The question whether intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is certainly imprecise, because we are not sur...

Irina on July 30, 2019

@zachary,

Let's briefly look at the argument.

The question of whether intelligent life exists elsewhere is imprecise because we are not sure how different from us something might be and still count as "intelligent life."

Yet we cannot define "intelligent life" more precisely because we will only find and recognize intelligent life elsewhere if we leave our definitions open.

Which of the following claims this argument is most likely to attempt to refute?

One way to approach this question is to imagine it in a context of dialogue and consider what the argument in the stimulus logically responds to. Paraphrasing answer choice (C), we can use it as an initial claim the argument in the stimulus objects to:

Person A: We must define intelligent life more precisely if we hope to answer the question of whether it exists elsewhere correctly.

Person B: It is true that the definition is imprecise but we cannot define it more precisely because we will only find and recognize intelligent life if our definitions stay open.

The other answer choices are wrong because the likely point of disagreement here is the need to change the definition of "intelligent life," and none of the other answer choices argue for changing the scope of this definition.

Does this make sense?

Let me know if you have any other questions.