How to distinguish between context and premise?

jeanchan

Just as the title says, I was wondering if anyone has any tips in regards to noting what you would categorize as context and what you would categorize as premise. I feel like there is a blurred line from my understanding.

jilliankirkland

Assuming you’re able to identify a conclusion from at least one other premise provided, ask yourself “why does the author want me to believe this?” about that conclusion. If you can answer that with “because (insert possible premise,” then that piece of information is doing something to support the conclusion. If it doesn’t make the conclusion more believable, even in some small way, then it’s likely just there to set the scene for the actual argument.

Remember that intermediate/sub-conclusions are just premises for another conclusion, so this method can also help you identify those. If you have trouble figuring out which one is the main conclusion and which is the sub-conclusion, try the question above two different ways: one time with one of them as the conclusion, then another time with that same conclusion as the premise. Read it both ways and see which way makes the most sense and in that case, the “because” will be the sub-conclusion and whatever offers proof for believing is the main conclusion.

Argument parts were very difficult for me to identify when I was brand new at this. I got the first 10 Actual Preptest books (the one with test #s below 18) and did days of practice where I’d put a post-it note over the questions and answer choices, and just identify and underline the conclusions in each stimulus. I also practiced the same way but with just reading the stimulus, then covering it up and writing down what I remember or how I would summarize it. You can also use a 10 Actual book and the post-it note thing to practice prephrasing/predicting answers. I did all of those and immediately noticed that LR seemed way easier from that point forward. I also found that once I was able to identify the conclusions consistently, questions about the other argument parts or structure were also more intuitive.

Hope that helps

beyondpossum

Premises are propositions explicitly expressed in the stimulus which feed into the conclusion. Context, meanwhile, comprises facts about the world of the stimulus, or about how to interpret language (e.g., polysemous language) in the stimulus, that you can glean without it being explicitly stated. So if the stimulus says "fish move at 3 mph", from context we can glean that the fish are swimming rather than flying, and also that "fish" has the sense of the type of animal, rather than the more exotic sense of "caught criminal".

jilliankirkland

To put simply, background or contextual information is something that is not a premise (because it doesn’t support a conclusion) and is not a conclusion. That means it could be contextual if it elaborates on a premise or conclusion, or not (i.e. it could be related to the general subject of the argument but won’t actually clarify or lead into any structural part of it).