Q24 - Politician: Democracy requires that there be no

[mshinners]

Question Type:
Determine the Function

Stimulus Breakdown:
The statement in question leads the stimulus off. It's immediately followed by a statement starting with "Therefore," so we know the first statement is a premise and the second a conclusion. The final statement includes "thus" (though not at the beginning, those sneaky dogs), telling us it's another conclusion.

At this point, it'd be necessary to see which statement is the subsidiary conclusion, and which is the main conclusion.

Answer Anticipation:
The "therefore test" would help with that logically. Structurally, the last sentence must be the main conclusion, since a statement that has conclusion language can't follow another statement without the preceding statement serving as a premise for the latter statement.

Correct Answer:
(B)

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Wrong description. The first part is fine ("claim for which no support is provided" is synonymous with "premise"). The second part goes off the rails, however, when it states that it supports ONLY the main conclusion. It also supports the subsidiary conclusion. Without the word "only", this would be a correct answers, since statements that support the sub. conclusion also support the main conclusion.

(B) Bingo. It's a premise that supports the subsidiary conclusion, which goes on to support the main conclusion.

(C) "Claim for which support is provided" describes a conclusion, and we're being asked about a premise.

(D) Definitely not the main conclusion, especially since the statement following it starts with "Therefore".

(E) Definitely not the main conclusion, especially since the statement following it starts with "Therefore".

Takeaway/Pattern: Structural indicators and the "therefore test" are definitely helpful, but don't forget about grammar/overall structure. A statement that is immediately followed by another that includes conclusion language must serve as a premise to that second statement.

#officialexplanation

[JorieB701]

Question Type:
Determine the Function

Stimulus Breakdown:
The statement in question leads the stimulus off. It's immediately followed by a statement starting with "Therefore," so we know the first statement is a premise and the second a conclusion. The final statement includes "thus" (though not at the beginning, those sneaky dogs), telling us it's another conclusion.

At this point, it'd be necessary to see which statement is the subsidiary conclusion, and which is the main conclusion.

Answer Anticipation:
The "therefore test" would help with that logically. Structurally, the last sentence must be the main conclusion, since a statement that has conclusion language can't follow another statement without the preceding statement serving as a premise for the latter statement.

]

Hmm. I want to take issue with that last sentence^^. Is that true? There's no way to connect two sentences together, both with conclusion language, without the preceding one being the subsidiary? I definitely see that for this question the last sentence makes sense as the main conclusion and the one preceding it, the subsidiary, but that seems like it can't possibly be true in every situation. If it is, can someone confirm? I was lucky to have quite a bit of time at the end of this section to mull this one over but had I not, it would have been nice to have a rule like this to fall back on.

[ohthatpatrick]

It is true.

Any time you'd have
________ , thus ________ .
or
_________ . Thus _______ .

It's always gonna be that the 1st claim supported the 2nd.

If the 1st claim is itself a conclusion, it won't change the fact that 1st supports 2nd.

What's probably giving you pause is that you've most likely encountered a structure that's more like this:
_________ . After all ______ and thus ______ .

In this case, the 1st blank is the conclusion, but we can tell structurally because the second sentence is designed to support the 1st blank ("after all" tells us that).

The 3rd blank is an intermediate conclusion, because it's being supported by the 2nd blank.