Let's first take a look at Jane's argument. Jane concludes that they "must restrict the amount of time Jacqueline and Mildred are allowed to watch television." Why? Because an article states that "children's hand eye coordination suffers when they spend a great amount of time watching television."
What is Alan's argument? Conclusion: "we need not restrict their television viewing." Why? "The article says that only children under three are affected in that way. Jacqueline is ten and Mildred is eight."
Alan has shown that Jane's support for her conclusion is not valid, i.e. only children under three are affected in this way, and takes this to conclude that we shouldn't restrict Jacqueline's and Mildred's television viewing. However, even if only the hand eye coordination of children under three is affected by a great amount of time watching television, that doesn't mean that there aren't other ways a great amount of television watching can cause harm to Jacqueline and Mildred.
Therefore, it is incorrect for Alan to conclude that "we need not restrict their television viewing." Alan has not addressed the validity of Jane's conclusion, only her reasoning in support of her conclusion. It is still possible that we should restrict the amount of TV watched by Jacqueline and Mildred for a different reason.
Thus, answer choice (B) is the correct answer. Alan's argument confuses undermining Jane's argument in support of her given conclusion (i.e. "The article says that only children under three are affected in that way. Jacqueline is ten and Mildred is eight."), with showing that her conclusion itself is false (i.e. "Therefore, we need not restrict their television viewing.").
Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.
BatmanDecember 18, 2013
Superb!!! Thank you so much!!!^^
SamOctober 3, 2024
The fallacy of Alan's argument seems to be errors in assessing the force of evidence.
There are four subsets of this fallacy and Alan's fallacy is:
Some evidence against a position is taken to prove that the position is false.
But the introduction of evidence against a position only weakens the position; it does not necessarily prove the position false.
Emil-KunkinOctober 3, 2024
I don't think the issue is the force of evidence per se. Rather, he is taking the absence of one form of support for a conclusion to mean that the conclusion is necessarily false.
SamOctober 5, 2024
Aha thanks. I didn't look at it from the absence of support view.
But can I still say that Alan's premise is some evidence against Jacqueline? (I think Alan's premise can be seen as both some evidence and absence of evidence)
Some evidence against a position (Alan's premise: "The article says that only children under three are affected in that way. Jacqueline is ten and Mildred is eight.") is taken to mean that Jacqueline's conclusion ("must restrict the amount of time Jacqueline and Mildred are allowed to watch television.") is false.
But this is where the argument is flawed because Alan's evidence against Jacqueline can only weaken her position, not make it false.
Emil-KunkinOctober 7, 2024
I agree with you. He does indeed weaken her argument, but you are correct that all he does is weaken it, not show her conclusion is false. He shows that her premises don't support her conclusion, which absolutely weakens it, but then he goes to far and says her conclusion must therefore be false.
