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 Administrator
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#24992
Complete Question Explanation

Flaw in the Reasoning—CE. The correct answer choice is (D)

The local resident in this stimulus has noticed that the few times he has seen many dead fish wash ashore in the summer, the pond has also had an abnormally large amount of algae. From this fact, the resident concludes that the algae must be harmful to the small fish. This is a causal argument, and can be diagrammed as follows:
  • Cause ..... ..... ..... ..... ..... ..... Effect

    Overabundance of algae ..... :arrow: ..... Harm to small fish

The resident supports the causal argument only by his observations of a correlation between the existence of the abnormal amount algae and the abnormal number of dead fish. The author does not provide additional information leading that would support the causal relationship in the conclusion. In a causal relationship, the cause must occur before the effect, and the cause must directly lead to the effect. The author’s argument is flawed because the author does not eliminate an alternate cause for the harm to the fish, nor does he or she eliminate a common cause for both occurrences. Finally, there is the possibility that the dead fish are somehow causing the overabundance of algae in the pond. The author fails to address any of the above alternate explanations for the correlation.

Answer choice (A): The stimulus provides no information about large fish. The pond may only contain small fish, or perhaps the author did not care about the death of larger fish. In either case, the author does not say that the small fish are unusually susceptible to harm from algae. Therefore, this cannot be the correct flaw.

Answer choice (B): The resident’s argument is only focused on the impact of algae in this pond. The fact that small fish may fare better in a larger body of water is not relevant to the causal conclusion drawn about the way the algae harms fish in the resident’s pond.

Answer choice (C): As with answer choice (A), this answer choice incorrectly applies the causal relationship to large fish. The resident’s argument is limited to small fish in the local pond. Answer choices, like this, that address a broader conclusion are incorrect.

Answer choice (D): This is the correct answer choice. As explained above, the author only supports that the death of small fish and the overabundance of algae tend to occur at the same time. The resident does not adequately address the possibility that there might be a common cause to both events that cause them to occur together, but where the algae do not directly cause the fish death.

Answer choice (E): The author does not draw any conclusion about what a lower than normal amount of algae would do to fish in the pond. The flaw cannot be about a conclusion that the author does not make.
 ieric01
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#73719
Hello,

I have a different reason why E) was wrong. I don't disagree with the reasoning given here, but I wanted to offer an alternative view. Feel free to let me know if my reasoning was wrong. I'm actively looking for criticism ; )

Hope this helps someone!

Anyhow, here it goes...

====

E) wants to show that excess algae isn’t harmful to smaller fish by bringing up the opposite scenario when there’s too little algae. However, we can’t draw any conclusions because they’re two different contexts. A pond with too much algae isn’t the same as a pond with too little algae. What happens in one pond may not happen in the other. Maybe too much algae IS also bad.

Consider this example:

Eat too little food and you can become anorexic.

Eat too much food and you can become obese.


Too little or too much of anything can both be bad. Although the effects may differ. Similarly, we don’t know what would happen if there's too much algae from a scenario when there’s too little of it.
Last edited by ieric01 on Thu Feb 06, 2020 9:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.
 Claire Horan
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#73723
Hi ieric01,

I think you meant to write that you have a different reason why answer choice (E) was wrong, since (D) is the right answer and your explanation relates to answer choice (E).

As I understand your post, you are expanding on the Administrator's reasoning by using an example rather than offering an independent reason. But that's entirely okay! It's always helpful to rephrase arguments in your own words, and creating your own examples can really help you solidify your learning.

Kudos to you for taking the time to really understand each question! :-D
 ieric01
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#73731
Thank you Claire! I really appreciate you taking the time to have given me feedback :)

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