PT11.S4.Q24 - Mainstream economic theory holds that manufacturers

buckmartin

How did you guys determine which sentence was the main conclusion? The sentence beginning with "However" seems to support the last sentence.

Admin note: edited title

Lucas Carter

Hey, so the first sentence begins by discussing Mainstream Economic Theory. This sentence is telling us about a norm or common thought of other people. 98/100 times that we are told about other peoples opinions in an argument, it is because the author is going to form an argument to respond to their opinion. For example, some people say x, however this is not the case because y. Or some people say x, I agree with them and would like to add that y also supports x.

The next sentence begins with "However". This term is a common term to use when shifting from other peoples opinion to the author's. The second sentence tells us that instead of responding to needs and desires of consumers, manufacturers are actually manipulating the needs and desires. This goes against what the mainstream theory in the first sentence tells us but appears unsupported. Additionally, we are told that most people who watch television know that manufacturers are manipulating needs and desires.

The third sentence begins with "Since" which generally introduces a premise and we are told that mainstream economists watch television, therefore their motive in the theory must be based on something other than truth. We have to push together all of our information now.

The mainstream economists watching television is a premise to support the final sentence of them having other motives. This is a premise because of the word since and also because we know that most television viewers know that manufacturers are manipulating consumer demand while manufacturers are stating in their theory that manufacturers are responding to demand. This argument is claiming that these 2 views are incompatible with each other and that there must be another motive.

The sentence beginning with "However" does support the last sentence or the main conclusion because it shows why mainstream economic theorists watching tv means that their motives must be something other than scientific truth. The fact that they watch TV must be pushed together with the information that most TV watchers know that manufacturers are manipulating consumer demand and with the fact that the theorists claim manufacturers are simply responding to demand. All of this information pushed together supports the last sentence or main conclusion. I think this is a good example of a main point question where you have to push all the statements together to understand what they are doing in relation to each other. Hopefully this helps!!