Self-study
Attorneys for a criminal defendant charged that the government, in a coverup, had destroyed evidence that would have supported the defendant in a case. ███ ██████████ ███████ ████ █████ ██ ██ ████████ ████ █████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ███ █████████ ██ ███ █████
Summarize Argument: Counter-Position
This is an usual stimulus because there’s no argument. Instead, we have a claim and a reply to that claim.
Attorneys’ claim: The government destroyed evidence that would have supported the defendant.
Government’s reply: There is presently no evidence that supports the defendant.
Notable Assumptions
There are no assumptions, because there’s no argument here. But notice that the government’s reply doesn’t actually address the point made by the attorneys. The attorneys’ point is that there was once supporting evidence, before it was destroyed. But the government’s response is all about the present situation—there’s now no supporting evidence. This leaves open the possibility that the attorneys are right: the government destroyed the evidence, which is why it no longer exists.
5.
Which one of the following ██ ███ ████ ████████ ██████████ ██ ███ ████████████ ██████
a
It leaves open ███ ████████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████████ ███ █████████ ████ █████████
The government’s reply is all about the present situation—there’s now no supporting evidence. This is completely consistent with the attorneys’ claim that there was once evidence, but the government destroyed it. So the question remains: did the government destroy that evidence?
b
It establishes that ███ ██████████ ██████ ██ ██ █████████████
The attorney’s charge is all about what happened in the past, while the government’s reply is solely about the present situation. So, the government’s reply does nothing to counter the attorneys’ charge.
c
It shows that ███ █████████ ███ ███ ████ ███████ █████ ██████ ███ █████
The attorney’s charge is all about what happened in the past, while the government’s reply is solely about the present situation. So, the government’s reply does nothing to counter the attorneys’ charge.
d
It demonstrates the ████████████ ███████ ██ ██████ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ██████
The government’s reply might be true—there might currently be no evidence in the government’s files (or anywhere else) to support the defendant. We don’t know. So we can’t conclude that the government failed to search for evidence.
e
If true, it ███████████ █████████ ███ ██████ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ███ ██████████
The attorney’s charge is all about what happened in the past, while the government’s reply is solely about the present situation. So, even if the government’s reply is true, it does nothing to counter the attorneys’ charge.