Alright so let's first break down the argument given to us in the passage.
We are told that Arnold's irrational beliefs (that every offer of assistance on the part of his colleagues is a disguised attempt to make him look inadequate) have a biographical explanation due to some childhood experience/trauma (being a consequence of his early experiences with an admired older sister who always made fun of his ambitions and achievements) and because of this are completely justified.
Answer choice (C) has the exact same flawed reasoning: Joan's irrational belief that cats are not good pets is completely understandable, i.e. justified, because they have biographical explanations based in some childhood experience/trauma (that she was punished every time she played with her father's prize Siamese cat).
Therefore, answer choice (C) is the correct answer.
Hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.
jbartonNovember 17, 2017
Thank you. Great explanation! Question, would that make this fallacy a subset of the historical repetition fallacy?? (The logical fallacy that just because it happened in past it must happen again in future)
RichmondJune 11, 2018
Can you please explain why B is incorrect.
ChristopherJune 15, 2018
@Richmond, (B) introduces new information that justifies Emily's fear but was not part of Emily's fear to begin with. The original question doesn't do this, so this is a different logical pattern from the question so cannot be the answer.
