Passage Discussion

[s.atrmachin3]

What would be an accurate outline of this passage's structure?

Thanks to everyone here, I've been paying particular attention to the reasoning structure of the passage, and it has started to pay off in the form of an easier time understanding and answering questions.

Here is what I came up with for this passage. I'm not satisfied with it though because I was not able to outline the structure without making specific references to the subject matter (as opposed to "... author ID's criticism of theory, rejects criticism, gives support for rejection, etc."):

P1: Describes promising new system. Author asserts that it has fallen short to this point and gives reason why.

P2: Discussion of challenge facing current system. Specific examples. Assertion that system is currently lacking.

P3: Adjustment to system that proponents think give it greater likelihood for success. Author criticizes and says why adjustment still falls short.

I did pretty well with the other three passages in this section of PT 51, but I'm just not satisfied with this one. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Lastly, can anyone point me in the direction of threads, links, resources, etc. that go more in depth with this process of seeing, understanding, verbalizing passage structure? I'd really like to master this skill.

Thanks,
Lance

[tommywallach]

Hey Lance,

I gotta be honest. I think you rocked this one. I totally understand your complaint about not wanting to get into the content if you can help it, but you did a pretty good job of that here, all said.

P1: Describes promising new system. Author asserts that it has fallen short to this point and gives reason why.

P2: Discussion of challenge facing current system. Specific examples. Assertion that system is currently lacking.

P3: Adjustment to system that proponents think give it greater likelihood for success. Author criticizes and says why adjustment still falls short.

Nowhere in that outline did you mention law, or computers, or legal reasoning. I think you kept it as content-neutral as it could possibly be!

If you feel like this was the worst of your four outlines for this RC section, then you have nothing to worry about. You're doing great!

-t

[s.atrmachin3]

Thanks for the reply Tommy. Looking at my summary again, it doesn't look bad at all. I'm not sure why I was so dissatisfied with it. Anyhow, I appreciate the encouragement and I'll be sure to keep working at it.

Less than a month away,
Lance