Q4 - Giselle: The government needs

[acechaowang]

Could anyone help me confidently eliminate answer C and E? Thanks a lot!

[ohthatpatrick]

The question is specifically concerned with why Antoine's response is an ineffective rebuttal, so we definitely want a clear understanding of G's argument.

G is arguing that the govt. should raise the tax on gas because the govt. has a need to discourage petroleum use and raising the gas tax will discourage petroleum use.

Antoine could disagree with that on any of several levels:
- no, the govt. does not have a need to discourage petroleum use
- no, raising the tax will not discourage petroleum use
- no, the govt. should not raise the gas tax as its method of discouraging petroleum use (Antoine could suggest an alternative, superior method of achieving the govt.'s goal of reducing petroleum use)

Instead, Antoine launches into an argument about the unfairness of a potential gas tax increase, saying that it will disproportionately punish gas users. Antoine is saying that a fair tax increase would raise government revenue in a more equitable fashion.

Why is this a bad rebuttal? Antoine makes it seem like Giselle was focused on "how the government can raise revenue". She wasn't. Giselle was focused on "how the government can discourage petroleum use."

It doesn't matter if this gas tax "unfairly" targets gas users. The whole POINT of the tax is to target gas users (because the whole goal of the proposed tax is to discourage gas users from using as much petroleum).

It is probably easier to explain why (C) and (E) are wrong by being confident in why (A) is right: Antoine's response is part of the wrong conversation.

(C) is basically saying that it is wrong to make an argument based on the subjective idea of "fair/unfair". This is really never a flaw. You're allowed to make arguments based on subjective premises. You wouldn't want to go from a subjective premise to an objective conclusion. That could be a flaw (but almost never is).

For example,
I think Carly is beautiful. Thus, Carly is beautiful.

But Antoine's conclusion is subjective; it's about what he thinks the government should/shouldn't do. So it's fine for him to use the subjective concept of "unfairness". Also, this choice wouldn't really answer the question stem that well. Our problem with Antoine's rebuttal is not that it contains Antoine's opinion on the matter, it's that his rebuttal is mostly off topic.

(E) is not supported. How do we know Antoine assumes that something else is a more fair, evenly distributed tax than the gas tax would be? Antoine might believe that the gas tax is the closest we'll ever come to an evenly distributed tax, but still believe it falls short of being an equitable burden. Antoine might just be against all tax increases.

Again, think about how (E) answers the original question. Antoine's rebuttal of Giselle is ineffective because the gas tax might be the closest we can come to evenly distributing the burden of increasing govt. revenue?

No, the rebuttal is ineffective because the gas tax isn't being proposed to increase revenue; it's being proposed to discourage petroleum use.

Hope this helps. Let me know if you have lingering qualms.

[WaltGrace1983]

I really thought that (B) was correct and I was very confident in it. It seems that if you were to analyze Antoine's argument by itself, that would be the flaw.

Can someone go over what the differences between (A) and (B) are? I just feel like (B) is definitely a flaw and it was the first thing that I thought of when I was thinking about the flaw in the argument. I want to make sure I learn from this mistake. Thanks.

[maryadkins]

First off, and I think this is most important for you as a learning experience, notice that this question is a qualified flaw question. You're not being asked to analyze Antoine's argument on its own:"As a rebuttal of Giselle's argument..."

We are analyzing his flawed argument SOLELY in relation to how he rebuts Giselle's point; Giselle, therefore, has set the terms of the discussion. Does he rebut her point well, or not? And if not, why not?

Her point is that the government should raise taxes IN ORDER TO get the public to use less petroleum. How would knowing how many taxpayers are not petroleum users"”the point of (B)"”make his rebuttal any stronger? He could say that 20% are petroleum users or 90% are. Either way, Giselle wants petroleum taxed more to cut down on whatever that current number is.

If, hypothetically, you looked at Antoine's argument in isolation as:

Premise: Tax increases should be applied in a way that they spread the burden.

Subsidiary Conclusion: A tax increase on gas would be unfair.

Conclusion: Government should not raise the sales tax on gas.

Then we have a gap between "unfair" and what the government should do (maybe it's okay for the government to do unfair things sometimes?), and one between spreading the burden and gas users (maybe, as I think you're suggesting, everyone is a gas user so it's already spread?). But again, this isn't what we're up to here.

Hope this helps!

[WaltGrace1983]

Okay I see what I did here. I misunderstood the job. However, as for Antoine's argument, I thought that maybe if everyone was a gasoline user than maybe the tax wouldn't be unfair because it is evenly spread. Is this wrong thinking?

This strictly speaking about his argument and not the question. I understand now why (A) is right.

[jasonleb1]

Can someone explain why D is incorrect? I had it narrowed down between A and D and went with the latter because I felt that his incorrect assumption that the tax was focused only on gas users ("... not just users of gasoline.") was more controlling of his rebuttal since Giselle never says gas should be the only product have an increase in sales tax (just that it should receive such a raise).

[maryadkins]

I would think about (D) this way: if he assumed Giselle might also want sales tax increased on other things, too, would his argument have been better? How? I don't see it. I don't think it matters what Giselle's opinion is on things that aren't gas.

But let's look at (A). If he didn't ignore the fact that her point ISN'T revenue, it's decreasing petroleum use, then he wouldn't have made an argument that's all about revenue! She wasn't even concerned with revenue. She was concerned with gas use. He doesn't address her concerns at all.

Hope this helps.

[frank0478]

this is red herring!