#23 - Ethicist: Only when we know a lot about the events that led to an action

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Justify the Conclusion—SN. The correct answer choice is (C)

This seemingly straightforward stimulus is comprised of an ethicist’s conditional reasoning; the argument is fairly straightforward, but the author’s conclusion must be justified by one of the answer choices.

The single premise presented in this stimulus is that, in order to be justified in assigning praise or blame to an action (as, the author provides, we sometimes are), we need a lot of information regarding the events that led to that action:

• justified in praising or blaming for an action know a lot about events leading to act

Based upon this premise, the author concludes that Tolstoy’s assertion must be rejected. Tolstoy’s claim: if we had such information, and knew much about the events that led up to a given action, we would cease to regard that action as freely performed.

In other words. Tolstoy’s claim is as follows:

• know a lot about precipitating events cease to regard as freely performed

Again, the author asserts that this claim must be rejected, allowing for us to regard an action as freely performed even if we know a lot about the events that led to that action:

• know a lot about precipitating events cease to regard to freely performed

The stimulus is followed by a Justify the Conclusion question, so we can find the correct answer choice the with the Justify Formula; the right choice will provide an assumption which, when added to the premise from the stimulus, justifies the conclusion drawn by the author in the stimulus.

• Premise: Justified in praising/blaming an action know a lot about events that leading to act
  + Correct Answer choice
  _______________________________________________________________________
  know a lot about events cease to regard to freely performed

The element that is present both in the premise and the conclusion deals with knowing a lot about events leading to an act. The correct answer choice should somehow connect the rogue elements, which deal with whether one knows a lot about events leading to an act, and whether one ceases to regard the act as freely performed.

Answer choice (A): This choice introduces the new element of acts’ being caused by conditions beyond one’s control, and fails to link the rogue elements as discussed above, so this answer cannot justify the author’s conclusion and should be ruled out of contention.

Answer choice (B): This answer deals with a person’s genuine responsibility for an act, a new element that is not discussed in the stimulus, and fails to justify the ethicist’s argument.

Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice, as it is the choice that allows the author’s conclusion to be validly drawn, and the one that links the rogue elements as discussed. The stimulus provides that to justifiably praise or blame a person for a given action, we need to know a lot about the events leading up to the act. This choice provides that justifiably assigning praise or blame requires that we regard the act as freely performed:

• justly praising or blaming for action know a lot about events beforehand
  + justly praising or blaming for action regard act as freely performed

Since the stimulus also provides that in some cases we are justified in praising or blaming an action, it must be that Tolstoy was wrong. In other words, it must not be the case that knowing a lot about the events before hand doesn’t keep us from regarding an act as freely performed:

• justly praising or blaming for action know a lot about events beforehand
  + justly praising or blaming for action regard act as freely performed
  know a lot about events beforehand cease to regard as freely performed

Answer choice (D): This choice might be appealing at first, as it deals to some extent with praise, blame, and information, but has nothing to do with regarding an act as freely performed, so it cannot justify the ethicist’s conclusion about Tolstoy’s claim.

Answer choice (E): This choice provides that if we don’t know about events leading up to an act, we regard that act as freely performed:

• know a lot about events to act regard the act as freely performed

This was a popular wrong answer choice among test takers, because it includes elements that could justify the author’s conclusion, if the sufficient condition were “know a lot about events leading to act” instead of “NOT know...” Since this answer fails to justify the conclusion drawn in the stimulus, it should be ruled out of contention.

[Jason Schultz]

Hi sarae,

This question is a justify the conclusion question, which means that the answer choice must tie the loose ends together to complete the Ethicist's argument. So, look for something mentioned in the premises but not raised in the conclusion as well as something mentioned in the conclusion not raised by the premises. Your prephrase should tie them together.

In this problem, the conclusion is the final sentence in which the Ethicist rejects Tolstoy's conclusion. The premise mentions 'praise and blame' while the conclusion mentions 'freely performed.' The answer choice must tie those two together, and C does.

Some students have trouble with A), which comes quite close to this idea, but not quite. The Ethicist's argument is about when we are justified in praising or blaming, while A) addresses when we are not.

Does that help?

[sarae]

makes sense now! thanks!!

[mpoulson]

Hello,

I read the analysis but I want to be sure I understand. C is basically saying that if you are justified in blaming or praising someone then that action was freely performed. Which if we connect it to the conditional statement Justified (SC) ------> Knowledge we can then assume that that the person has alot of knowledge since only in these cases is a person justified for praise or blame. Basically the two points have to work together. If you are justified you have alot of knowledge and if you are justified it was freely performed. Is this correct?

