Self-study
Most people are indignant at the suggestion that Conclusion they are not reliable authorities about their real wants. ████ ███████████████ ████████ ██ ███ ███ ███████ ████ ██ █████████ ██ ████████ ███████ █████████ ██ █████ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ███████████ █████ █████ ██ █████ ████ ███████ ██████ █████████████ ████████ ██████████ ████ ████ ████ ████ ███████ ████ ████ ██████ █████
Argument Breakdown
The author starts by observing that most people are "indignant" at the idea that they might not be reliable authorities regarding what they really want. The author then argues that knowing what you really want is difficult and often requires hard work and risk. He adds that people tend to avoid this work and "unconsciously convince themselves" that they want what their society dictates for them.
Analysis: Main Conclusion
This is a bit of a tricky structure for a Main Conclusion question, because the author does not directly state his main point in a separate sentence. Rather, he first states that "most people" don't like the idea that they aren't reliable authorities about their real wants, then the rest of the stimulus defends that idea — i.e., that they really aren't reliable authorities about their wants. In other words, as you read the last three sentences, you should ask yourself, "So what?": What's the point of saying that "such self-knowledge" (knowledge of one's own wants) requires hard work, and people unconsciously internalize what their society says they should want instead? The point is to support the claim that most people are not reliable authorities about what they want, even though most people don't like that idea. So we know that idea is the main point of the argument.
10.
The main point of the ████████ ██ ████
a
acquiring self-knowledge can ██ █████
Incorrect. Though the author claims that acquiring the kind of self-knowledge involved in knowing one's real wants can be risky, he makes that claim to explain why most people don't acquire that kind of self-knowledge and thus are not reliable authorities about their own wants. Since this claim is used as support for another claim, it is not the main conclusion.
b
knowledge of what ███ ██████ █████ ██ ███ ██ █████████ ██ ██ ██ ███████ ███████ ██ ██
Incorrect. The author never comments on how desirable people "usually" think it is to know what one really wants.
c
people cannot really ████ ████ ████ ██████ ████
Incorrect. The author never claims that it is impossible to know what one should want. In fact, he never even talks about what people should want, only about what people really (i.e., actually) want.
d
people usually avoid ██████ █████████ █████████
Incorrect. The author does suggest that people avoid the hard work of acquiring self-knowledge about their own wants. But he never claims that in general, people avoid making difficult decisions.
e
people are not ███████████ ████████ ███████████ █████ ████ ████ ██████ ████
Correct. The whole argument is meant to support the idea that even though most people don't like the idea, they actually might not be reliable authorities about their own desires.