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Lesson: Challenging Critical/Logical Reasoning - 13t02

Reasoning Classics: The Representativeness Argument, continued

[Page 13 of 24]

In addressing the region-wide recession, the comptroller of County X has asserted that the depressed economy of County X is indicative of the inevitable consequences of the recession for all counties in the region. But that must be false, considering that the economy of neighboring County Y is as robust as ever, despite the overall current financial difficulties of the region.

The author is making a conclusion about the cause of County X's economic troubles.

The author uses County Y's economy as evidence to support her conclusion.
The author is assuming that County X and County Y are enough alike that evidence about one can be used to draw conclusions about the other.

Now that we've identified the assumption, think of one statement that would strengthen the argument and one statement that would weaken the argument. Click Continue to see our examples.


If the economies of County X and County Y were dependent on one major industry, the argument would be strengthened.

If County Y, unlike County X, derived the majority of its economic activity from its tourism industry, the argument would be weakened.

Whenever an argument relies on a sample of a larger group, check to make sure that the sample is, in fact, representative of that group.

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