Q23 - Anthony: It has been established

[Greatsk8erman]

Why not E? I thought Judith did a very good job of questioning the possibility of Anthony just throwing out conclusions from statistics......

[aileenann]

It's true that part of what Judith did was show that Anthony's use of statistics in this case could be misleading, but I think (E) would have to go quite a bit deeper than that. In particular, (E)'s use of the phrase "calling into question the possibility of EVER establishing causal connections" goes too far. Judith is really only interested in this example - she's not talking about how to establish causality generally with the use of statistics.

I hope that helps. Let me know if you have more questions.

[Greatsk8erman]

I see. The word "ever" is an indicator word that was definitely too extreme, and the end of what Judith said would lead into a clearly false conclusion. Thanks!

[jardinsouslapluie5]

Why not (B)?

[nflamel69]

Because you can't derive absurd consequences from the conclusion. the conclusion is marijuana lead to use of heroin. It's the false reasoning that led you to the conclusion could produce other false conclusions.

[julia.lynch]

Could someone kindly explain why D is correct and why B is wrong? I'm not seeing any false conclusions in Judith's statement. Thank you!

[gaheexlee]

Could someone kindly explain why D is correct and why B is wrong? I'm not seeing any false conclusions in Judith's statement. Thank you!

When I did the test, I actually eliminated D too because I matched "true conclusion" with the water and heroine correlation part of the stimulus. I'll try to explain how I eventually reconciled it as the correct answer!

So Anthony's logic rests on the fact that because there is a correlation between heroin and marijuana use, that marijuana causes heroin. Classic correlation to causation flaw.

Judith then replies by saying that there's also a perfect correlation between heroin use and water drinking, but that it would be absurd to think that drinking water causes heroin use. Essentially, Judith applies Anthony's reasoning to show how correlation cannot lead to causation.

If you think about her water example in terms of correlation-causation, it may become easier to understand that while it IS true to conclude that 100% of heroin users drink water, it is FALSE to conclude as answer choice D says, to say as Anthony does that water causes heroin use.

In choosing D as the correct answer, we need to realize that Judith isn't saying there is a correlation between water and heroin, but that there is a causation since she's applying Anthony's point.

I know I repeated myself many times but hope that helped!

[maryadkins]

This is a tricky one, huh?

Anthony says that 80% of heroin users used pot.

Judith says this is stupid as a justification for arguing that pot leads to heroin use because 100% of them drank water.

Zing, Judith!

So (B) and (D) are both attractive because they both boil down what Judith is doing, which is saying, let's apply your logic in a way that we get this obviously ridiculous result.

The difference between (B) and (D) is that (B) says she shows that "his conclusion is a statement from which" absurd consequences can be derived. Is that what leads to the absurdity, though? His conclusion statement?

His conclusion statement is: smoking pot leads to heroin use.

Is that the part from which absurd consequences arise? No. That may actually be true, she says.

It's the EVIDENCE he uses that she has such a problem with.

She doesn't actually use any of his actual statements to argue anything; she uses similar reasoning.

(D) says this: that she uses his line of reasoning.