LR Question 5 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Jenkins maintains that the movie Firepower was…
QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning
CONCLUSION: Jenkins is wrong. The movie Firepower was intended to provoke antisocial behavior.
REASONING: The movie did produce antisocial behavior.
ANALYSIS: The author forgets that we can produce an effect even if we don’t mean to. Plans backfire all the time.
If you crash your car, usually you don’t intend to. The fact that you did crash has nothing to do with your intentions.
___________
- The author never said that Jenkins was biased.
Example of flaw: Jenkins is a Democrat/Republican. Therefore, she is wrong. - There’s no correlation in this argument.
Example of flaw: People who watch Firepower are more likely to be antisocial. Therefore, Firepower causes antisocial behavior. - This is a different flaw.
Example of flaw: People in New York City like Firepower. Therefore, all Americans like Firepower. - This is tempting, but it’s describing something different. The Director didn’t act contrary to his expressed interest. Instead, the director’s actions produced results that weren’t what the director intended.
Example of flaw: Johnson has said he plans to stop smoking. So clearly, Johnson will never smoke again. Willpower always works, right? - CORRECT. See the analysis above. The director unfortunately did cause antisocial behavior, but that doesn’t mean she intended to do so.
More Resources for Flaw Questions
- Flaw drills: Use these to practice making examples of abstract flaws.
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Flaw questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers flaw questions.
I was between D and E but picked D. I am still gray on why E is 100% correct and why D is 100% wrong.
My reading must be flawed.
I read option E as:
“an action had a certain effect” to refer to antisocial behavior performed by those who saw the movie
and
“the effect was intended by the person who performed the action” to refer to the people who performed the antisocial behavior
I have a hard time seeing the tie in to the director since the only “action they performed” was directing the movie.
Hope I verbalized my reading of E properly. Thanks for the time.
If we translate E to apply to the context of the stimulus it reads “concludes from the mere fact that the movie produced antisocial behavior that this behavior was intended by the person who produced the movie”. This is the exact flaw that the stimulus does. It concludes that Jensen is wrong about the intention of the director just because the results were contrary to this intention. What if the consequences were unintended? You can act 100% in favor of a certain result and still produce the opposite result without wanting to.
As for D, we have no reason to believe the director acted contrary to their interest. Jenkins argues the movie was not intended to promote antisocial behavior because it is against the director’s interest. The only evidence against this is the results of the movie (which we have already established could just be an unintended consequence). That doesn’t prove anything about the director acting against their interest. The stimulus would actually have to show/argue that the director in some way acted against their interest (of not provoking antisocial behavior) for D to be correct.
Hopefully that clears things up! It seems you might have read E a little differently than how it actually applies to the stimulus. Let me know if you want further clarification.