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Tough CR

by hemant.dunga » Mon Jul 20, 2009 11:20 am
Activist: Food producers irradiate food in order to prolong its shelf life. Five animal studies were recently conducted to investigate whether this process alters food in a way that could be dangerous to people who eat it. The studies concluded that irradiated food is safe for human to eat. However, because these studies were subsequently found by a panel of independent scientists to be seriously flawed in their methodology, it follows that irradiated food is not safe for human consumption.

The reasoning in the activist’s argument is flawed because that argument

(A) treats a failure to prove a claim as constituting proof of the denial of that claim

(B) treat methodological flaws in past studies as proof that it is currently not possible to devise methodologically adequate alternatives

(C) fails to consider the possibility that even a study whose methodology has no serious flaws nonetheless might provide only weak support for it’s conclusion

(D) fails to consider the possibility that what is safe for animals might not always be safe for human beings

(E) fails to establish that the independent scientists know more about food irradiation than do the people who produced the five studies
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by nervesofsteel » Mon Jul 20, 2009 3:14 pm
IMO D..

things tested on animals.. might not be safe for humans in general...
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by Domnu » Mon Jul 20, 2009 6:04 pm
I believe that the answer should be A. The rest are out of scope or misinterpret the argument.
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by Mayur Sand » Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:43 pm
why cant be B where we are talking about methodology in question.Since it is methodology that is of not high standard which led to such a scenario.Please explain
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by pandeyvineet24 » Mon Jul 20, 2009 7:47 pm
agree with B.
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by tohellandback » Mon Jul 20, 2009 8:04 pm
IMO A
the studies are flawed, that in no way proves that the food is not safe.
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by viju9162 » Mon Jul 20, 2009 8:29 pm
i didnt understand what "A" is trying to say? can anyone explain?
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by suo1987 » Tue Jul 21, 2009 6:22 am
I think its D.
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by raghavsarathy » Tue Jul 21, 2009 7:18 am
IMO - A

Author's conclusion - Irradiated foods are dangerous

Argument - The study which claimed that Irradiated foods are not dangerous are flawed in their methodology. Hence Irradiated foods are dangerous.

Just because the methodology used was wrong we are told that irradiated food is dangerous. i.e we still dont have a proof (s study) that irradiated foods are safe. Hence they are dangerous.

This is not necessarily true. This is what A attacks.

The "claim" in A is "Irradiated foods are safe". We haven't proved it and hence there is "denial of the claim" (Unsafe)
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by m&m » Tue Jul 21, 2009 9:46 am
The Activist's claim is "irradiated food is not safe for human consumption"

his premises are:
- irradiate food to elongate life
- 5 animal studies test irradiated food --> conclude it is safe
- panel disproves of study on methodological grounds


so for activist's claim to be flawed we must challenge his logic, namely:
since panel disproves of study on methodological grounds then irradiated food is not safe for consumption. Panel may agree with conclusion just not the methodology it was found.

(A) treats a failure to prove a claim as constituting proof of the denial of that claim
-- Proof is not the issue the scientists are having, we must show that methodology does not necessarily lead to conclusion

(B) treat methodological flaws in past studies as proof that it is currently not possible to devise methodologically adequate alternatives
-- the issue is not methodology it's that flawed methodology does not necessitate false conclusion

(C) fails to consider the possibility that even a study whose methodology has no serious flaws nonetheless might provide only weak support for it’s conclusion
-- Correct, no methodological issue yields weak support for conclusion then we can say that methodology and conclusion are not correlated

(D) fails to consider the possibility that what is safe for animals might not always be safe for human beings
-- not in context

(E) fails to establish that the independent scientists know more about food irradiation than do the people who produced the five studies
-- out of context
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by shibal » Tue Jul 21, 2009 10:10 am
IMO C
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by crackgmat007 » Wed Jul 22, 2009 6:29 pm
IMO A. If methodologies are flawed, one cannot conclude the opposite of what the methodology proved.
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