#9 - Specific Reference, Must Be True

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

The correct answer choice is (D).

Answer choice (A):

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C):

Answer choice (D): This is the correct answer choice.

Answer choice (E):

This explanation is still in progress. Please post any questions below!

[wdrosenfeld@yahoo.com]

Is answer choice B wrong because the descriptivists do, in fact, rely on observation in describing language usage? I think this is evidenced by first sentence of the third paragraph saying many attempts to regulate language have failed, is this an observational point that disproves the answer? If not, or if I have something wrong I would really like a detailed explanation on why this answer is wrong

[German.Steel]

I got this one right, but definitely felt like I was on shaky ground, and didn't have much to go by for picking (D) other than commonsense and process of elimination...are there any clues in the text that more definitely support (D)?

[Jeff Wren]

Hi wdrosenfeld,

That's exactly right. The descriptivists do rely on observation, so it would be incorrect to describe them
"relying on theory rather than observation" and the author does not use "article of faith" in this way.

Instead, the context of the phrase is that some of the prescriptivists' attempts to regulate language have succeeded, and the question is why? According to the author, the descriptivists may respond that those times where the language didn't change weren't due to the prescriptivists efforts to save/preserve them, but would have been preserved anyway due to the normal laws of how languages change.

Now the author replies to this potential argument of the descriptivists by saying in effect, "well, there is no way to tell whether those examples would have remained in the language without the efforts of the prescriptivists." In other words, that would have been strictly hypothetical, and so there is no proof to that claim. This is how the phrase "article of faith" is specifically being used by the author in the this context, to show that there is no proof to that claim.

[Luke Haqq]

Hi German.steel!

In general, when given a specific line reference, it's helpful to look at the material before and after the given line reference to understand its context better.

Here, the paragraph in which the "article of faith" language occurs begins, "With regard to the scientific objection..." That pushes back where one should look--what is the "scientific objection" mentioned at the start of this paragraph? The previous paragraph explains that this objection takes the transformation of language as "not unlike the laws of nature." Prescriptivists who try to change language from how it is actually used, the objection runs, are engaged in something like trying to defy the law of gravity, i.e., they won't succeed (in language from the first paragraph, they are "doomed to almost certain failure").

Then, the first sentence of the final paragraph call this into question. It points out that sometimes prescriptivists do succeed. On its face, this would seem to suggest that the descriptivists aren't entirely right, or at least their scientific objection isn't a knock-down objection. The next sentence just redescribes the instances in which the prescriptivists succeed in changing language as being "in accordance with the laws" of language change. In that context, the descriptivists don't give any reason for this. That is reflected in answer choice (D)--the author describes this as "article of faith" to indicate that the descriptivists who make that claim "have no proof to bolster their claim."

So the two sentences that come before the line reference seem to be the most germane and direct support for answer choice (D), but there is also important support for it in the second paragraph, and additional support in the first.

[svd24]

Could you please explain the reasoning that makes answer choice D better than answer choice C? I was going back and forth between these two answers and decided that the use of “overwhelming evidence” in C was too strong.

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi svd,

Let's put the phrase in the correct context. The author of the passage is talking about how prescriptivists have succeeded at times in controlling the use of language. The descriptivists are claiming that the prescriptivist's action to help control the language was unnecessary because the language would have followed the prescriptivist preferences regardless. The author isn't using "article of faith" as a way to show that there's overwhelming evidence to the contrary. The author is using it to show that the descriptivists don't have proof to support their assertion.

We can't know what WOULD have happened without the prescriptivist intervention. The descriptivists are just guessing/assuming they know what would have happened. That's what "article of faith" is meant to describe: the idea that we can't be certain how something would have turned out if the facts were different. The uncertainty is what answer choice (D) captures perfectly. Answer choice (C) is describing something that has a lot more certainty and clarity than the situation given in the passage.

Hope that helps!