Q20 - Pulford: Scientists who study...

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Procedure

Stimulus Breakdown:
P: You're only justified investigating someone's private health history if it's to advance science, so scientists doing this work have to ask themselves whether they're motivated by advancing science or mere curiosity.
V: Yeah, but sometimes mere curiosity is the motivation for accidental scientific advancement.

Answer Anticipation:
Like most two speaker Procedure prompts, the 2nd person raises an aspect of the issue the first person overlooked.

Does V think that P's conclusion is wrong?
It's important not to go too far with the purpose of person 2's pushback. It sounds like V might tolerate some researchers investigating health history for mere curiosity, since it may turn out that those researchers would accidentally discover something that advances science.

I wouldn't be able to predict anything precise here, though, because it's not clear that V is really against P's rule. It could just be that V is pointing out that if we follow P's rule, we will miss out on what could have been some accidental scientific advancements.

Correct Answer:
A

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) I definitely got rid of this on a first pass, but nothing else worked. P's argument hinges on a distinction between "motivated by scientific inquiry" and "motivated by mere curiosity". V muddies those waters (makes that distinction seem less tenable) by reminding P that curiosity is the root of scientific inquiry (they're inextricably linked) and that many times mere curiosity leads to legitimate scientific discovery.

(B) Sounds too extreme, but maybe if nothing else works. V is certainly showing that the principle, if followed, might cost us some accidental scientific discoveries. But that doesn't mean that V disputed the validity of the principle.

(C) P's conclusion is a normative idea ("they should first ask themselves about their motivation"). We wouldn't usually call that a generalization. And it's a stretch to call V's comments a counterexample. If P had generalized, "Scientists studying health history only discover important stuff if they're motivated by scientific inquiry, not curiousity", then V's 2nd sentence would be a counterexample.

(D) I don't know how to match up all these views that are being talked about. V's objection is simply that sometimes scientists motivated by pure curiosity nonetheless give us important discoveries. That objection doesn't seem to be "distinguishing between two views."

(E) "Inconsistent" = contradictory. V did not argue that P's premises were contradictory.

Takeaway/Pattern: I don't trust myself to get this right on a timed test, mostly because of how I feel like I'm talking myself into a bad answer either way. In hindsight, and with the confirmation of the correct answer as my guide, it becomes clearer that my only other choice (B) cannot be right, because disputing P's explicit principle would involve talking about whether or not certain investigations were justified. Since V doesn't address the concept of justified (unless we make our own assumptions that "anything that results in a great discovery was justified"), (B) really can't be the answer.

#officialexplanation

[hrgreen]

Can you please clarify why the answer is A and not B on this one?

I went with B, even though I disliked the answer, because (while strong), it did seem that V is undermining the principle that P proposes. As for A, I don't think I agree regarding the "untenable distinction."Perhaps it is my learned tendency to argue with the LSAT questions to try the best answer, but I didn't think that V was referenicing the distinction but rather providing additional information. I see that you initially also passed over A. Can you please explain what led you back to selecting this answer please? Thank you!

[JoyC484]

Can you please clarify why the answer is A and not B on this one?

I went with B, even though I disliked the answer, because (while strong), it did seem that V is undermining the principle that P proposes. As for A, I don't think I agree regarding the "untenable distinction."Perhaps it is my learned tendency to argue with the LSAT questions to try the best answer, but I didn't think that V was referenicing the distinction but rather providing additional information. I see that you initially also passed over A. Can you please explain what led you back to selecting this answer please? Thank you!

I think the distinction is made between "a inquiry motivated by curiosity" and "a legitimate science inquiry". V is saying that a inquiry can be both motivated by curiosity and be a legitimate science inquiry.

[HelenH783]

I also chose B, and after staring at it for a while think it's wrong because Varela isn't disputing the meat of Pulford's principle-- she doesn't really engage with it. For B to be the right answer, Varela's response would have to be along the lines of "An investigation into a private matter such as health history is also justified if it is conducted for mere curiosity" (or some other, new reason.)

