Q20 - Political Scientist: Democracy depends on free choices

[Laura Damone]

Question Type:
ID the Flaw

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: In the Information Age, a highly literate society will be a democratic one.

Evidence: Democracy depends on free choices. Choices can't be free unless they are made on the basis of well-reasoned opinions. In the Information Age, reading skills are essential to forming well-reasoned opinions.

Answer Anticipation:
Lots of conditional logic indicators here: "depends," "unless," "essential." We should look at whether and how these statements link up to see if there's a Conditional Logic Flaw.

The premises chain together: democracy --> free choices --> well-reasoned opinions --> reading skills.

That means that if a society is democratic, members of the society posses reading skills. But the conclusion that's drawn here is the reverse of that: If a society is highly literate, then it is democratic. Illegal Reversal!

Correct answer:
A

Answer choice analysis:
(A) There it is, right out of the gate! This argument definitely mistakes the necessary conditions of reading skills, well-reasoned opinions, and free choices for sufficient conditions because it moves backwards up the conditional chain!

(B) Incorrect. This attacks the premise that forming well-reasoned opinions requires reading skills. Since this is something that is explicitly stated, not something we have to infer, we have to take this to be true no matter what. Nothing an answer choice says can disrupt that. Eliminate!

(C) Means and reasons don't show up in this argument. It's about conditional logic: requirements and guarantees. Eliminate!

(D) There is no single type of case that forms the evidence for this argument. Eliminate!

(E) Tempting…"a condition under which something occurs" and "prerequisites" are both conditional logic indicators. But a condition under which something occurs is a sufficient condition. And this argument doesn't assume that if a sufficient condition guarantees a necessary condition, it also guarantees all the necessary condition's prerequisites. Instead, it assumes that if a necessary condition is met, all of the sufficient conditions in a conditional chain are met, too. Eliminate!

Takeaway/Pattern:
If you see conditional logic in an ID the Flaw question, predict a Conditional Logic Flaw and confirm your prediction by diagramming, either on paper or in your head. If you have multiple answers that use conditional language, replace the abstract language in the answer with concrete language from the stimulus to evaluate further.

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