Q25 - Occultist: The issue of whether

[noah]

Tricky wrong answer!

The conclusion of this argument is that astrology is both an art and a science. Why? It's a science because creating an astrological chart requires math and astronomical knowledge. It's an art because you have to synthesize different factors.

We have to figure out the flaw, and the gaps are in the assumptions that each premise leads to the conclusion. Does synthesizing factors make something an art? Does using math and science make something a scientific? (B) hinges on the latter gap.

(A) is incorrect as it's too strong - the argument isn't about any science. That's reversing the logic (Math --> Science, not Science --> Math).

(C) is out of scope. The argument does not limit astrology to only those components.

(D) is tempting! However, the stimulus does not suggest that the only reason that astronomical knowledge is scientific is that it's used to create a chart. To understand what the clause is doing here, let's replace the words "needed to create an astrological chart" with the words "that only a few people know." The fact that only a few people know the astronomy is not being offered as a reason it's scientific, it's an nonessential modifier - it's just a label. Here's one more example:

Dan is clearly violent because of his tendency to hit people and the skull and crossbones tattoo that he got when he was in Tijuana.

Where he got the tattoo is not the reason the tattoo is proof of Dan's violent nature, and the argument is not saying the tattoo is proof of his violent nature merely because he got it in Tijuana.

Similarly, the argument is not necessarily saying that the astronomical knowledge is scientific merely because it's used to make that chart.

(E) is a logical reversal, similar to (A).


#officialexplanation

[gyfirefire]

hi Atlas staff,

I find (D) is tempting, which states "incorrectly infers that astronomical knowledge is scientific merely from the fact that such knowledge is needed to create an astrological chart".

Can anyone help me understand why (D) is not correct?

Thanks a lot!

[gyfirefire]

Thank you so much for the quick reply. Now it is clear that what (D) says doesn't match what the stimulus states.


By the way, can you please help me with
2003-June-C-#23 Flaw "A television manufacturing plant..."
I dont' know why (E) is not wrong. It seems to me it is exactly the mistake that the original argument commits.

Thanks a lot!

[noah]

I'm glad that was helpful. You'll have to post your new question as a new thread in the right place - as you can tell, we're trying to keep things pretty organized around here!

[missbernadette]

Hi Noah,
I understand why B is correct, but I'm confused why D is wrong. Could you expand a bit on your explanation?
I'm trying to understand it, but I keep hitting a brick wall when trying to explain it to myself.

[noah]

I went back and read my explanation for (D) and decided it was awful. I edited it - does the new version clear it up?

[alana.canfield]

(C) is out of scope. The argument does not limit astrology to only those components.

I chose (C) having made a prephrased answer and then misreading the word "denies" in (C) as the word "ignores". My prephrase was that even if astrology has all the attributes that make a science a science (or an art an art), that still is not sufficient to make it a science (or art), because it could have other attributes which are known to make something NOT a science (or NOT an art). For example, a chair may have all the attributes of a table (four legs, a top, etc), but it also has a chair-back which makes it not a table. I'm just wondering if this logic is correct? If (C) had said "ignores" instead of "denies" would it have been a contender? Thanks!

[noah]

(C) is out of scope. The argument does not limit astrology to only those components.

I chose (C) having made a prephrased answer and then misreading the word "denies" in (C) as the word "ignores". My prephrase was that even if astrology has all the attributes that make a science a science (or an art an art), that still is not sufficient to make it a science (or art), because it could have other attributes which are known to make something NOT a science (or NOT an art). For example, a chair may have all the attributes of a table (four legs, a top, etc), but it also has a chair-back which makes it not a table. I'm just wondering if this logic is correct? If (C) had said "ignores" instead of "denies" would it have been a contender? Thanks!

I like your thinking, but you've got to go a bit stronger. Just because something has a chair-back doesn't mean it's not a table. It could be some strange table with a chair-back.

You'd want those additional characteristics to guarantee that astrology is not either an art or science.

[nflamel69]

I didn't think denies was a big flag on C, but rather it's reasoning. just because it included something that's not scientific or art, does it make that thing itself not science or not? not necessarily. for example, a scientific novel explaining black hole theory, but it also contains fictional characters, does that mean it's not science?

[sumukh09]

Just for clarification, A says: Science --> Math, right?

[patrice.antoine]

Just for clarification, A says: Science --> Math, right?

Yes, "any" introduces the sufficient.

[gliev001]

This may have already been answered, but, is (A) wrong because the argument is not really making the claim that "any science must involve complicated mathematics". The argument is strictly limited to astrology.

[noah]

This may have already been answered, but, is (A) wrong because the argument is not really making the claim that "any science must involve complicated mathematics". The argument is strictly limited to astrology.

