Police captain: The chief of police has indicated that gifts of cash or objects valued at more than $100 count as gra...

Irina on October 14, 2019

@hannahnaylor5,

The argument tells us that gifts of cash/ objects valued above $100 count as graft, and on the basis of this definition alone, the chief concludes that there is no graft in his precinct. The issue is that graft generally involves any situation where a public official receives a benefit in the course of his official duties where no benefit is expected, e.g. a politician offered a police officer's relative a lucrative job in exchange for dropping the investigation, or a company executive shared insider information about an upcoming business deal that would increase the stock price. Essentially, a gift of cash/ $100 + objects is a sufficient condition for graft but not a necessary one. Since the chief fails to consider other instances of graft, the argument is flawed.

Let me know if this makes sense or if you have any further questions.

Juliana on July 10 at 01:00AM

I answered A for this and am confused-even though it is saying the officers in his area that he knows haven't taken bribes, how can we conclude that this is representative of every single officer in his area. I guess how do we know to assume that he personally knows all of them

Emil-Kunkin on July 11 at 10:10PM

I don't think we need to focus on the entire area, just the chiefs precinct. I think it is completely reasonable to expect the chief of a precinct to know all the officers in their precinct. Even so, the chief claims to know their entire precinct.