not to have children

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not to have children

by thephoenix » Sat May 22, 2010 3:50 am
Dillworth: More and more people are deciding not to have children because of the personal and economic sacrifices children require and because so often children are ungrateful for the considerable sacrifices their parents do make for them. However, such considerations have no bearing on the fact that their children provide the best chance most people have of ensuring that their values live on after them. Therefore, for anyone with deeply held values, foregoing parenthood out of reluctance to make sacrifices for which little gratitude can be expected would probably be a mistake.
Travers: Your reasoning ignores another fact that deserves consideration: children's ingratitude for parental sacrifices usually stems from a wholesale rejection of parental values.
18. Dillworth employs which one of the following argumentative strategies?
(A) showing that considerations cited as drawbacks to given course of action are not really drawbacks at all
(B) exposing as morally suspect the motives of people who would make the choice that Dillworth rejects
(C) indirectly establishing that a given course of action is obligatory by arguing that the alternative course of action is prohibited
(D) distinguishing a category of person for whom the reason presented in favor of a given course of action is more telling than the reasons cited against that course of action
(E) using evidence that a certain course of action would be appropriate under one set of conditions to arrive at a general conclusion about what would be appropriate in all cases

[spoiler]again i was confused b/n two wrong ans A and E[/spoiler]
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by grockit_andrea » Sat May 22, 2010 4:50 am
I would say D for this one.

A. The drawback is children's lack of gratitude for the sacrifices parents make. The author doesn't try to make that not a drawback, but merely points out that the the advantage of having one's deeply held values passed on would outweigh that drawback.
B. "Morally suspect" is a strong phrase, and is inappropriate here.
C. Again, "obligatory" and "prohibited" are strong words, too strong for this argument.
D. This is correct. The conclusion mentions "For anyone with deeply held values," which distinguishes that class of person, and then presents a reason why the advantage of having children might outweigh the disadvantage.
E. The "one set of conditions" here is that people with deeply held values might find it important to have children despite the drawbacks. But no general conclusion is drawn from that.
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