Sabina: The words used in expressing facts affect neither the facts nor the conclusions those facts will support. Mor...

Ravi August 19, 2019

@Julie-V,

Let's look at (C), (D), and (E).

(C) says, "a sound argument in support of a given conclusion is a
better argument than any unsound argument for that same conclusion"

Sabina believes that soundness is what makes an argument good or bad;
however, Emile does not go so far to say that words trump soundness.
Emile simply thinks that words are also important. Thus, we can get
rid of (C).

(D) says, "it would be a good policy to avoid using words that are
likely to lead people either to misunderstand the claims being made or
to reason badly about those claims"

Emile would likely agree with (D). Words do matter. However, Sabina
never discusses the possibility that people will misunderstand things.
For Sabina, words do not matter as long as they are clearly defined.
Thus, we can get rid of (D).

(E) says, "a factor that affects neither the truth of an argument’s
premises nor the logical relation between its premises and its
conclusion can cause an argument to be a bad one"

(E) looks great. Both Sabina and Emile agree that words do not affect
the soundness of an argument. However, they do disagree about whether
or not words can make an argument bad. (E) captures this, so it's the
correct answer choice.

Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any other questions!

Meredith October 8, 2019

Where is the evidence that Emile thinks words do not affect the soundness of an argument?

shunhe January 9, 2020

Hi @Meredith,

Thanks for the question! This is a bit of a tricky one in my opinion because there’s two different axes we need to follow here. One is sound vs. unsound and one is good vs. bad/poor. Soundness has to do with the validity of an argument’s premises (if the logic makes sense) and if the premises are true. Good/bad has to do with how people respond to the argument and acknowledge a fact. Emile thinks that words can make sound arguments poor (see her first premise), but she doesn’t say they can make sound arguments unsound. In other words, picking the wrong words doesn’t change the truth of the premises or the logical relations between them. It makes people less likely to acknowledge certain facts and draw the conclusions you want to because of how they might respond to the words you used. Hope this helps!