Q20 - Morton: In order to succeed

[vik]

I chose ans D here because it looks like while he did consider the counterexample, he did not consider the status of the counterexample. He did not consider the counterexample may be valid. What o you think?

[giladedelman]

Thanks for posting!

I disagree. I think if you take a counterexample and give a reason why you think it's not actually valid, then you have absolutely considered its status. For (D) to be right, the argument would have to ignore the issue of whether there really are people without college degrees who are successful.

So the problem with this argument is not that Morton doesn't consider the status of the counterexample, it's the way he dismisses it. His conclusion is that you must have a college degree in order to be successful. When faced with the objection that there are people without college degrees who are successful, he responds that those people only seem successful. How does he know? Because without a college degree, they can't be truly successful.

Whoa, red flag! What do you notice about Morton's first and last claims -- his conclusion and one of his premises? They're THE SAME! He's trying to argue that a college education is necessary for success, but one of his reasons for dismissing the counterargument is that ... college education is necessary for success! So his argument already assumes the truth of the conclusion.

That's why (A) is correct.

(B) is out because there's no causality/correlation thing going on here.

(C) is incorrect because the argument is general the whole time. There are no individual cases.

(E) is incorrect because what most people believe has no relevance to the argument.

Does that clear this one up for you?

[goriano]

His conclusion is that you must have a college degree in order to be successful.

How did you know that the conclusion was this line?

When I was reading the stimulus, I understood the conclusion to be "the counterexamples the skeptics provide of success is only apparent success."

And I saw the first line and the last line after the word "because" as providing the two pieces of evidence for that claim.

Whoa, red flag! What do you notice about Morton's first and last claims -- his conclusion and one of his premises? They're THE SAME!

"

I didn't take these two claims to be the same. The first line is about succeeding in today's society, while the last line is about being TRULY successful. Aren't these different concepts?