(A) is incorrect as it's too strong - the argument isn't about any science. That's reversing the logic (Math --> Science, not Science --> Math).

[arash.nouraee]

I was able to get to (B) by way of elimination, but I don't see why it is the correct answer.

Can someone please help? If Y (astronomy) contains X'y (scientific) things, isn't Y by default a little bit X? Why is that a flaw?

[elanaminkoff]

Hello Noah- I am not sure I completely understand your explanation. Well, I understand the analogy you gave but I am not sure I see how it applies to this situation.

I correctly chose b but was very tempted by d, and since I am not sure I understood your explanation I want to check if my reasoning was sound, or if I just happened to get lucky.

I eliminated d because I noticed a term shift from astrology to astronomical knowledge. It is true that this term is used in the stimulus, however it is used as an example of a scientific component (term used as part of premise) not inferring anything about this idea. The conclusion is that ASTROLOGY is scientific (because it requires scientific astronomical knowledge, which is a scientific component). D say ASTRNOMICAL KNOWDELGE is scientific.

Does this make any sense, and am I even on the right track? If not can you please try and clarify this for me.

Thanks

[maryadkins]

Yes, Elana! Well done!

This is also why I got rid of (D).

The conclusion is about astrology being both a science and an art. (D) makes the conclusion out to be something about astrological knowledge being scientific. That's not part of the conclusion, though. That's only mentioned in a premise. I think you're correctly thinking about this here.

[kyuya]

This argument concludes that astrology is a science (and an art). Why?

Premise 1: The scientific components and complicated maths and the astronomical knowledge.

Premise 2: The art portion is of many symbols and factors into a coherent statement of their relevance to an indiv.

What truly being said here is that those components of art and science are sufficient to make it an art or science. For example, for the science portion it assumes that because of:

- complicated math
- astronomical knowledge

Then therefore, its a a science. These things are sufficient to make it a science, according to the occultist. Does having the components of something make you that thing, necessarily?

Consider a few examples. Does having four legs (components of a dog) make you a dog? No. Maybe you're a sheep. Maybe you're a pig. Maybe you're a cow. Seems silly to draw this conclusion. Lets look for an answer choice that describes this.

(A) This answer choice says SCIENCE ---> complicated math. But is this what's being said? Lets look back.. it says, components ---> science. If it said complicated math --> science, then this might be a better answer.

(B) Here we go! Okay, so we have scientific components, and we are concluding its a science now. As explained above, thats exactly what the stimulus does.

(C) We actually do not speak about astrology in any depth. We only speak about it insofar as it relates to it being a scientific component presumed to be sufficient to make something a science.

(D) Does the argument ever say, "since astronomical knowledge is needed to create an astrological chart, therefore astronomical knowledge is scientific"? No it does not. It infers that astronomical knowledge is scientific because it is a known component of science.

Furthermore, it never really presumes its scientific FOR any reason, it simply just accepts that it is scientific. There is no case made for it being scientific.

(E) This is just very irrelevant if we focus on the core of the argument. We are concerned with astrology being a science and how strong the evidence was in support of that. If we look back, art being mentioned is actually a lot of fluff. It serves no purpose other than distracting us.

[rpagan4]

My reasoning on why D) is wrong is that it says "merely" knowledge to make an astronomical chart

The argument gives two reasons for astrology being scientific, not just one.

It says the scientific components are the mathematical components and the astronomical knowledge to make a chart.

It is not just saying that astrology is scientific only because of the astronomical knowledge needed to make a chart (which is what D is saying, since it uses "merely") It is saying that astrology is a science because of the scientific components (complicated math and astronomical knowledge to make a chart)

B) Also uses merely but it uses the term scientific components which hits both reasons.

BTW, They could have don't this with the art side of the argument too

This is my first post, Im no expert and I hope that is helpful/right because I really don't know but that ^ is how I made sense of it.

[JeremyK460]

My reasoning on why D) is wrong is that it says "merely" knowledge to make an astronomical chart

The argument gives two reasons for astrology being scientific, not just one.

It says the scientific components are the mathematical components and the astronomical knowledge to make a chart.

It is not just saying that astrology is scientific only because of the astronomical knowledge needed to make a chart (which is what D is saying, since it uses "merely") It is saying that astrology is a science because of the scientific components (complicated math and astronomical knowledge to make a chart)

B) Also uses merely but it uses the term scientific components which hits both reasons.

BTW, They could have don't this with the art side of the argument too

This is my first post, Im no expert and I hope that is helpful/right because I really don't know but that ^ is how I made sense of it.

the argument is about astrology being a science
answer (d) says the argument infers that astronomy is a science based off astrology needing it for some astrology stuff
that's not what the argument is saying

astronomy is a science and its given to us as such in the argument and in real life lol