Q21 - A smoker trying to quit

[qtcherrysyrup]

Hi.
Could you explain each answer choice?
I chose A but the correct answer is D : People generally do not find it easy to deceive themselves.

Thanks!

[giladedelman]

Thanks for your question!

So, as with all assumption family questions, it's absolutely essential that we nail down the core. In this case, it's

P: exaggeration-of-danger strategies require deception
--> C: individuals can't easily adopt them unless third party provides warning.

Notice that the first two sentences simply provide background, letting us know what strategies the argument is talking about.

So, the gap seems to be that deception is difficult unless a third party does it -- in other words, that self-deception isn't easy.

(D) is correct because it identifies this assumption. If people did find it easy to deceive themselves, then the conclusion wouldn't make any sense; individuals would be able to adopt these strategies easily without a third party.

(A) explains why the strategy might work, but it doesn't explain why doctors or another third party are necessary for it to be adopted easily.

(B) is irrelevant. The overlap between smoking and other habits isn't what we care about; we care about whether the strategy is easy for individuals.

(C) is a premise booster. We already know the strategy can work.

(E) is out of scope; the argument isn't about whether the deception is justified.

Does that clear this one up for you?

[jamiejames]

Thanks for your question!

So, as with all assumption family questions, it's absolutely essential that we nail down the core. In this case, it's

P: exaggeration-of-danger strategies require deception
--> C: individuals can't easily adopt them unless third party provides warning.

Notice that the first two sentences simply provide background, letting us know what strategies the argument is talking about.

So, the gap seems to be that deception is difficult unless a third party does it -- in other words, that self-deception isn't easy.

(D) is correct because it identifies this assumption. If people did find it easy to deceive themselves, then the conclusion wouldn't make any sense; individuals would be able to adopt these strategies easily without a third party.

(A) explains why the strategy might work, but it doesn't explain why doctors or another third party are necessary for it to be adopted easily.

(B) is irrelevant. The overlap between smoking and other habits isn't what we care about; we care about whether the strategy is easy for individuals.

(C) is a premise booster. We already know the strategy can work.

(E) is out of scope; the argument isn't about whether the deception is justified.

Does that clear this one up for you?

it does, thank you!

[tzyc]

I'm still a little not sure about (D)...
The stimulus says "individual cannot easily adopt them" and I thought this means what (D) says...they cannot deceive themselves. Both of them contain the word "easy" (easily) too.
Or does what the stimulus says actually mean the strategy to break the habit?

Thank you!

[ohthatpatrick]

I'm still a little not sure about (D)...
The stimulus says "individual cannot easily adopt them" and I thought this means what (D) says...they cannot deceive themselves. Both of them contain the word "easy" (easily) too.
Or does what the stimulus says actually mean the strategy to break the habit?

Thank you!

What you're describing there, that (D) sounds like what you already heard, is often the sign of a correct answer. If you're like, "Well, duh, didn't the author say that?", then there's a good chance your brain naturally filled in the assumption as you read the argument. So when you read the correct answer, it already sounds familiar.

The stimulus says "individuals cannot easily adopt them". What is them ?

Them = Such strategies

What strategies?

Such strategies = "exaggerating the danger of a bad habit so you can quit that habit"

So the stimulus, specifically the conclusion, says "individuals, on their own, cannot easily exaggerate the danger of a bad habit in order to quit that habit", whereas (D) says "individuals cannot easily deceive themselves".

Those are two different ideas, even though they're obviously somewhat similar.

Again the core is,
P: Since these strategies involve deception
C: Ppl can't easily adopt them on their own

So we need the link that (D) provides between 'involving deception' and 'being difficult to do by yourself'.

Let me know if that doesn't clarify.

[tzyc]

Thanks for the reply, now I see it

What you're describing there, that (D) sounds like what you already heard, is often the sign of a correct answer. If you're like, "Well, duh, didn't the author say that?", then there's a good chance your brain naturally filled in the assumption as you read the argument. So when you read the correct answer, it already sounds familiar.

I like your advice...but just wondering, how can we know it's not a premise booster or re-statement of a sentence in the stimulus?
Under timed condition, how can I distinguish them? Sorry if it's an elementary question, but sometimes I do not have time to read answer choices twice so...
Appreciate your insight.

[ohthatpatrick]

I'm not sure I've ever seen an answer choice actually re-state a fact or claim from the stimulus.

There's probably a handful of examples among the 1000's of questions, but it would be incredibly rare.

What normally happens is that an answer choice reminds us of something we've already read/heard.

In those cases, the 'familiar idea' is either
1 - a near-restatement of an individual fact, only it's subtly distorted so that it's not REALLY saying the same thing
or it's
2 - a statement that connects two ideas that were implied to go together .. or an idea that was implied but never stated.

