Ph.D. programs are valuable only if they inculcate good scholarship and expedite the student's full participation in ...

AndreaK March 28, 2020

Hi @UMAR-JAMIL,

Our claim in questions (doctoral dissertations should not be required in the humanities) is in a sentence that begins with the word “hence.”

“Hence,” as we know, is a pretty solid conclusion indicator word! The argument is seeking to establish (or argue or prove) that doctoral dissertations should not be required in the humanities. The first sentence and the sentences following the claim in question together seek to support that conclusion.

In regards to the rest of your question, I might need a little more context to understand fully what you mean. If you thought the last sentence served as a subsidiary conclusion, then which sentence did you think was the main conclusion it was supporting?

I wouldn’t say the last sentence is a subsidiary conclusion. Rather, it’s additional supporting evidence. It supports the claim in question, the main conclusion, that dissertations should not be required in the humanities.

Did you maybe mean to say you thought the claim in question was an intermediate conclusion supporting the last sentence?

If so, there’s always a nifty little test you can try. I call it the because/therefore test. When you can’t decide what the conclusions is, use the words “because” and “therefore” between two claims to figure out which is evidence (or support) for a conclusion and which is the conclusion itself.

Option 1: BECAUSE the dissertation is counterproductive and frustrates the appropriate goals of the doctoral program, dissertations should not be required by the humanities.

(This sounds good! “Because” introduces evidence.)

Option 2: BECAUSE dissertations should not be required by the humanities, the dissertation is counterproductive and frustrates the appropriate goals of the doctoral program.

(Feels off, right? The argument makes way more sense the other way around, so we know what comes after the “because” in our first option is our evidence!)

Now let’s try it with “therefore” :

Option 1: The dissertation is counterproductive and frustrates the appropriate goals of the doctoral program, THEREFORE dissertations should not be required in the humanities.

Option 2: Dissertations should not be required by the humanities, THEREFORE the dissertation is counterproductive and frustrates the appropriate goals of the doctoral program.

See how this second option doesn’t answer why dissertations shouldn’t be required by the humanities, and instead just goes off to make another blanket statement? The first option give us evidence, and that evidence in tern helps answer why dissertations should not be required by the humanities. That’s how you know the claim that dissertations should not be required by the humanities is supported by some evidence. Same as above, the first option gives us evidence that supports the conclusion which comes after the “therefore!”

Answer choice E (It confirms the observation that the requirement for a dissertation can frustrate the goals of a doctoral program) is written in such a way that it describes something that confirms (or supports) a conclusion. That’s what evidence does. The claim in question (dissertations should not be required by the humanities) is supported by evidence in the stimulus, such as that observation. Conclusions are the parts of an argument being supported, not the parts of an argument doing the supporting (unless of course you’re talking about a subsidiary conclusion, which is both of those at the same time (supporting a main conclusion but supported by evidence itself) but like we said, that’s not at play here.)

Hopefully this little “because” and “therefore” test helps you better understand how to pick apart evidence from conclusions! Feel free to let us know if you have anymore questions about this one.