Principle Support vs Sufficient Assumptions ?

[minhtientm249]

Can anyone please explain to me the difference between those two? I know that the correct answers to both of them will allow the arguments to be drawn properly. Then what's the difference?

Thank you in advance.

[ohthatpatrick]

Well, you're pretty close to being correct in suggesting these two types are nearly interchangeable, in practice.

The wording for Principle-Support is commonly:
Which of the following principles, if valid, most justifies the conclusion?

And the wording for Sufficient Assumption is commonly:
Which of the following, if assumed, allows the conclusion to be properly drawn?

Note: "if assumed" = "if valid" = "if true"

So the sentiment in each question stem is essentially which answer choice, if true, would make the argument logically valid?

However, it's not technically true to say that the correct answer to Principle-Support needs to prove the conclusion. The wording is more like Strengthen: "most supports / most justifies / most strengthens" the conclusion.

(Whereas Suff. Assumption will ALWAYS say something like "conclusion follows logically / conclusion can be properly drawn / properly inferred")

So the wording of Princ.-Supp is actually closer to that of Strengthen. However, the way the questions actually work in practice is much more similar to how Suff. Assump questions do.

1st of all, for both PS and SA questions, the answer choices are almost always conditional statements.

2nd of all, for all SA correct answers and most correct PS answers, the answer really will end up proving the conclusion is valid.

Those 2 things are almost never the case on Strengthen questions.

The difference between SA and PS tends to be more in the stimulus itself.

SA questions typically have conditional logic involved in the premises. Often, the conclusions themselves are conditional statements. We are normally missing a link in the conditional logic chain that would connect all the ideas in the argument.

PS questions, meanwhile, typically describe a situation/person/thing and then conclude that that situation/person/thing deserves a certain label. Our correct answer is usually a conditional statement that says "If you fit the criterion discussed in the premise, you deserve the label that is assigned in the conclusion."

So to sum up all that:
1. You're basically correct - SA and PS are usually VERY similar in how the correct answer works.
2. It doesn't have to be that way - the correct answer to SA has to prove the conclusion / the correct answer to PS only has to strengthen it the most.
3. SA normally has conditional logic in the argument itself, whereas PS normally has a situation in the premise that is assigned a certain label in the conclusion.

Hope this helps. Let me know if this elicits any other questions.

[minhtientm249]

Thank you, your reply was helpful.

I just want to clarify that whether or not whenever the phrase "if valid" appeared, the principle would certainly be sufficient to prove the conclusion. Does it work similar to sufficient assumption and necessary assumption? Like if there's no "if valid" on a principle question, the principle must be necessary for the conclusion to be drawn.

And also could you please give me some insights about what I really have to do in principle questions? The correct answers are sometimes seemingly out of scope in such a way that my instinct usually eliminates them during first pass. I know they all have to connect the gaps and such.

Thank you very much.