1's would be wrong.

2's would be Necessary Assumptions.

So if you read an answer choice and you're like, "Didn't we already say that?", you would have to check back with the stimulus.

If you find a sentence that looks a lot like the answer choice, read the two VERY carefully and try to notice how one is different from the other. (But basically, eliminate it, it's a trap)

If you find there's no sentence that actually says what the answer choice says, it's just that the answer choice blends together a couple things that were talked about separately, that could very well be a correct answer.

I don't want to try to turn this into something too formulaic, because this is NOT a mechanical process that is the same from question to question.

But generally, if you THINK an answer choice is just repeating something you've heard, you can either find the similar sounding thought and realize, "oh, nevermind. the stimulus said something slightly different. I'll eliminate this" or you can TRY to find the similar sounding thought and realize, "oh, I guess he never actually DID say this. I was just assuming he thought this" (in which case you're probably looking at the right answer).

[WaltGrace1983]

I am a bit intrigued by (A). It seems like it could totally be the correct answer if it was diluted a bit to say "People tend to believe some things that doctors tell them."

However, this wouldn't necessarily get at the gap between the premise (But since such strategies involve deception) and the conclusion. Is this a necessary component of an NA question, that is to (at least slightly) help to bridge the gap between the premise and conclusion?

On the other hand, (A) still probably wouldn't be right even if it did say "some things" because the conclusion says a "doctor or some other third party." With this little "or" statement, I guess it wouldn't be true that the doctors HAVE TO BE involved at all.

Interesting.

Thoughts?

[ohthatpatrick]

I think you nailed it.

The focus of the logic is that "you CAN'T easily use this strategy yourself ... you MUST use someone else".

It doesn't matter if that someone else is a doctor. I think it is fair to say that the author thinks that people tend to believe AT LEAST SOME things a doctor says. Contained in the notion of 'deception' is the idea that the deceived believed the deceiver.

But the doctor discussion is a bit of a red herring to the author's actual argument core. The author provides the doctor/smoking example for context, but the author is really talking about whether you can employ the strategy of exaggerating danger to break a bad habit. The core is ultimately as simple as "Because deception is required, you can't employ the strategy without a third party"

[WaltGrace1983]

I think you nailed it.

The focus of the logic is that "you CAN'T easily use this strategy yourself ... you MUST use someone else".

It doesn't matter if that someone else is a doctor. I think it is fair to say that the author thinks that people tend to believe AT LEAST SOME things a doctor says. Contained in the notion of 'deception' is the idea that the deceived believed the deceiver.

But the doctor discussion is a bit of a red herring to the author's actual argument core. The author provides the doctor/smoking example for context, but the author is really talking about whether you can employ the strategy of exaggerating danger to break a bad habit. The core is ultimately as simple as "Because deception is required, you can't employ the strategy without a third party"

Hey thanks for the reply, Patrick! I truly appreciate it. Do you have any thoughts on my previous question?

However, this wouldn't necessarily get at the gap between the premise (But since such strategies involve deception) and the conclusion. Is this a necessary component of an NA question, that is to (at least slightly) help to bridge the gap between the premise and conclusion?

So, for example, NA questions usually focus on a term shift. Is addressing this term shift pretty much necessary? If I say something like, "Manhattan is a great place to work. Patrick works at Manhattan. Therefore, Patrick enjoys working at Manhattan." Obviously, there is that gap between "working
and "enjoying," place X can be a great place to work but that doesn't necessarily mean you enjoy it. Would the "enjoyment" be a necessary part of the right answer? Maybe this hypothetical stimulus is too rudimentary. Either way, if you see what I'm saying, what do you think?

[ohthatpatrick]

Let’s take your example:

Patrick works at Manhattan. Manhattan is a great place to work. Therefore, Patrick enjoys working at Manhattan.

So our core, of course, is:

Works at great place to work "”> enjoys working there

And your question is essentially "does enjoyment have to be in the correct answer"?

Generally speaking, yes. For Sufficient Assumption, DEFINITELY yes.

It’s a little more nuanced an answer for Necessary Assumption/Flaw/Strengthen/Weaken because the arguments we see in those question types often have more than one potential gap.

Sufficient Assumption is designed to only have one missing idea, so that we can identify the correct answer that supplies the missing idea and COMPLETES the logic.

All the other questions are just shades-of-gray type answers: they make the argument somewhat better or worse without actually proving or refuting them.

Consider this argument:

Governments that censor their national media inevitably succumb to revolution. Therefore, France will one day see its capital building burned to the ground.

