Self-study
Educator: It has been argued that our professional organization should make decisions about important issues—such as raising dues and taking political stands—by a direct vote of all members rather than by having members vote for officers who in turn make the decisions. ████ █████ ████ ████████ ██ ███ █████ ███ ██ ██████ █████ ████████ ███ ███ ████ ██ ███ █████ ██████████ ██ ████ ████ ██████ ██ █████████ ██████████████ ██████ ██ ███████████ ███ ████████ ██ ██ ███████ ████ ██ ███████████ ███ ██████ ██ █ ██████ ████ ██ █ ██████ ██████
Summary
The educator’s organization should make decisions by electing officers to represent them, rather than through a direct vote. Why would electing officers be better? It would give each member more influence over the decisions being made.
Notable Assumptions
The educator concludes that members should vote on officers to make decisions, but her only support is that this would allow each member to have more influence over the decisions being made. We don’t know how much influence each member should have, however, so the author is assuming each member ought to have significant influence over these decisions.
The right answer will bridge this gap by establishing that the organization should, in fact, give its members much influence over decision-making.
19.
Which one of the following ██████████ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████████ ██████████
a
No procedure for ██████ ██████████████ █████████ ██████ █████ ███ ████████████ ████ ██ █████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ████████
The argument is comparing each member’s voting power to themselves, not to each other. As long as each member’s individual power is maximized, we don’t care if some members have more power than others.
b
Outcomes of organizational █████████ ██████ ██ █████████ █████████ ██ █████ ███████ ██ ███ ████████████ ██ █ ██████ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ █████ ████ ███ █████████
Irrelevant. The author is not concerned with the outcomes of any elections or decisions, only with how those decisions are made.
c
Important issues facing █████████████ ██████ ██ ███████ ██ ██████ ███ ███ ██████ █████ ████ ████ ██ █████████ ███ ███████████ ████████ ██ ███ ███████
(C) wants us to assume that officers can devote their full time to making decisions and that other members cannot, but the stimulus doesn’t give us this information. As such, we can’t use this principle.
d
An officer of ██ ████████████ ██████ ███ ████ █ ██████████ ████████ ██ ██ █████ ██████ █ ████████ ██ ███ ██████████████ ███████ █████ ███████ ██ ████ █████████
Irrelevant. (D) gives us information about what decisions officers should make, but the argument is concerned with whether we should have officers in the first place.
e
An organization's procedures ███ ██████ ██████████████ █████████ ██████ ████████ ███ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ ███ ████████████ ██ █████████ ███ █████████ █████
If members should be given as much influence as possible over decisions being made, then the educator’s organization should vote for officers instead of directly, as this would maximize each member’s influence. This establishes the relevancy of the premise and allows the conclusion to be properly drawn.