Self-study
Teacher to a student: You agree that it is bad to break promises. ███ ████ ██ █████ ██ ████ █████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ████████ ███████ ██ ████ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ████ ████████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ████████ ██████ ████ ███ █████ ████ ██ ███ ██ ████ █████ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ██ █████ ██ ███ ████ ████ ███ ██ █████
Summary
The author concludes that even if the student promised Jeanne that he would tell the teacher Jeanne is homesick, the student should not lie to the teacher.
Why?
Because whenever people speak to each other, they make an implicit promise to tell the truth. Lying breaks that promise. (The implication is that if the student lies to the teacher, that’s breaks the implicit promise that the student will tell the truth to the teacher.)
Notable Assumptions
The author assumes that the obligation to tell the truth to the teacher overrides the obligation to fulfill the promise the student made to Jeanne. (Remember, the student promised Jeanne that he would say Jeanne is home sick. Why should the implicit promise to the teacher take precedence over the explicit promise he made to Jeanne?)
11.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ █████████ ████████ ████████
a
Most people always ████ ███ ██████
Not necessary, because the argument concerns what the student SHOULD do if he made a certain promise to Jeanne. What other people actually do concerning truth-telling doesn’t affect what the student should do.
b
It is sometimes ██████ ██ ███ ██ █ ████████ ████ █████████ ████ ██ ████ █ ███████ ██ ████ ███████
Not necessary, because we don’t know what is in Jeanne’s “best interests.” Nothing in the argument commits the author to some view about what would be the better course of action for Jeanne’s interests.
c
Breaking a promise █████ ██ █████ ████████████ ████ ████ ███████ █ ████
Not necessary, because the consequences of a broken promise are irrelevant to the reasoning. Although the author does believe that the student should not break the promise he implicitly makes, we have no reason to think that this has anything to do with the consequences of broken promises.
d
Some implicit promises ███ █████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ████████ █████
Necessary, because if it weren’t true — if NO implicit promises are worse to break than ANY explicit ones (or in other words, if every explicit promise is worse to break than every implicit promise) — then we have no reason to think the student should honor his promise to the teacher over the promise to Jeanne. The promise to the teacher is implicit; but the promise to Jeanne is explicit. The negation of (D) would imply the student should lie to the teacher in order to fulfill the promise to Jeanne.
e
One should never █████ █ ████████
Not necessary, because the author’s argument encourages the student to break the promise to Jeanne. So clearly the author does not have to believe that one should never break a promise.