We never mentioned France until the conclusion. Does "France" have to be in the correct answer?

Not necessarily. It WOULD be a correct answer to say "France’s government censors its national media". But it would also be a correct answer to say "At least some nations that succumb to revolution see their capital building burnt to the ground".

Another type of exception would be something like this:

Bob is crying. Therefore, Bob must be cutting onions.

Can we demand that "cutting onions" be in the correct answer? (something like "cutting onions can make one cry") No, because a correct answer could ALSO be something like "Bob’s dog did not just die".

When an author’s conclusion is essentially offering an EXPLANATION for or INTERPRETATION of some fact the author presented, then the most typical correct answer deals with an alternative explanation/interpretation.

For those types of answers, the idea in the conclusion is really never directly dealt with. In a subtle sense, these answers still deal with "bridging the gap", because to go from "Bob crying" to "Bob cutting onions", you are making the assumption that "cutting onions is the only thing that makes Bob cry", so you are assuming nothing else made him cry.

I think you’re might be right about saying that NA questions "usually" focus on a term shift, but if you ARE right, it’s probably only about 51-60% of the time.

I think slightly more than half of them PROVIDE A MISSING LINK whereas the other 45% of the time, the correct answer RULES OUT A POTENTIAL OBJECTION / ALTERNATIVE EXPLANATION

Although the latter type of answer still relates to the gap between the premise and the conclusion, it’s harder to understand those answers as "bridging the gap" the way MISSING LINK answers do. It’s easier to think about them like we do with the Negation Test: if this idea were NOT true, it would suddenly become a huge objection to the argument.

Let me know if that didn’t make sense or answer the question.

[WaltGrace1983]

Patrick, WOW! Thanks for the detailed response. If I could give you a pay raise and a cookie I totally would.

Governments that censor their national media inevitably succumb to revolution. Therefore, France will one day see its capital building burned to the ground.

We never mentioned France until the conclusion. Does "France" have to be in the correct answer?

Not necessarily. It WOULD be a correct answer to say "France’s government censors its national media". But it would also be a correct answer to say "At least some nations that succumb to revolution see their capital building burnt to the ground".

I really like this example. It shows how tricky NA correct answers could be. Now this hypothetical answer - "at least some nations that succumb to revolution see their capital building burnt to the ground" - is correct simply because the conclusion is based off the premises. In other words, there ABSOLUTELY is an implicit assumption that France censors its media because this is the central premise, or the reason, why the author draws her conclusion. The author MUST be assuming this. However, not only is the author assuming this point, but she is adding another necessary assumption onto this, focusing on the gap between "censoring media" and "getting burned to the ground." While "France" represents perhaps the biggest gap, this gap between censorship and getting burned is a smaller, but just as a necessary, gap that needs to be addressed.

Is that the correct thinking?

Now as for your other example about the Bob and the onions, this is an area in which I want to really firm up my understanding. Obviously the negation test tells us that if the premises do not necessarily lead to the conclusion (when an answer choice is negated), that answer choice is right. However, I have a hard time deciding when the premises are the ONLY way to lead to the conclusion. When you have an argument that says...

X didn't happen → Therefore, Y didn't happen

Are we assuming that X is the ONLY way to get to Y? Because if there were OTHER WAYS to get to Y then it seems like we would wonder, "well then why the hell are you so bent out of shape about X not happen? Z can lead to Y too!"

Similarly...

X did happen → Therefore, Y happened too

We would be assuming that X is sufficient for Y, but not exactly necessary right?

Basically, I have a hard time deciding when the conclusions based on premises are assuming that something is the ONLY way it could happen versus it is merely SUFFICIENT for it happening, but not exactly the only.

I hope that makes sense.

Thank you so much for the help though! As I said, this really means a lot to me!

[ohthatpatrick]

Thanks for the virtual cookie. Mmmmm, snickerdoodles.

Your examples were exactly right. I know what you mean, though, about being confused/hesitant about whether your author is actually assuming something so harsh as to be a Sufficient or Necessary idea. We are justified in saying the author is assuming something so harsh if the author is CERTAIN of his conclusion based on his one premise.

So if you say X didn't happen, therefore Y must not have happened.

Then you HAVE to assume that X is necessary to Y.

You're making a certain move from
~X --> ~Y
which can be re-written as
Y ---requires--> X

If you say that X did happen, therefore Y must have happened

Then you HAVE to assume that X is sufficient for Y.

We normally distrust the extreme language in Nec. Assump. but it's important to be flexible and sensitive to this possibility. If the author's conclusion is in no way watered down or qualified by any uncertainty, then the author really IS assuming some black and white conditional connection between the evidence and the conclusion.

Hopefully that made sense.