssnasir]

Hi there,

I understand the logic behind the argument which boils down to you should quit because you're unhappy either ways and that is a problem since he could be more unhappy when he's unemployed.

But, I was hoping if someone could please clear this up for me in the stimulus Morgenstern says that if you're unemployed then you'll be "pretty unhappy" which I thought accounted for Answer Choice A which considered the relative unhappiness and that's why I crossed it out during review. I guess my issue with A is that he does take into account that unhappiness can vary with the "pretty unhappy" statement.

[Adam Tyson]

Being pretty unhappy doing one thing still doesn't really tell us how that level of unhappiness might compare to how you would feel in a different situation, ssnasir. I might tell you that I would be pretty unhappy stuck in quarantine at home for two months, but does that tell you anything about how much more or less happy I would be if I was incarcerated in a maximum security prison? Nope! "Pretty happy" is still an absolute term, not a relative one, because it doesn't provide any information to allow a comparison to anything else.

I'll be very happy if I learn this helps you (but I still might be even happier if my son comes to visit me!)