P: All leprechauns are shoemakers.P: No leprechauns are females.C: ?
Christy-EarlsMay 17, 2019
Why not D?
Usually I'm pretty solid with these types of questions but for some reason this one has my brain a little twisted. My diagram:
L - - ->SM
L - - -> not F
__________
C: SM - - - > not F
I kiiiiiind of roundabout feel like it doesn't work, but I would like an explanation as to why... Because without incorporating L into the conclusion, we aren't showing that L exists or... something? Thanks in advance for your input!
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Great question. You might be thinking (D) is right because you're confusing the meaning of the first premise.
We're told that all leprechauns are shoemakers.
L - >SM
This DOES NOT mean that all shoemakers are leprechauns. This is an important distinction. Sure, if all shoemakers were leprechauns, then we could conclude that all shoemakers are not female. However, since this isn't what the premise is, we can't conclude that.
Based on the info we have, we can conclude (A) because we know that all leprechauns that exist are shoemakers and no leprechauns are female. This means there has to at least one shoemaker that is not female, so (A) is the correct answer.
Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any other questions!
Marcus-TownsendJuly 18, 2019
I selected answer "A" but app says "A" is incorrect, and says "E" is the correct answer. Your explanation says "A" is correct. The two conflicting explanations are totally confusing me.
jaclynschulzeOctober 3, 2019
I don't know why A is wrong. To get to this answer I inferred that L some not female. Then I recycled the inference and got: Shoemaker some not female.
