Argument Dissection

[a.compean6786]

I'm learning how to dissect an argument. Including how and which premises interact with each other to provide support for the final conclusion. I notice I'm missing many questions due to lacking expertise in this basic skill. This is an example of a questions that has me a bit stumped. I know I don't necessarily need an infallible grasp to do well on the test, but its interesting to see how sentences play on each other.

"Red squirrels are known to make holes in the bark of sugar maple trees and to consume the trees' sap. Since sugar maple sap is essentially water with a small concentration of sugar, the squirrels almost certainly are after either water or sugar. Water is easily available from other sources in places where maple trees grow, so the squirrels would not go to the trouble of chewing holes in trees just to get the water. Therefore, they are probably after the sugar."

The way I dissected the argument is as follows:

"(Red squirrels are known to make holes in the bark of sugar maple trees and to consume the trees' sap). (Since sugar maple sap is essentially water with a small concentration of sugar, the squirrels almost certainly are after either water or sugar.) (Water is easily available from other sources in places where maple trees grow, so the squirrels would not go to the trouble of chewing holes in trees just to get the water.) Therefore, they are probably after the sugar."

Premises
Intermediate Conclusion
Conclusion

Would you agree with this dissection? Thanks in advance.

[ohthatpatrick]

Make sure you're rock solid on argument indicator words.

CONCLUSION: thus, therefore, so, hence, as a result, consequently, in conclusion
PREMISE: for, after all, because, since (F.A.B.S.)

BUT / YET / HOWEVER: switches from background/counterpoint into the author's argument.

As we read this, these words should pop:
"Red squirrels are known to make holes in the bark of sugar maple trees and to consume the trees' sap. Since sugar maple sap is essentially water with a small concentration of sugar, the squirrels almost certainly are after either water or sugar. Water is easily available from other sources in places where maple trees grow, so the squirrels would not go to the trouble of chewing holes in trees just to get the water. Therefore, they are probably after the sugar."

Premise indicators indirectly reveal a conclusion.

If we say
______ , after all ______.
______, for ______.
______, because ______.
______, since ______.

In all cases, we know the 1st idea is a conclusion, and the 2nd is a premise.

Because and since are flexible, though. You can start a sentence with them, and say
Since ____ , ______ .
Because _____ , _____ .

In both cases, the 1st idea is a premise and 2nd is a conclusion.

So when we see the keywords in the squirrel argument, we see a sentence that says
"Since sugar maple sap is essentially water with a small concentration of sugar, the squirrels almost certainly are after either water or sugar."

You know that the 2nd idea is a conclusion.

When we see
"Water is easily available from other sources in places where maple trees grow, so the squirrels would not go to the trouble of chewing holes in trees just to get the water."

You know that the 2nd idea is a conclusion.

And when we see
"Therefore, they are probably after the sugar."

You know that that idea is a conclusion.

So there are apparently three conclusions here. To be sure you know which is the Main Conclusion, verify that the conclusion gets supported by the other ideas.

Our Main Conclusion is
"the squirrels are after the sugar"
how do we know?
"they're either after water or sugar" and "they wouldn't go to this trouble for water"

Our two intermediate conclusions combine to give us our main conclusion.

We could unpack the support for each one of the intermediate conclusions if we wanted to.

"They're either after water or sugar"
how do we know?
"they consume the trees' sap, which is essentially water and sugar"

"They wouldn't go to this trouble for water"
how do we know?
"Water is easy to get elsewhere"

By the way, it's VERY unusual to see an argument with TWO subsidiary conclusions!

What might be helpful to your process is better recognition of argument indicating keywords and more thinking through the lens of "which claim supports another?"

"Conclusion. How do we know? Premise."

[a.compean6786]

It was definitely the subsidiary conclusions that got me! I had only ever seen questions with one, and I already had trouble dissecting those!

Thank you! This was exactly the explanation I was looking for. I'll keep an eye on those indicator words, my worst skill is memorization but I can see how important those words are. Thanks again