Orthodox medicine is ineffective at both ends of the spectrum of ailments. At the more trivial end, orthodox medicine...

mallen January 21, 2021

How is C not correct???

C is more consistent with the stimulus than D. D assumes that the patient has belief in alternative medicine when the stimulus does not say so. The stimulus states that people use alternative medicine when they don't see results from orthodox medicine. This does not imply belief. One could easily just be exhausting his/her resources and be very skeptical about alternative medicine but is turning to it because there is no other option. The stimulus clearly states that there are no effects at all from alternative medicine but C states that people who use alternative medicine receive a sense of hope from the medicine. This is an effect and is caused by the medicine which weakens the conclusion necessarily, D does not, because it is not necessary that anyone who uses alternative medicine believe in it.

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shunhe January 28, 2021

Hi @mallen,

Thanks for the question! (C) is wrong because if you look through the (lengthy) passage, nothing is said about profiting.

(E), on the other hand, says that the flaw in the reasoning is that the argument concludes that a premise is false when that premise could be true, and another one false. So the premise that could be true is that the role of the supreme court is to protect all human rights (the first sentence). The argument kind of just assumes that’s false instead of other premises. But other ones could be false.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.

shunhe January 30, 2021

Hi @mallen,

I’m so sorry—I just realized I answered another question by accident! To answer your original question: (C) is wrong because “hope” isn’t the same as a medical effect, and so doesn’t let us know if a MEDICAL effect actually happens. And that’s what we care about, not about people’s subjective hope about the illness and the treatment.

(D), on the other hand, is different because it explicitly links “hope” to physiological effects (like releasing painkillers and whatnot). This is what’s missing in (C), and thus what makes (C) wrong.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.