Q5 - Letter to the editor:

[tzyc]

Is the "characteristic" in (A) rich?? (rich=a movie star/celebrity/just wanted to make it simple to think...)
The editor says since a movie star or celebrity cite middle-class families are responsible for ecological damage, it should not be taken too seriously because they are rich and they may be the people who actually destroy the environment?
Did I read the stimuli correct??

I chose (E) for this question, thinking it maybe generalizes about the behavior of all people (movie stars/cerebrities) on the basis of a few (a movie star/a cerebrity).

But when I took a second glance...it says "if widely adopted", so the editor does not generalize...maybe?

Could anyone plz help me to clear this up?

[timmydoeslsat]

Is the "characteristic" in (A) rich?? (rich=a movie star/celebrity/just wanted to make it simple to think...)
The editor says since a movie star or celebrity cite middle-class families are responsible for ecological damage, it should not be taken too seriously because they are rich and they may be the people who actually destroy the environment?
Did I read the stimuli correct??

I chose (E) for this question, thinking it maybe generalizes about the behavior of all people (movie stars/cerebrities) on the basis of a few (a movie star/a cerebrity).

But when I took a second glance...it says "if widely adopted", so the editor does not generalize...maybe?

Could anyone plz help me to clear this up?

PT 38 Section 4 #8

This one sticks out as very similar to this problem: q8-politician-my-opponent-says-our-zoning-laws-t6435.html

The short of this argument is that we conclude that the criticism of the lifestyle causing ecological damage should not be taken seriously. And the evidence supporting this? Those that make the criticism live in a way that is inconsistent with their criticism/advice.

The main take away is that their lifestyle does not make a judgement upon the quality of their advice. Much like the doctor example in the link given above, the advice can actually be very sound, and in this case, could be very serious.

You can rightly accuse the movie stars of living in a contradictory nature to their advice/criticism, but the quality of the advice/criticism is not changed.

[tzyc]

Oh...so the "source" means the source of information/argument right?
I thought the source is the cause of the damage so the writer shifted the blame for the damage onto the celebrilies...

[timmydoeslsat]

Thats exactly right. The source is referring to the people stating the argument, not the cause of the damage.

[dandrew]

What about answer choice "B"? Aren't the movie stars/celebrities "[failing] to act consistently with" their beliefs that middle-class families' lifestyles cause ecological damage?

Is it wrong because we don't actually know what movie stars/celebs believe but only what kind of lifestyles they have?

Thank you!

[ohthatpatrick]

Yeah, I think you pretty much nailed (B). The sincerity of their belief is something we don't know or care about. The conclusion is not about their sincerity; it's saying "don't worry about middle-class lifestyles doing ecological damage".

Here's the whole question rundown:

Conc:
Don't worry about the ecological damage resulting from the lifestyles of middle-class families in wealthy nations.

(why? because ... )

Prem:
The people who tell you to worry about it are often movie stars and celebrities ... and THEIR lifestyles would do even MORE ecological damage, if widely adopted.

If you're having trouble spotting the flaw, consider this:
"My friend Bob told me back in 1990 to invest in Apple stock. I was smart to ignore his advice. After all, BOB wasn't investing in Apple stock."

Well, congratulations, dummy, you missed out on making a fortune. Just because someone doesn't follow their own advice doesn't mean it's bad advice.

Similarly, it's an illegal logical move to reject the validity of a claim by saying that the person who said it
- is a hypocrite
- has an ulterior motive
- would stand to gain from the claim being true

Sure, those things can raise a suspicious eyebrow, but you can't shoot down an argument by saying nasty things about the person who said it ... you have to attack their supporting ideas.

Another flawed part of this argument that doesn't get addressed in any of the answer choices is that the author says that the warning about ecological damage OFTEN comes from movie stars / celebs, which he considers an untrustworthy source. Okay, but who ELSE is issuing the warning about ecological damage? Maybe some of the other sources of this criticism are very reputable!

