The proper way to plan a scientific project is first to decide its goal and then to plan the best way to accomplish t...

AndreaK November 22, 2019

Hi @MACZ,

This is a flaw question. Let’s break it down from the beginning to see how it all comes together and where the problem in the argument is!

The passage starts by giving us a principal that is a premise. “The proper way to plan a scientific project is to first decide its goal and then decide the best way to accomplish that goal.”

It then goes on to tell us that “The United States space station does not conform to this ideal.”

When you read that, red flags should be going off in your mind. Why not?
Likely, we are about to be given a reason why not. I think this step helps for understanding the relationship between evidence and conclusion.

The sentence that starts with, “When the Cold War ended...” gives us our author’s reasoning for this. When the war ended the project lost it’s original purpose, so they quickly came up with a new one, even though the new purpose could have been accomplished differently. With that reasoning, the author then offers a conclusion on the situation.

“It is, therefore, abundantly clear that the space station should not be built.”

Hmmm, strong conclusion, right? It’s abundantly clear that something SHOULD NOT be built? But what if there are other unaddressed reasons the space station SHOULD be built?

There are two things that stick out to me here. One, we aren’t told if the alternative ways the project could have been explored after the purpose was changed were actually the “best ways.” Because we don’t know this, we don’t know if the principal was actually violated.

Second, the principal itself only talks about “the proper way to plan a scientific project.” This is not the same as “a scientific project should be built only if...”

It could be the case that even if a project doesn't necessarily have “proper planning,” it should still be built (what if they’re under time pressure to save the world from aliens?)

Just because we have one reason to believe the project may not have been planned properly, doesn’t mean that it necessarily should not have been built at all.

Let’s hop into our answer choices now.

A) No ad hominem flaw here!

B) No circular reasoning flaw here either!

C) The author isn’t faulting planners or “faulting” anyone—just saying it’s clear that the station shouldn’t be built!

D) The argument isn’t contradicting itself. Additionally, you can’t assume the truth of the conclusion in your reasoning (since that’s what you’re trying to be critical against, after all!). Also, when the conclusion states “the space station should not be built” that means that it hasn’t been built yet.

E) Bingo! We found evidence of a weakness, but that doesn’t mean the whole project should be killed. I like to think of this flaw as something like “just because there’s one con to something, doesn’t mean the whole idea needs to go down the drain.” Lots of things in the world have pros and cons—it’s going too far to say that an entire space station should not be built just on the information we’re given here!

Hope this helps!

Kath November 23, 2019

@AndreaK great explanation! Thanks!

jcefalu88@gmail.com August 24, 2020

I understand the correct answer choice, but to me there is still a self-contradictory statement in the question. The fact that there are alternative avenues to test movement in a gravity free environment does not nullify the fact that testing gravity free movement on the space-station is an expressed goal. The principle set forth is that there must be a goal followed by a set plan to achieve that goal, and we're then given a goal and a plan to achieve it, regardless of whether there are alternative solutions. The conclusion then follows that because there are alternatives, there wasn't a goal, and there is no need to construct a space-station. To me that stands out as a contradiction. Nonetheless I think I understand the correct answer and the lesson being advanced, this just seems like a poorly crafted question/answer choice.