Diff. version

All NBA players are athletic.

Lebron James is an NBA player.

Therefore, Lebron James is athletic.

Everyone that is athletic is a desirable mate.

Lebron James is a desirable mate.

I am confused about why the tiger example from last lesson is treated as an argument while the linguistics example in #3 is not.

In the tiger case, the conclusion that not every mammal is suitable as a pet requires the unstated assumption that animals which are very aggressive and can seriously injure people are not suitable pets. That assumption is not explicitly stated, yet you guys still say it's a premise supporting a conclusion.

In the linguistics case, it seems similarly reasonable to supply an unstated assumption that comparative analyses of languages across many regions and eras support the claim that human communication is universal. If you conduct an analysis on something, don't you have to discover it in the first place, meaning it has existed???

I am struggling to see why supplying an unstated assumption is allowed in the first case but not in the second.

Lawyer Wilkins