Politician P.

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Politician P.

by vikramveer » Wed Oct 27, 2010 12:17 am
Politician P: My opponent claims that the government is obligated to raise taxes to increase funding for schools and health care. Because raising taxes to increase funding for schools and health care would make taxpayers upset over their loss of buying power, my opponent is simply mistaken.
Politician P's reasoning is questionable because it involves
(A) presupposing that a claim is mistaken on the grounds that the person defending it advocates other unpopular views
(B) assuming that a claim is false on the grounds that the person defending it is of questionable character
(C) concluding that a view is false on the grounds that its implementation would lead to unhappiness
(D) appealing to wholly irrelevant issues to deflect attention away from the real issue
(E) insisting that an obligation exists without offering any evidence that exists


Please provide reasons for selecting and for removing an option.
Source: — Critical Reasoning |

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by saurabhmahajan » Wed Oct 27, 2010 1:37 am
IMO: C

becoz Politician P mentions that people would be upset and concludes that the opponent is mistaken.

OPTION C proves this

OA please.
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by vikramveer » Wed Oct 27, 2010 2:05 am
OA is C. But could you please explain whats wrong with A?

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by saurabhmahajan » Wed Oct 27, 2010 2:21 am
Vikram A is wrong becoz politician P does not advocates or present any of his own views.He just counter attacks his opponent's view. and thus he is not defending his view. which A says so.
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by samudranb » Wed Oct 27, 2010 2:59 am
(A) presupposing that a claim is mistaken on the grounds that the person defending it advocates other unpopular views
In this, the "person defending it" = "opponent" mentioned by Politician P.
We have no idea about the opponent advocating "other unpopular views".

Hence it is out of scope.

(E.g. if it had been mentioned that he is FOR the death penalty, which 99% of the people in his constituency disagree with... and Politician P uses THIS as his counter-argument, then A would have been the perfect answer.)

IMHO, C is right.

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by atrayee345 » Wed Dec 19, 2018 3:17 am
The argument's conclusion is that the politician's opponent is simply mistaken. The evidence for this claim is that people would be unhappy with it. The flaw here is that just because people would be unhappy with something, doesn't it make it the wrong thing to do. So, Choice C correctly describes the absurd reasoning in the stimulus.