[ohthatpatrick]

Great follow-ups.

I think it comes down to the fact that (A) is safer given what we HAVEN'T heard Varela say.

To go along with (B), we're adding our own thoughts ... Varela never takes us to "Since pure curiosity sometimes leads to great scientific discoveries, we ARE sometimes justified in investigating private health history merely because we're curious."

Given the active, strong verb of "disputing an explicit principle", we'd want to point to something that sounds like Varela more directly speaking to whether or not investigating the remains of ancient figures is JUSTIFIED.

(A) is match-able, without us needing to add anything.

Since Varela mentions that "many great scientific discoveries came about from pure curiosity" and that "curiosity is the root of scientific inquiry", it seems clearer that Pulford would say
it's possible for something to be a legitimate scientific inquiry AND be motivated by mere curiosity
than that he'd say
Investigating private matters CAN be justified even when it wasn't done for the advancement of knowledge

You can have someone accept a principle but still argue that it's untenable for people to follow that principle.

Pulford: "Actions should be evaluated based mainly on their consequences, not on the intentions of those committed the actions. So we should evaluate everyone's actions based on whether they led to good or bad consequences on the whole."

Varela: "You forget that the consequences of many actions are unknown to the person committing the action as well as to the bystanders observing the action".

Here, again, Varela isn't necessarily disagreeing with the explicit principle in the first sentence. He's just saying that the advice seems hard to follow.

[ThaoN810]

I also picked (B) during timed condition. Upon blind review, I went with (E) instead. My reasoning was that Pulford's premise (not 'premises,' so I wasn't reading correctly) was inconsistent, because he distinguished between "scientific inquiry" and "mere curiosity" (should have gone with (A) if I got that far), while they were really one thing (one leading to the other). So Pulford was contradicting himself.

My question is just that, can someone help me with an example of "inconsistent premises"? So I would know what it is and not fall into the same trap next time.

[StratosM31]

Here's what I thought about (B) (to be honest I also thought about (B) as well, but were able to eliminate it relatively quickly):

The principle stated explicitly by Pulford is the second sentence (investigation justified --> done for the advancement of scientific knowledge). Varela is not disputing the validity of this principle.

The flaw of Pulford's argument is that he assumes that legitimate scientific inquiry cannot include motivation by mere curiosity:

P: investigation justified (=legitimate) --> done for the advancement of scientific knowledge
C: EITHER legitimate scientific inquiry OR motivation by mere curiosity.

Varela does not attack the premise, but he disagrees instead with the conclusion derived, by pointing out that motivation by mere curiosity can lead to many scientific discoveries (lead to the advancement of scientific knowledge), therefore being a part of legitimate investigation.

If he would attack the principle, it would sound like: "hey, you're wrong, an investigation can also be justified even if the investigator doesn't care at all about the advancement of scientific knowledge!"

[JenniferK632]

Thanks for all the great explanations debating A v. B. I've now got a good grasp on the differences.

I'm still unsure as to why (C) wouldn't work. Valera's counterexample is, actually yes, sometimes scientific discoveries were motivated by curiosity alone. Isn't that a counterexample? She does counter Pulford's conclusion, which separates investigations into two pots, a generalization.

[Laura Damone]

Hi!

So, the LSAT uses terms like "generalization" and "counter-example" to mean very specific things. A generalization is an broadly applicable conditional statement.

There is a generalization in Pulford's argument: an investigation into a private matter is only justifiable if it's done for the advancement of scientific knowledge. This, however, is a premise, not a conclusion. This alone is grounds for elimination.

But furthermore, to offer a counter-example to a generalization you must show a concrete example of its sufficient condition without it's necessary condition. For Pulford's generalization, that would mean an example of an investigation into a private matter that was definitely justifiable even though it wasn't done for the advancement of knowledge.

Varela doesn't provide any concrete examples. This, too, is enough to eliminate.

If you force yourself to be very strict about your interpretation of logic terminology, these questions get a lot easier. Hope this helps!