(A) is correct. The author DOES criticize the lifestyle of the movie stars and celebrities who often make the argument that 'middle class lifestyles can do ecological damage'. The author doesn't present any premise that undermines the validity of the argument.

(B) If the author had said, "the celebrities and movie stars have ecologically damaging lifestyles, therefore, they must not really mean what they say" then this answer would be accurate. Instead the author said, "therefore, we shouldn't take the criticism about middle-class lifestyles seriously". Remember, the conclusion is not just addressing movie-stars/celebs. It's shooting down an entire claim about the ecological damage of middle class lifestyles, no matter WHO says it.

(C) We can't match up the 2nd half of this answer choice. The viewpoint we're discussing is that 'middle class lifestyles cause ecological damage'. What grounds were advanced to support it?

There were none. This answer choice is saying that some reason(s) was given to support the idea that 'middle class lifestyles cause ecological damage' but the author found that supporting idea insufficient. Since there were no supporting ideas mentioned, we can't match this answer to anything in the argument.

(D) The evidence advanced in support of the author's conclusion is that movie stars / celebs have ecologically damaging lifestyles. Does that weaken the idea that "middle-class people have ecologically damaging lifestyles"? No. They could BOTH have ecologically damaging lifestyles.

(E) The author never generalizes about ALL people.

[dandrew]

Thank you very much, ohthatpatrick!

[lissethbayona]

Yes, brilliant explanation by ohthatpatrick!

I actually prephrased the flaw on this question correctly and saw it in (A) but then got confused by reading (B) and (C). I ended up picking (B). In the moment I wasn't sure if saying that movie stars/celebs don't have ecologically friendly lifestyles was criticizing a characteristic of theirs. CLEARLY, I thought about it too much but now I definitely see why all the other answer choices are wrong.

I'm confused on how carefully I should be reading other answer choices if I have prephrased an answer and I see it in the answer choices. Can't someone give me some input?

I also want to clarify one more thing. Can conclusions like this one which says "this criticism shouldn't be taken too seriously" always be taken as shooting down the criticism it's referring to? When I read the conclusion I didn't think the author meant, 'it's not true that middle class families have ecologically damaging lifestyles'. I took it to mean that middle class families don't have lifestyles as damaging as the criticism purports or something weaker like that.

I would appreciate any guidance!

[tommywallach]

Hey Lisseth,

I'd say yes, that's a fair takeaway from this question.

-t

[roflcoptersoisoi]

The flaw in this argument is that the author uses an ad hominem attack (attacks the person) instead of engaging in the substance of their argument. People to do this all the time, but it's an inherently flawed way of arguing because doing so has no bearing on the reasoning structure of the argument.


(A) Bingo. This is both descriptively accurate and describes the flaw in the argument. The people in question are movie stars/celebrities and the characteristic in questions are their lifestyles. The author criticizes it instead of their argument.

(B) Descriptively inaccurate. This would be correct if the argument was constructed along the lines of something like:
Premise: Movie stars believe that everyone should refrain from living lifestyles that cause ecological damage.
Premise: Movie stars have failed in acting in accordance to with this principle.
Conclusion: Movie stars do not believe that everyone should refrain from living lifestyles that cause ecological damage.

(C) Descriptively inaccurate the argument doesn't do this.The stimulus doesn't even talk about the reasons for which middle class families criticized. This would be correct if the argument was constructed along the lines of something like this:

Movie stars premise: Poor people in all countries don't care about the environment.
Movie star conclusion: Middle class families in wealthy countries need stop living a lifestyle that causes ecological damage.
Author argument: Some of the reasons used by movie stars to support their argument is irrelevant.
Conclusion: Criticisms should not be taken too seriously

(D) Descriptively accurate, it does fail to recognize this, due to the limited scope of the stimulus, but it's not a flaw in the argument. Eliminate

(E) The author does not make an extrapolation error.