Self-study
Support Because some student demonstrations protesting his scheduled appearance have resulted in violence, the president of the Imperialist Society has been prevented from speaking about politics on campus by the dean of student affairs. ███ ██ ████ ██████ ███ ████████████ ███████ ██ █████ ██ ██ ████████ ████████████ █████ ██ ████ ███████████ ██████ ███ ████████ ████████ ███ ██████████ ████████████ █████ ██ ████ ███████████
Structure: Rule-Application
The stimulus starts by describing a specific situation: the president of the Imperialist Society has been prevented by the dean from speaking about politics on campus, because there have been some violent protests. The stimulus then appeals to a general principle: "to deny anyone the unrestricted freedom to speak is to threaten everyone’s right to free expression." The stimulus concludes that the dean's decision has threatened everyone's right to free expression.
Analysis: Parallel Reasoning
Let's review the structure of this argument. We are presented with a specific situation, and then with a general principle taking the form of a conditional rule:
deny anyone unrestricted freedom → threaten everyone's right
To reach its conclusion, the argument assumes that this situation with the dean meets the sufficient condition of this rule, which seems reasonable: by restricting the Imperialist Society's president from speaking about politics on campus, the dean has, in fact, denied someone the "unrestricted freedom" to speak. Therefore, the rule applies to this situation, and (as the argument concludes), everyone's right to free expression is threatened.
So we're looking for an argument that describes a situation that meets the sufficient condition of some rule (A → B), and therefore concludes that the necessary result will occur because of this situation.
13.
The pattern of reasoning displayed █████ ██ ████ ███████ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██████████
a
Dr. Pacheco saved █ █████████ ████ ██ ██████████ █████████ ████████ ███ ███████ ██████ ████████ ███ ████ ██ ███ ████████ ██████████ ██ ██ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ██████ ██ ████████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ████ █████ ███ ███████████ ███████ ███ ███ ███████
Incorrect. Remember that the structure we're looking for: an argument that presents a specific case that meets the sufficient condition of a conditional rule provided as a premise, allowing the conclusion that the necessary result will occur. Here, the conditional rule is presented as a hypothetical appended to the conclusion ("if an act is not heroic unless it requires the actor to take some risk"). The argument also jumps from saying that surgery "rarely" involves risk to the surgeon to assuming that Dr. Pacheco definitely took no risk — an assumption that has no parallel in the stimulus.
b
Because anyone who ████████ ██ ███ ██ ███████ ████ ██████████████ ██████ ████ ██████████ █ ███████ ████ ███████ ███████ ██████████ ████████ ██████ ████ ████ ██████████████
Incorrect. Notice that there's no specific example provided in this answer choice. We just go from the general rule to a conclusion about a generic "society." This doesn't effectively parallel the stimulus.
c
In order to ██████ █ ████████ ██████ ██████ ██████ ████ █ ████████ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ █████████ ██ ████ ███ ████ ██ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ██████████ ██████ ████████ ███ █████ ██ ████
Correct. Like the stimulus, this answer choice provides the details of a specific situation. We are then given a rule that applies to the situation, and the conclusion is that, because the situation meets the sufficient condition of the rule (Isabel's action counts as "an act of heroism performed to save the life of one"), the necessary result will follow: everyone's life is enriched. (C) effectively parallels the stimulus.
d
Fire fighters are █████ ████████ ██ ███████ ██████████ █████ █████ ███████████ ███ ██ ███ ██ ████ ████████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██████ ████ ████████ ███ █████ ████████ ██ ███████ ███████ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ██ ████████
Incorrect. Not only do we lack a specific example, as in the stimulus and (C), the rule that is appealed to here doesn't provide an additional consequence that the firefighters' actions bring about. We're only given an additional moral description about whether or not those actions are "required."
e
Acts of extreme ██████████ ███ ███████ █████ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ██ █████ ██████████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ██████████ ███ ███████ █████ ███ ███████ ████ ███ █████ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ██ ████ ███ ███████
Incorrect. Like (D), this answer choice fails because it doesn't focus on a specific case and because it doesn't reach a conclusion about an additional consequence of the actions being described — it just provides another description of such actions. We also have a jump from "usually" in the premises to "most" in the conclusion, which isn't paralleled in the stimulus.