Flawed Parallel ReasoningDiff: Medium
Logic Breakdown
Passage Summary: An artist claims that because they and their famous friends haven't won a specific contest, the contest winners must be terrible.
Conclusion: Winning the Art Competition is actually evidence that an artist lacks talent.
Reasoning: The speaker and six other popular, successful artists have never won the competition despite their commercial success.
Analysis: This argument is a classic case of 'sour grapes' mixed with a sampling error. The artist assumes that because a small group of 'good' artists failed to win, the winners must be 'bad.' In abstract terms, the flaw is: 'Group A (good things) did not achieve Result X; therefore, anything that achieves Result X is not in Group A.' When looking for a parallel, find an argument that dismisses a success or a status simply because a few supposedly superior examples didn't achieve it.
Conclusion: Winning the Art Competition is actually evidence that an artist lacks talent.
Reasoning: The speaker and six other popular, successful artists have never won the competition despite their commercial success.
Analysis: This argument is a classic case of 'sour grapes' mixed with a sampling error. The artist assumes that because a small group of 'good' artists failed to win, the winners must be 'bad.' In abstract terms, the flaw is: 'Group A (good things) did not achieve Result X; therefore, anything that achieves Result X is not in Group A.' When looking for a parallel, find an argument that dismisses a success or a status simply because a few supposedly superior examples didn't achieve it.
Passage Stimulus
Passage Redacted
Unlock Full Passage25.The pattern of flawed reasoning in which one of the following arguments most closely resembles that in the artist's argument?
Correct Answer
D
D matches the flaw: From the fact that the student government does not take widely supported (apparently good) proposals seriously—mine or others’—the student concludes that the proposals the government does take seriously are bad. That mirrors the artist’s move from “some good didn’t get selected” to “selected implies bad.”
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