From the observation that each member of a group could possess a characteristic, it is fallacious to conclude immedia...

Batman January 15, 2014

Is this fallacy????

On the passage, it says that "...each member of a group possess a characteristic, it is fallacious to conclude immediately that it is possible for all the group's members to possess the characteristic." Is it fallacy? Isn't it like "each part of this watch is heavy, so this watch is heavy"? Please, explain why that argument is fallacious. Is it because the difference " a characteristic" and "the characteristic"?????? Thanks, always

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Naz January 21, 2014

This is a type of part to whole flaw. The example you gave: "Each part of this watch is heavy. So this watch is heavy," does not go in line with the type of part to whole that the stimulus has introduced. The stimulus describes an observation where each member of a group COULD possess a characteristic. Just because a part of something CAN have a quality, that does not mean that the whole could also have that quality. Let's look at the example the argument gives: just because each player entering a tennis tournament HAS A POSSIBILITY of winning it, doesn't mean that there IS A POSSIBILITY that everyone will win the tournament. The absurdity of the part to whole flaw is clear in this example: there is only one winner in a tennis tournament. Thus, there is not a possibility that all will win.

Likewise answer choice (C) states that each of many nominees COULD be appointed to any one of the three openings on the committee. It then concludes from this that it is POSSIBLE for all of the nominees to be appointed the openings on the committee. Well there are only three openings. So there is no possibility that all nominees will be appointed to the three openings on the committee.

Hope that helped! Let us know if you have any more questions.

Batman January 22, 2014

Superb!!! Appreciate your amazing explanation!! ^^

Cairo September 9, 2014

I took this to be a trick answer that the numerical term "many", left undefined, could constitute 3 people, and as such all the nominees could be appointed to the three spots on the committee.

Would you explain why this is interpretation is invalid please?

Naz September 16, 2014

Just as you have pointed out, the term "many" could mean "three," but it also could mean "one hundred."

Though it is true that if we assume that there are exactly three nominees, then this answer choice technically wouldn't be flawed, we cannot make that assumption because the term is left undefined. "Many" is the same thing as "some," which means at least one, i.e. the possibilities for how many nominees there could be are endless.

Remember, each question is made up of one correct answer choice and four incorrect answer choices. Which answer choice did you end up choosing? None of the others have a similar flaw. Therefore, when you saw that answer choice (C) did have a similar flaw, there was no reason to assume that "many" could mean "three," because none of the other answer choices work at all.

Hope that clears things up! Please let us know if you have any more questions.

ClaudiaSierra July 30, 2020

I was down to C and D and eliminated C because like someone previously stated, I did not feel good ruling it out knowing "many" could mean "three". Why is D incorrect?

ClaudiaSierra July 30, 2020

Nevermind I saw Mehran's response in the other thread, thanks!