Q15 - There is a popular view among literary

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Flaw

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: Poetry CAN be accurately paraphrased.
Evidence: Although some critics say it's impossible since a poem itself is the only accurate expression of its meaning, these same critics think that THEIR paraphrases are accurate.

Answer Anticipation:
This seems like an Unproven vs. Untrue flaw to me. What evidence did the author present to convince us that poems can be paraphrased? [crickets] The author just shot down someone ELSE's argument, and then concluded the polar opposite. That is how Unproven vs. Untrue works: "since you didn't successfully prove X is true, X must be false".

Correct Answer:
D

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Presupposing the conclusion is code for CIRCULAR ARGUMENT, but this wasn't circular. The author did have a genuine premise to shoot down the critics' arguments.

(B) This author doesn't need to assume anything about the "MAIN purpose" of poems.

(C) This author doesn't need to assume anything about a poem's "USEFULNESS"

(D) YES! This gets at the Unproven vs. Untrue flaw. By showing the critics' hypocrisy, the author has successfully ruined the critics' argument, but that just brings us back to a state of doubt. Their argument that poetry can't be paraphrased was a bad argument. So we still don't know whether poetry can or can't be paraphrased. The critics concluded it can't be, but they have separately believed that their own paraphrases ARE accurate. This answer choice is saying, "We still don't know whether poetry can / can't be accurately paraphrased." but they're putting it in the code language of "we still don't know which of the critics' beliefs is the correct one".

(E) This is not a flaw … I'm not even sure that there ARE different definitions of "paraphrase". We didn't discuss or allude to any, so this doesn't seem like a pertinent critique.

Takeaway/Pattern: They disguised this Unproven vs. Untrue argument and corresponding answer choice pretty well. When we're doing Flaw, and the author is rebutting someone else, keep a keen ear for whether he concludes the polar opposite, rather than concluding the correct, moderate conclusion, "Their argument is unconvincing."

We certainly don't need to see this as Unproven vs. Untrue (it's not a typical exemplar). We can simply think to ourselves, "Sure, these literary critics are contradicting themselves, but how do we know the 1st belief was wrong and 2nd was correct, rather than vice versa?" The literary critics have two irreconcilable beliefs and the author favors one belief over the other, without giving us any reason for that preference.

#officialexplanation

[AshH953]

Oh no I ruled out D because I was clueless where 'the other critic' is. Should put it down on my notes that this is exactly wording for 'unproven vs. untrue'.

[abrenza123]

I did the same! I kept reading D as "other critic's" and thinking.. there aren't two different critics or groups of critics being mentioned here..

So that lead me to A, which I still didn't think totally fit but I sort of justified it as "well author must be assuming that critics CAN because they are saying two contradictory statements that critics hold and says that the first is false. My thought was that the auth was (implicitly) accepting that the critics' paraphrases were correct, hence their view that you can't paraphrase was incorrect... Again, I know this isn't a perfect fit and we see a lot of circular reasoning in wrong answer choices, but how would it work in a more subtle, nuanced LR question??

after realizing my reading error, D makes sense, but I was a little confused by the explanation - How does the unproven vs. untrue flaw fit in? Does holding two self contradictory views, as in this question, equate to something being "unproven?" I guess I am a little confused because I'm not used to this being referenced in the context of the two claims both being stated by the same group (the critics), if that makes sense?

[ohthatpatrick]

I updated my original explanation, because I'm surprised my initial reaction to this was so strongly Unproven vs. Untrue.

There's a type of bad argument they've done several times (but not enough times for this flaw to get its own name) in which Thing 1 and Thing 2 contradict each other, and the author randomly sides with Thing 2, without telling us why it's better than the other.

There's one where "a new story says eggs are healthy. the old story said eggs weren't healthy. Thus, I guess the old one was wrong."
(Why? why are we assuming that new is right and old is wrong?)

There's one where "System A would say these two species are related. System B would say they aren't. Thus, System B is messed up.
(Why? why are we assuming that System A was correct to say the two species were related?)

There's also an element of False Choice within these arguments: just because two things contradict doesn't mean that one is right and one is wrong. They could BOTH be wrong!

You don't need to see this argument as Unproven vs. Untrue to get the answer right. When you read the argument, you're supposed to come up with some objection to the conclusion.

When I read it just now, I thought, "How do you know the first claim was wrong? Maybe the 2nd claim was wrong! (or maybe both claims are wrong)."

(D) looked like a good match for that.

However, you CAN read this as Unproven vs. Untrue, in the sense that those arguments typically have this structure:

Some people claim X.
But here's some problem with their rationale / evidence.
Thus, claim X is false.


(A) is the language of Circular reasoning, as you nicely recognized.

Circular is usually described using one of these phrasings:
presupposes the conclusion
assumes what it sets out to prove
the conclusion is restatement of a premise

Circular reasoning essentially means there WAS no premise, other than a regurgitation of what's being proven.

Our author's conclusion is
"Poetry CAN accurate be paraphrased".

Does the author offer any premises on behalf of that, or does she just presuppose her correctness?

She does offer a premise, which is why we can't consider it circular.

"How do I know poetry can accurately be paraphrased? Some literary critics say that they are able to make accurate paraphrases."