PT114.S3.P2.Q9 > Analytics

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Intellectual authority is defined as the authority of arguments that prevail by virtue of good reasoning and do not depend on coercion or convention. █ ███████████ ███████ █████████████ ██████████ ██████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ██████ ████████████ ██ ███████ ██████████ ██ █████████ ████ ███ ██ ███ ███ ███████ ████████████ ██████████ ███

Intro to Concepts · Intellectual v. Institutional Authority

Intellectual authority is founded on good reasoning whereas institutional authority is founded on the coercive power of social institutions.

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Question · Is the authority wielded by the courts institutional or intellectual?

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One Judge · claims courts have purely intellectual authority

Critics · claim courts have purely institutional authority

Some even say that intellectual authority doesn't exist.

Author’s Critique of Critics · Intellectual authority is real and different from institutional authority

Support: Some arguments accepted by institutions are later rejected on intellectual grounds; some arguments rejected by institutions are later recognized on intellectual grounds.

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Critics' Rebuttal to Author · Intellectual authority depends on institutional recognition

E.g., if a composer lingered in obscurity for 20 years and is hence judged to not be a genius, is that an intellectual or institutional judgment? You might say it's intellectual, i.e., a judgment on the merits, i.e., he's just a bad composer. But critics might say, hold on, how do you know 20 years is long enough to recognize merit or lack thereof? Why not 30 years or 70? The length of time is purely an institutional convention. Hence, even what seems like an intellectual judgment is actually an institutional one.

Critics' Rebuttal · Legal precedent is example of institutional authority

Judges decide cases based on how similar cases were previously decided.

Author’s Critique · Intellectual authority enables judges to reconsider, revise, or overrule precedent

Author's Main Point · Even if most of legal power is institutional, there is a significant amount of intellectual power as well.

Passage Style

Critique or debate

Which one of the following ████ ██████████ ██████ ███ ████ ████ ██ ███ ████████

Question Type

Main point

The main idea of this Critique passage is a criticism of the argument that courts have purely institutional authority. The author concludes here that, even if most of their power is institutional, legal systems also have a significant amount of intellectual authority.

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Instead of (A), the author argues that although some claim that the authority of legal systems is purely institutional, these systems also possess a degree of intellectual authority, since judges can reconsider— not enforce— badly reasoned decisions.

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In P1, the author describes the perspective of one judge, who thinks that legal systems are vehicles for applying the intellectual authority of the law, and that they don’t have coercive power of their own. But the author doesn’t agree with this, and it’s not the main idea of the passage. Instead, the author concludes here that even if most of legal systems’ power is institutional, they also have a significant amount of intellectual authority.

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Instead of (C), the author argues that although some claim that the authority of legal systems is purely institutional, these systems actually have both institutional and intellectual authority. The author does not agree that intellectual authority reduces to institutional authority.

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The main idea of the passage is articulated here.. The author criticizes the claim that legal systems only have institutional authority, concluding that they also have a significant amount of intellectual authority, since judges can reconsider badly reasoned decisions.

86%

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Instead of (E), the author argues that although some claim that the authority of legal systems is purely institutional, these systems actually have both institutional and intellectual authority, since judges can reconsider— not enforce— badly reasoned decisions.

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