- In a study, 84% had a correct diagnosis of "swimmer's ear" (a better accuracy rate than physicians)
(→)
Most people can diagnose "swimmer's ear" themselves without having to consult a physician
→
We should allow the sale - without prescription - of the medication used to treat "swimmer's ear"
There are a lot of logical leaps in this argument. First of all, we go from talking about 1,000 people in a particular study, 84% of which had diagnosed "swimmer's ear" correctly, to talking about most people in general. Who's to say that these people in the study aren't a bit extraordinary, unique, or distinctive? Maybe these particular people were the sons and daughters of doctors who had learned a lot about "swimmer's ear" through osmosis? In addition, just because some people were able to diagnose themselves, the argument says that we should allow anyone to pick up "swimmer's ear" medication willy nilly?! What if "swimmer's ear" is a serious condition and medication without consult a doctor would likely produce disastrous results?! Thus, I think that we can attack this argument in two ways: (1) show why the people in the study aren't representative or (2) show why having a doctor's visit is necessary.
- (A) This might even strengthen the proposal to let anyone pick up some meds without a prescription. If hardly any of the cases of "swimmer's ear" become serious, then maybe there is no need to consult a doctor.
(B) Interesting. However, I think we are more concerned with the people who diagnosed correctly - those people are used as the premise for the argument and thus we should probably inspect them.
(C) This is not right on the money but it is a very good weakener! It shows why the people who diagnosed themselves are indeed distinctive to others: they have already have "swimmer's ear!" If they already had swimmer's ear then maybe they were simply more likely to diagnose their condition as that! In other words, there was no magic going on here. Though most people in the study did diagnose correctly, it does not suffice to say that most people in general could diagnose themselves correctly.
(D) We have no reason to compare physicians to one another. We are talking about physicians in general and how we don't need to go to them for our cases of "swimmer's ear."
(E) This is very similar to (A) and it may even strengthen the argument! It shows that "swimmer's ear" is not so serious because it disappears without having to see a doctor anyway (in most cases)! We don't need no stinkin' prescriptions for "swimmer's ear!"