Self-study
Politician: Conclusion The funding for the new nationwide health-awareness campaign should come from an increase in taxes on cigarettes. ██ ██ ████ ███████████ ████ █████████ ███████ ██████ ████ ███████ ██████ █████████ ███ ██ ██ ████ ██████████ ████ ██████ █████ ███████████ ██████ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ████████ ██████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ████ █████████
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Politician's Argument
The politician concludes that a new health-awareness campaign should be funded by taxing cigarettes. As support, the politician says that smoking causes many health problems, and that it is reasonable to cover the campaign’s cost by taxing people whose habits cause health problems. Thus, it is reasonable to tax smokers.
Smoker's Argument
The smoker supports the unstated conclusion that it is not reasonable for smokers to bear the costs of this campaign, in disagreement with the politician. The smoker uses an analogy as support: consuming high-fat, high-cholesterol foods causes comparable health issues to smoking, but it is unreasonable to charge those consumers for the campaign’s costs. This implies that it is also unreasonable to charge smokers.
1.
Which one of the following ██ ███ █████ ██ █████ ███████ ███ ██████████ ███ ███ ███████
a
whether the politician's ████████ ███ █████████ ███ ████████████████ ████████ ██ ██ ████████████ ███
The politician agrees with this point but the smoker disagrees, making it the point at issue. The politician argues that the proposal to tax smokers is reasonable, while the smoker’s argument supports the implicit conclusion that taxing smokers is unreasonable.
b
whether smokers are ████ █████ ██ ███ ███████ ███████ ██ █████ █████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ █████████ ███ █████████ ████████████████ █████
Neither speaker discusses people’s awareness of the health impacts of either of these habits. The focus is on the effects of these habits, not people’s perception of those effects.
c
whether the effects ██ ███████ ██████████ █ ███████ ██████ ██████ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ █████████ ██████ █████████ ████████████████ █████
The smoker disagrees with this, instead claiming that the two habits cause roughly equal health problems. On the other hand, the politician never offers an opinion about the health impacts of eating certain foods. We can’t know if the speakers disagree about this.
d
whether it is ████████████ ██ ███████ ██████ ███ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ███████ ████████████ ████████ ██ █████ ███ █████ ██ █████ ████████
Neither speaker brings up who benefits from governmental programs, nor does either one suggest distributing the costs based on who benefits.
e
whether the proposed ████████ ██ █████████ █████ ██ ██ █████████ █████ ██ █████████ ███ ████████████████ ████████
Neither speaker actually indicates how efficient the increased cigarette tax would be as a method of funding the campaign. Each speaker is just focused on whether the proposal is reasonable or not.