PT8.S2.Q23

PrepTest 8 - Section 2 - Question 23

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Anthony: It has been established that over 80 percent of those who use heroin have a history of having used marijuana. ████ ████████ █████ ████ ██ █████ ████ ███████ █████████ ██████████ █████ ██ ██████ ████

███████ █████ ███████ █████████ ████ ████ ██ ██████ ████ ███ ██ ██ ██████ ██ █████ ████ ██████ █████ ██████████ ██████ ████ ██ █████ █████ ████ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ██ ██████ ███ █ ████████ ███████ ██ ████████ ██████

Objective: Describe Judith's Method of Reasoning

Anthony claims that using marijuana leads to heroin use, because a large majority of heroin users also have a history of marijuana use. Judith replies to this argument, concluding that Anthony's evidence doesn't support his conclusion, even if the conclusion itself could be true. Judith supports this by suggesting an analogous argument: all heroin users have a history of drinking water, so why not conclude that drinking water leads to heroin use?

By drawing this analogy to a clearly ridiculous argument, Judith reveals a significant problem with Anthony's argument. Just saying that many heroin users have participated in another behavior, without additional evidence about how common that behavior is among non-heroin-users, doesn't actually support a causal relationship with heroin use. Based on Anthony's evidence, it's equally possible that marijuana use is just very popular among both heroin users and non-heroin-users.

Answer Choice Strategy

The answer choices will likely use abstract language, so it will be useful to make that language concrete to understand whether it actually describes Judith's reasoning. For example, if an answer choice says Judith "suggests an analogous argument," we should be able to identify the specific analogous argument in question. If an answer choice doesn't link back to concrete parts of Judith's argument, it might be incorrect. This can also be easier to test if we break each answer choice into parts, and check each part.

We should also keep in mind that incorrect answer choices will all have some inaccuracy, while the correct answer will not be inaccurate at all. So if an answer choice says something inaccurate, we can eliminate. The correct answer might describe only one facet of Judith's reasoning, or may approach it in an unintuitive way, but it will never be inaccurate.

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23.

Judith’s reply to Anthony’s argument ██████ ██ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ █████████████ ███████████

a

offering evidence suggesting ████ ███ ██████████ ███████ █████ ██ ███████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███ ██████████

Judith doesn't claim Anthony's statistics are inaccurate, just that they don't actually support his conclusion.

0%
b

undermining the credibility ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ███████ ████ ██ ██ █ █████████ ████ █████ ██████ ████████████ ███ ██ ███████

Judith does undermine the credibility of Anthony's conclusion—so far so good. But she doesn't show that Anthony's conclusion leads to absurd consequences. Rather, Judith shows that an analogous argument would lead to the conclusion that drinking water causes heroin use.

For (B) to be correct, Judith would have to show that absurd consequences follow from accepting that marijuana use can lead to heroin use. But she actually accepts this conclusion as something that could be true; she just doesn't think Anthony adequately supported it.

15%
c

providing an example ██ ████ ████ ███ ██████████ ████ ████████ ██████ ███ ██ ██████

Judith doesn't give any examples of behaviors that might promote heroin use. She does say that all heroin users have a history of drinking water, but that doesn't mean drinking water promotes heroin use. It's rather a way to show that not everything heroin users have done necessarily led to them using heroin.

2%
d

demonstrating that Anthony’s ████ ██ █████████ ██ ██████ ██ ███████ ████ ████ █████████ ███ ████ ██ ███████ █████ ███████████

Judith does demonstrate that Anthony's line of reasoning is flawed: she says his evidence doesn't support his conclusion. And she does so by showing that similar reasoning could lead to the ridiculous conclusion that drinking water leads to heroin use. (D) accurately describes Judith's reasoning.

60%
e

calling into question ███ ███████████ ██ ████ ████████████ ██████ ███████████ ██████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ███████████ ████████

Judith doesn't have a problem with the use of statistics in general; the issue is that Anthony uses a particular statistic which, by itself, doesn't support his conclusion. If Anthony showed that almost all marijuana users went on to use heroin, then his argument would work—he just needs to add more statistics.

Looking closely at Judith's argument, she has an issue with Anthony's specific choice of statistics, not statistics overall. It's unwarranted to assume Judith rejects all causal claims based on statistics.

23%

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