Self-study
Political analyst: Several years ago, McFarlane, the military dictator, had Brooks, the former prime minister, arrested on charges of corruption. █████ █████ ██ ████████████ █████████ ███ ████████ ███████ ███ ███ ███ ██████ ██ ████ ███ ███████████ ██████ ███ ██ ███████████ ██████████ ███████ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ██ ███████████ █████████ ██████ ███ ██ ███████████ █████████ ████ ██████ ██████ ███ ██████ ██ ████ ███ ███████████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ███ ██████████ ██ ████ ████████
Summary
The author concludes that Brooks will have few supporters in this country.
Why?
Because almost all of the supporters of McFarlane (the current military dictator ruling the country) believe Brooks is guilty of corruption. And almost all of McFarlane’s opponents will oppose anyone who agrees to join McFarlane’s government. Brooks has agreed to join McFarlane’s government.
Notable Assumptions
The author assumes that most people in the country are either McFarlane’s supporters or McFarlane’s opponents.
The author assumes that if someone thinks Brooks is guilty of corruption, they will not support Brooks.
6.
The political analyst's argument depends ██ ███ ██████████ ████
a
Brooks's joining McFarlane's ██████████ ███████████████ █████ ████ ██████████ █ █████████ ██ ██████████
Not necessary, because the legitimacy of the government is irrelevant. What matters is whether most people support Brooks; their support for Brooks isn’t affected by the legitimacy or illegitimacy of the government.
b
there is less ██████████ ██ ███ █████████ ██████████ ███ ████ ████ ██████ ███ █████ ████████
Not necessary, because the overall amount of corruption in the government is irrelevant. What matters is whether most people support Brooks; the level of corruption in the government doesn’t affect whether people support Brooks. Although most supporters perceive Brooks as guilty of corruption, that’s a separate issue from the overall level of corruption in the government.
c
Brooks's political positions ██ ███ ███████ ████ █████ ██ █████████
Not necessary, because the argument isn’t based on the degree of overlap between Brooks’s political positions and McFarlane’s. Even if there is some overlap, it’s still the case that most supporters of McFarlane thinks Brooks is guilty of corruption, and most opponents will oppose Brooks because he agreed to join McFarlane’s government.
d
most people in ███ ███████ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ █████████ ██ █████████
Necessary, because if this were not true — if half or more people are NOT supporters and NOT opponents of McFarlane — then there’s a huge portion of the country that the premises do not address. We have no reason to think that those other people would not support Brooks. So we can’t conclude that most people in the country won’t support Brooks.
e
the charges on █████ ██████ ███ ████████ ████ █████████
Not necessary, because whether Brooks is guilty of the charge doesn’t change the fact that most supporters of McFarlane perceive Brooks as guilty of corruption.