Politician: Unless our nation redistributes wealth, we will be unable to alleviate economic injustice and our curren...
mprezzyMarch 22, 2020
Unless, and the negation
Can someone please help me understand why both parts of the compound statement in the unless sentence were not negated? How am I to know which to negate if I were to see a sentence similar to this in the future?
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The provided explanation is a bit confusing in the way it is laid out as it appears that the author of the answer has implicitly rewritten the first statement to make it easier to diagram: "If our nation does not redistribute wealth, we will be unable to alleviate economic injustice.
Not redistribute wealth - > Not alleviate economic injustice
This is the contrapositive of the above diagrammed statement so either method would get you to the same result. The method employed in the provided answer just makes it slightly easier to get to the correct answer.
However, you can still get to the answer either way. We have already diagrammed our first statement:
Alleviate economic injustice - > Redistribute wealth Not redistribute wealth - > Not alleviate economic injustice
Failing to alleviate economic injustice is tied to an inevitable move toward intolerable economic inequities i.e.: "If we are unable to alleviate economic injustice, we will inevitable move toward intolerable economic inequities.
Not alleviate economic injustice - > Intolerable economic inequities Not intolerable economic inequities - > Alleviate economic injustice
If inequities become intolerable, those suffering from injustice will turn to violence to coerce social reform.
Intolerable economic inequities - > Turn to violence for social reform Not turn to violence for social reform - > Not intolerable economic inequities
The politician concludes that politicians must do whatever is necessary to alleviate conditions that would otherwise result in violent attempts at social reform. We are looking for a way to conclude that it is necessary for the nation to redistribute wealth to avoid violent attempts at social reform. Notice, based on our diagrammed statements above, that we can draw this conclusion using the transitive property.
Not turn to violence - > Not intolerable economic inequities - > Alleviate economic injustice - > Redistribute wealth
Not turn to violence - > Redistribute wealth
So, as you can see, either method would work to reach the same answer in the future. Keep up the good work!
Hope this is helpful. Please let us know if you have any further questions.
mprezzyMarch 23, 2020
Thank you. I understand how you have explained this, and from what I can gather you have broken up the first sentence. The first part is handled with the unless rule:
unless our nation redistributes wealth, we will be unable to alleviate economic injustice
AEI -> RDW Not RDW -> not AEI
The part that follows: and our nation current system will lead inevitably to intolerable economic inequalities.
I originally handled this sentence as a compound statement but you have made it a separate premise:
Not AEI -> IITEI Not IITEI -> AEI
After looking at this in the way that you have explained and then the way it is explained in the video...is it safe to say that whether I diagrammed this as a separate premise or a compound statement is irrelevant. What I should focus on is diagramming the variables correctly according to the rule?
