Self-study
A local television station is considering a plan to create a panel of child psychologists to review programs in advance of their airing and rate the level of violence. █ ███████ ████ ████████ █ ████ █████ ██ ████████ █████ ██ ██████ ██ ██████████ ████ ████ ████ █████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ █████ █████ ██ █ ████ ███ ██████ █████████ ███ ███ █████ ██████ █████ ███ ████████ ███ ███████ ████████ ████ ████ ██████ █████ ████████ ███████ █████ ███ █████ ██ ████████ ██ ███ █████ ████████
Summary
The television station concludes that it can forewarn parents of how violent different programs are by having a panel review and rate each program. This is supported by an explanation of how the ratings would appear in newspapers.
Notable Assumptions
In order to believe that parents will be forewarned by program ratings published in newspapers, the station must assume that parents will read the newspapers. Otherwise, the information just wouldn’t reach them.
13.
Which one of the following ████ ███ ██████████ ███████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ████ ████ ███ ██████ ████████
a
Parents would read ███ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██████ ██ ███ ███████████
For the station to infer that parents will be forewarned because of ratings published in the newspapers, this assumption is necessary. If we negated this assumption, and parents did not read the newspapers, the conclusion wouldn’t make sense.
b
There would be █████ █████ █████ ████ ███ ███ ████ ████ ████ █████
The number of shows with any given rating is irrelevant to the question of whether this system will actually forewarn parents.
c
The rating system █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ █████████ ██████ ██████████
This isn’t necessary because the rating system doesn’t have to be the most effective possible system in order to forewarn parents. The bar is much lower than that.
d
The local television ███████ ███ ██ ██████████ ██ ████████ ███████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ████████ ██ ██████████ ██████
Whether the station is under an obligation or is voluntarily choosing to forewarn parents doesn’t affect the argument, which is just about whether the rating system will in fact work.
e
Television producers of ████████ █████ ██ ██████ ████ ██████ ██ ████████ █████ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ██████ █████ ███████
The argument is just about forewarning parents, not about reducing the amount of violence on television, so this assumption isn’t necessary.