- Micah

[Robert Carroll]

Micah,

As you said, justification requires knowledge:

justified in praise/blame know a lot about events

Tolstoy claims this:

know a lot about events freely performed

If the following were true:

justified in praise/blame freely performed

And, further, we knew that we are justified in at least one case, then there is a case where someone knows a lot about events AND the action can be regarded as freely performed. In other words, Tolstoy is wrong to say they exclude each other. The existence of some such cases is given in the stimulus ("as we sometimes are"), and answer choice (C) provides the last conditional above.

Note that the person performing the action does not have to be the one who knows a lot about the events.

Robert Carroll

[bli2016]

Hi, I got this question correct but I wanted to make sure I have the right reasons for eliminating the other answer choices.

A) I'm not sure about this one because it seems like the contrapositive of the conditional statement in C ("justified in praising or blaming a person for an action --> regard that action as freely performed") Need a little help here.

B) This is wrong because the stimulus does not address the responsibility of the person doing the action, but only addresses whether blaming them or praising is justified or not.

D) The degree of responsibility and the amount of information is not addressed in the stimulus.

E) This is wrong because the statement in the second sentence of the stimulus states that if we know a lot about the events leading up to any action, then we would regard that action as freely performed.

Could someone tell me if I'm right or wrong about these and explain how to eliminate the other answer choices in more depth? Thank you!

[Kristina Moen]

Hi bli,

Answer choice (A): "People should not be regarded as subject to praise or blame for actions that were caused by conditions beyond their control." can be diagrammed as "Conditions beyond control not subject to praise of blame" with the caveat that this is not stated as fact, but as an opinion ("should"). The word "for" here serves a similar function as the Sufficient Condition Indicator "when." You can easily imagine this sentence written as "People should not be regarded as subject to praise or blame when their actions were caused by conditions beyond their control."

Answer choice (B): Good explanation.

Answer choice (D): Good explanation. We're not discussing matter of degree here.

Answer choice (E): Keep in mind that the second sentence is actually the conclusion. Do not accept it as fact. The author is rejecting the claim that "If we knew a lot about the events leading up to any action, we would cease to regard that action as freely performed." But answer choice (E) is merely a mistaken negation of that sentence. It doesn't affect it in any way. It's like if I said "If you press this button, you get orange juice." And then you respond "If you don't press the button, you won't get orange juice." Both of those sentences can be true at the same time, your response does nothing to my original sentence.

Great job!

[avengingangel]

I still really don't understand this question.

This is how I am diagramming the argument:

JUST KNOW (premise)
JUST FP (answer choice C)
KNOW FP (conclusion)

JUST=justified in praising or blaming for an action
KNOW= know a lot about events leading to act
FP= cease to regard to freely performed AKA regard act as freely performed

This seems like the same diagram you have. How does answer choice C justify the conclusion ???? If A B and A C, that doesn't mean that B C.

[Adam Tyson]

The conclusion that we want to justify here is not that knowing guarantees free performance, angel. It's that Tolstoy is wrong when he says that knowing guarantees that it is not freely performed. We want to prove that knowledge and free performance are not mutually exclusive, as Tolstoy had claimed.

You're right that the argument, coupled with answer C, does not justify free performance, but it does justify the claim that the two cannot be mutually exclusive, because at least sometimes (the times when praise is justified) both necessary conditions (knowledge and free performance) must occur. We know, from the claim "as we sometimes are," that in at least one instance praise or blame is justified, and in at least that one instance you must have knowledge and, if answer C is true, the action must have been freely performed. So Tolstoy is proven wrong, because those two things can in fact coexist! Not that they must, but that they can!

Tough question, and the diagram can be a bit confusing if we lose sight of the goal here, which is to disprove Tolstoy, rather than to prove the opposite. Focus on the right goal and it gets easier.

[Albertlyu]

The conclusion that we want to justify here is not that knowing guarantees free performance, angel. It's that Tolstoy is wrong when he says that knowing guarantees that it is not freely performed. We want to prove that knowledge and free performance are not mutually exclusive, as Tolstoy had claimed.

You're right that the argument, coupled with answer C, does not justify free performance, but it does justify the claim that the two cannot be mutually exclusive, because at least sometimes (the times when praise is justified) both necessary conditions (knowledge and free performance) must occur. We know, from the claim "as we sometimes are," that in at least one instance praise or blame is justified, and in at least that one instance you must have knowledge and, if answer C is true, the action must have been freely performed. So Tolstoy is proven wrong, because those two things can in fact coexist! Not that they must, but that they can!

Tough question, and the diagram can be a bit confusing if we lose sight of the goal here, which is to disprove Tolstoy, rather than to prove the opposite. Focus on the right goal and it gets easier.

thank you! Adam. I finally got it.