Q12 - colic milk

[theanswer21324]

Hi

Great job with your strategy books - I find them to be very helpful

Could someone help me with this question? I am having trouble seeing how the premise works with the conclusion. The correct answer feels like it strengthens the argument, so could someone break this down along with the wrong answers?

Thanks.

[fmuirhea]

You may be getting turned around by the language, because you're asked to weaken an argument that denies a causal relationship, when usually you're asked to weaken an argument that posits a causal relationship. Here's the breakdown:

P: infants that feed on breast milk alone often show symptoms of colic
C: colic is probably not caused by the inability of infants to tolerate certain antibodies found in cow's milk

So, we actually want to weaken by finding an answer choice that suggests there is a causal link between cow's milk and colic. When weakening an argument, focus on its assumption(s).

Here, the big one is that infants who feed on breast milk exclusively are not exposed to cow's milk. Okay - they don't ingest cow's milk directly, but what about indirectly? What if it were possible for the breast milk to be contaminated with cow's milk? If that were true, then the group discussed in the evidence (breast-milk only infants) might actually ingest cow's milk, in which case there would at least be a correlation between cow's milk and colic.

(D) points out this consideration in a roundabout way. When the mothers stopped drinking cow's milk, the colic symptoms disappeared. This is one standard way of strengthening a causal argument: when the supposed cause (cow's milk) is removed, so too is the supposed effect (colic). This suggests a causal relationship, which is exactly what we want, since the conclusion is a denial of a causal relationship.


(A) does not bring up cow's milk at all
(B) is somewhat irrelevant; colic disappears, but that doesn't help us to understand what caused it in the first place, which is the important concept being discussed
(C) tends to strengthen the idea that there's no causal link
(E) suggests that breast milk may help guard against colic, but does not confirm that there is a link between cow's milk and colic

[WaltGrace1983]

I'm going to run through this a little bit more formally. I got turned around by this argument and maybe posting my thoughts will help me and others. Only very rarely have I seen a weaken question that devalues a causal relationship rather than posits one.

We want to weaken the following claim:

Breast Milk → Colic oftentimes* (note: NOT simply positing B → C)
→
~(Cow's milk → Colic)

So the argument is basically saying, "Colic doesn't seem to be caused by cow's milk. Why? because it seems to be caused by breast milk. The flaw is that it relies on exclusivity between cow's milk and breast milk. Sure, this sounds ridiculous to say that maybe breastfeeding will still cause the baby to ingest cow's milk, even though the baby is being fed on breast milk "exclusively."

When I first saw the question, I honestly didn't really see where to go with this one. Simply put, we would just have the try and show the following...

(Cow's milk → Colic), NOT (Breast Milk → Colic)

(D) gives us what we want. We might even be able to think about this argument like a strengthener because we want to strengthen the idea that (Cow's milk → Colic). This answer choice does this by showing the absence of the cause with the absence of the effect.

Let's think more about this. The conclusion says colic is probably not caused by cow's milk. However, (D) says that the mother's eliminated cow's milk from their diets and symptoms disappeared. If something said this to you in real life, you would probably think, "well that's weird. The cow's milk probably had something to do with it!"

(E) This is a super odd answer choice. If someone has more to add to this then that would be great. I'll see if I got this right though. This basically says that those fed with breast milk can better tolerate antibodies found in cow's milk. However, we don't know if this has anything to do with colic! We don't know what caused colic and we are trying to say that cow's milk might have caused it. So those fed with breast milk can better tolerate cow's milk. But does breast milk cause colic or does cow's milk cause colic? We don't know.

[MosheM795]

I believe answer choice E would actually strengthen the author's conclusion by saying that breastfeeding helps tolerate those antibiotics found in cow's milk thus implying a possibility of eliminating the effect of colic. Yet is the effect(colic) is present according to the premise in the last sentence.

I would be interested to know what you think of this explanation.

[WhimsicalWillow]

Example of Weakening Question featuring weakening an argument that denies causation-correlation flaw vs. suggests causation-correlation flaw.

C: “It’s probably not true” false Colic can’t be caused by cow milk.
P: “since” babies that are “EXCLUSIVELY” breastfed have colic too.

“It’s false that colic in infants is caused by.…inability of infants…to tolerate cow’s milk.”
[Effect]….caused by…. [Cause]
[colic]… caused by… [cow’s milk] What comes after “caused by” is the cause.

Diagram: Cause → Effect
P: Breastfed Infants→Colic
C: /Cow-milk fed infants→Colic


Gap/Assumption: Correlation-Causation flaw. Author assumes breastfed infants don’t have traces of cow-milk antibodies in their system. Weaken: “Colic can’t be caused by cow milk because infants fed breastmilk have colic too” Just because breastfed babies have colic too doesn’t mean it’s because cow milk doesn’t cause the colic.

Third Common Factor: Can something else cause the colic in both cow milk fed and breastfed infants?

Alternative explanation: Maybe there is an alternative explanation for the cause of colic in babies that are breastfed?

A) No, irrelevant because this is a correlation that doesn’t weaken
B) No, so what? Irrelevant because we don’t care what happens after they stop experiencing colic (phenomenon).
C) No, irrelevant. If anything, it affirms argument because if infants on cow’s milk didn’t experience colic, it strengthens author’s point that colic is not caused by cow milk.
D) Yes, weakens via alternative explanation (weakening the denial of correlation-causation via suggesting a correlation-causation relationship). Author assumed breastfed babies did not have traces of cow milk in their system and this introduces alternative explanation of how they get cow milk antibodies despite being breastfed due to mother’s diet.
E) No, out of scope and no direct impact on conclusion and no mention of colic from the argument.

I believe answer choice E would actually strengthen the author's conclusion by saying that breastfeeding helps tolerate those antibiotics found in cow's milk thus implying a possibility of eliminating the effect of colic. Yet is the effect(colic) is present according to the premise in the last sentence.

I would be interested to know what you think of this explanation.

E) "Infants fed breast milk develop mature digestive systems at an earlier age than those that are fed infant formulas, and infants with mature digestive systems are able to tolerate certain proteins and antibodies found in cow's milk"

E is wrong because it out of scope as it has no direct impact on the conclusion-- in the stimulus, the author argues that antibodies in cow's milk have nothing to do with colic. E says breastfed infants can tolerate cow's milk but the argument is about whether or not cow's milk causes colic. If anything, E is dis-affirming the author's point that cow's milk has nothing to do with colic because E is arguing that cow's milk is problematic for infants' digestive systems however, that's not the author's argument. Also, E makes an assumption that mature digestive systems = toleration of cow's milk. Additionally, there is no mention of colic and it cannot be assumed that immature digestive systems would cause colic.