#25 - Unquestionably, inventors of useful devices deserve

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Method-AP. The correct answer choice is (B)

Even though engineers must translate an inventor’s insight into something useful, they often receive too little credit for their contribution. The Argument Part (AP) mentioned in the question stem focuses on an issue which is not central to this argument: indeed, the claim that inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers lends no additional support to the conclusion. Quite on the contrary: if inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers, then the problem of depriving engineers of the recognition they deserve does not arise in every instance, since some engineers (i.e. the ones that are also inventors) do end up receiving due credit for their contribution. Answer choice (B) is therefore correct.

Answer choice (A): The argument makes no implicit distinction between theory and practice. The author is primarily concerned with the practical problem of engineers not receiving the appreciation they deserve.

Answer choice (B): This is the correct answer choice. See discussion above.

Answer choice (C): The argument part in question is not a premise of the argument, as the author does not rely on it in making her conclusion.

Answer choice (D): At first, this may seem like an attractive answer choice since the author does “concede” that inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers. However, the author does not concede that the distinction between the two is particularly unclear, only that it is not particularly relevant to every case in which the problem could potentially arise.

Answer choice (E): The AP in question proposes no solution to the problem lamented in this argument. This answer choice is incorrect.

[Tyler1237]

Hi,

I ended up getting this question wrong, mainly on a careless mistake on my part. The question only referenced “the claim that ‘inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers’”, but I went ahead and looked at that entire sentence in the stimulus (including the “engineers must translate … workable and useful”). This caused me to pick C (which, looking back, I’m sure would still be wrong even if the question was about the “engineers must translate … workable and useful” part of the stimulus, so I got this question double wrong lol) instead of B . I completely understand why B is correct, but I still would like to go over my argument part identification of the rest of the stimulus. I’m having some doubts on if I identified everything correctly.

“Unquestionably, inventors of useful devices deserve credit for their ingenuity”: Not a premise nor is required for the conclusion of the argument. It just shows that this argument is not an attack/does not take away from inventors.
“but the engineers who help develop an invention get too little recognition.”: Premise 1???
“Although inventors sometimes serve as their own engineers”: Explanation seen in B, and it is not a premise nor necessary for the conclusion.
“more often, engineers must translate an inventor’s insight into something workable and useful.”: Premise 2
“Therefore, engineers also deserve credit for their contribution.”: Conclusion

My doubt mainly comes from if what I identified as premise 1 is actually a premise to the conclusion. If I rephrased this with a premise indicator, it would say “Engineers also deserve credit for their contribution because the engineers who help develop an invention get too little recognition.” I don’t see that premise as a proper reason for them deserving credit. Instead, if the conclusion had said “engineers deserve MORE credit”, then I would actually be fine with that premise. I had actually originally thought what I have now as premise 1 was a sub conclusion, but a sub conclusion is still a premise for the actual conclusion, so the same issue remains.

Could this then be the actual conclusion instead? What is leading me to believe it could be a conclusion is the specific language used: X gets TOO little recognition. The “too” makes me think that the statement is an opinion of the author, in turn making me think of it as a possible conclusion. To be honest as I go through this argument again, I’m leaning more on the side that the “but the engineers who help develop an invention get too little recognition” is the conclusion while the “engineers also deserve credit” is the sub conclusion, but I’m still not 100% sure on that either.

So, if my skepticism is correct and what I have has premise 1 is not actually a premise, what would be the best thing to identify this part of the stimulus as? Conclusion? Something else? I also have an additional question. Do all premises in a valid argument have to be necessary for the conclusion of the argument to stand? Or do they just have to offer support/help?

Sorry for the long run on question. This seems like it should be an easy stimulus to identify the conclusion and premises but for some reason I’m having trouble here.

[Dana D]

Hey Tyler,

For the sake of time, I wouldn't necessarily feel that you need to break down an entire argument for a method of argument question if the stimulus gives you a specific phrase to look at. Obviously you will likely still end up considering the entire stimulus, but you wouldn't need to parse out the role of every single sentence / idea if you're given a specific phrase. I bring this up because this is also a common question type for RC, and since those passages are much longer, you could really sink too much time into each question if you develop that habit.

That being said - not every part of a stimulus is strictly a premise/ conclusion/ sub conclusion. If I had to label that first sentence, I might say it's a more like a claim or opinion that the author is justifying.

Hope that helps!