Q22 - A book tour will be

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Match the Flaw

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: Julia's book tour must have been well publicized.
Evidence: If a book tour is well publicized and the author is an established writer, the tour will be successful. Julia's an established writer and her book tour was successful.

Answer Anticipation:
We can tell from the "if" in the first sentence that this problem is testing conditional logic. Match the Flaw questions usually pull from the ranks of classic flaws, and if we see conditional logic on a Flaw question, we should anticipate the Conditional Logic flaw. In this case, the first sentence gives us a rule that says "If A and B are true, C is true". If we know a tour is well publicized and we know the writer is established, then we can conclude the tour will be successful. The facts the author provides in the second sentence are NOT the two facts in the trigger of that conditional rule. One is from the trigger, one is from the consequence. And then the author proceeds to conclude the second idea from the trigger. So we need another argument that says, If A and B, then C. A and C happened. Thus, B must have happened.

Correct Answer:
C

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) "only if" acts like an arrow. So this is giving us a rule that says "If A, then B and C". Move on.

(B) We get our "If A and B, then C" conditional, but the 2nd premise only gave us one fact: C.

(C) This gives us an "If A and B, then C" rule. The fact sentence gives us A and C (half of the trigger and all of the consequence). The conclusion claims that the B (the other half of the trigger) must be true. Looks good! If we're confident in our work, move on and save some time (circle #22 in your book, in case you have extra time and can come back to check out the other answers)

(D) We get our "If A and B, then C" conditional, but the 2nd premise gives us A and B (both parts of the trigger). We were looking for A and C (half of the trigger, all of the consequence).

(E) Same as (D). Both of these are valid arguments that go, "If A and B, then C. A and B are both true. Thus, C must be true."

Takeaway/Pattern: Because this flaw relates to conditional logic, it would behoove us to bust out some symbols here so that it's easier to keep track of the original form and whether a given answer is replicating it. We want to save time/brainpower on these exhausting questions, so if you're explicit about what you're looking for, it's easier to be definitive about eliminating answers that DON'T match.

#officialexplanation

[AllyMaeBell]

Please see the attached explanation. Hope this helps!