#24 - Politician: Every regulation currently being proposed

[cleocleozuo]

Thanks for the explanations. I still want to double-check one thing though. I did this problem wrong because I thought the argument was saying A causes B and B causes C, and removing the cause A will entail less C. I did not see where the flaw was because I thought it's ok to say A causes C & no A entails no C) if we have a causal chain. But I should not treat this question as a causal chain because the language here is not strictly causal ("reduce" and "help" has a much weaker causal connotation). Am I right?

[Jeremy Press]

Hi cleo,

The words "reduce" and "help" are causal in nature (implying that something has an effect on something else). The problem, though, is that, for the reasons Jon explained in his post, we can't say that removing the trade deficit by using some particular regulation will definitely result in helping the economy. And that's because the economy is a big system whose health is (causally) determined by lots of factors. Although we know the regulations will reduce the trade deficit, we don't know whether they will have other effects (within the "big" system of the economy) that will hurt the economy. So, the problem here comes in assuming that there is a definite "C" link in the causal chain. We can't know that from the given premises. Take another read through Jon's post (and James's too), because I think they both do a fabulous job of describing why that causal chain you trace isn't actually established by the premises.

I hope this helps!

[Henry Z]

Why is A wrong?

I chose A because I thought "trade deficit" mattered. The author believes "each of the proposed regulations WOULD help the economy" because "our country’s trade deficit IS so large that it weakens the economy." Isn't that a Time Mismatch flaw, as a statement about the present can't lead to an inference about the past or future? What if when the proposed regulations finally come into effect, the deficit is not so large that it doesn't weaken the economy? What if there's no deficit at all that it doesn't need to be reduced, how would the regulations help then?

I think A points out the author fails to consider the possibility that the trade deficit will not increase.

[katehos]

Hi Henry,

Your understanding of time shift errors is correct, but in the context of this question, that's not quite the specific flaw. Answer choice (A) asserts that the politician assumes the trade deficit will increase in size, but that assertion is not contained within the stimulus. The politician isn't saying the deficit is only going to get bigger, therefore these regulations will help the economy, rather, they're assuming that the regulations will simply reduce the cause of the economy's weakness (the deficit). So, we can eliminate (A) and find that (D) is correct, because the politician fails to consider the possibility that the regulations may hurt the economy in other ways (even if they do reduce the deficit).

Hope that helps!
Kate

[g_lawyered]

Hi P.S.
I had answer choice contenders C & D and chose C. After reading explanations, I understand why D is correct. I chose C because I read the author of the argument is a politician (power score lessons advise to be on lookout when politician- person of authority- argues because most of the time they commit an appeal to authority or source/ ad hominen flaw). For this reason, I was speculative from the beginning of the argument. While I did ID the gap between: difference in reducing trade deficit and helping economy, I prephrased that the author overlooks that the only reason for regulations from committee is to help economy. This means the author"overlooks the possibility of another reason why the regulation (from the conclusion) is proposed by the committee" (the only reason is to help economy). In my understanding, this matches what C is states "without evaluating any reasons for the proposed regulations". Because the evidence is limited to committee, I understood the argument to solely rely on the authority of that committee (doesn't consider other influential committees or factors). This error in reasoning, matched what C states "merely appeals to the authority of the committee ". Where does my analysis go wrong? Why is C incorrect?
Thanks in advance!

[Robert Carroll]

g_lawyered,

Politicians will often commit flaws on the test, but it's an Attack on the Source by us if we assume that any politician is always making a flawed argument! Seeing that a politician is saying something may put you on your guard for flaws, but you still have to deal with what's said.

You got the gap right - reducing the trade deficit may be one factor assisting the more general goal of helping the economy, but what are the other factors? They're not mentioned. This seems to be a part-to-whole flaw.

Now...none of that matches answer choice (C). There's no appeal to authority in the gap you identified. The reasons given for thinking the proposals will help the economy is that they will reduce the trade deficit, one factor that influences the health of the economy. That's all there is to the argument, as you identified. Answer choice (C) is wrong on two counts - there is no appeal to authority and the reasons for the proposed regulations are evaluated - they will reduce the trade deficit.

Robert Carroll

[g_lawyered]

Hi Robert,
Thanks for your advice on ID the flaws in argument. I now understand why C is incorrect.
In reference to your explanation:

You got the gap right - reducing the trade deficit may be one factor assisting the more general goal of helping the economy, but what are the other factors? They're not mentioned. This seems to be a part-to-whole flaw.

. This part-to-whole flaw is demonstrated in answer E:

concludes that every regulation in a set will have the same effects as a set of regulations as a whole

. Correct? Because the other factors aren't mentioned. are we to assume that it's not a flaw the argument makes? Since flaw in argument correct answers are to ID what the argument actually flawed. I eliminated answer E because of " every regulation in a set will have the same effects as a set of regulations as a whole". The argument states Each NOT Every and it doesn't mention the effects as a whole. Each is translated to "If one regulation". So the conclusion is: If proposed regulation help the economy. Is this correct? Answer E is incorrect because it mentions flaw that wasn't committed and uses extreme language (each vs. every), correct?
Thanks for all your help!

[Robert Carroll]

g_lawyered,

Answer choice (E) is actually whole-to-part! Look at the language of it - the conclusion is supposedly about "every regulation in a set" and the premises are supposedly about "the set of regulations as a whole." I.e., answer choice (E) is saying that, from premises about an entire set, a conclusion about the individual members of that set is made. That's whole-to-part, not part-to-whole. So answer choice (E) is a very tricky answer. It's reversed, though, so wrong.

Robert Carroll

[g_lawyered]

I see that now. Thanks for clarifying that Robert!