Q18 - The human brain and its

[noah]

This argument boils down to this: We should judge a person's aesthetic judgments based on how much those judgments keep him or her alive. Why? Because the human brain evolved to keep us alive, and so our aesthetic judgment (our ability to decide if things are pretty) evolved because of some past environment in which we lived.

This would be like saying this:

Cars were developed to make it easier for folks in cities to have an easy way to travel (since horses are difficult to maintain in a city), so when you're deciding on which car to buy, you must make your choose the car that makes it easiest for you to travel.

What's the gap? In both of them, there's an assumption that we should evaluate something based on the reason that that thing developed. Perhaps we should now evaluate cars based on their fuel efficiency (or, ability to brake ), and for aesthetic judgments, maybe we should evaluate them based on whether they are developed based on an established system. If (C) were added to the argument, it would be a tighter argument, as that large assumption would become a premise. If we negate (C), we find the argument not making much sense.

(A) is suspiciously extreme -- do we need ALL human adaptations to be like that? However, principles can be grandiose. But here, the issue is that the discussion is about mental capacities and how we evaluate them--whether ALL human adaptations are related to the brain is irrelevant. Consider the thumb--is it relevant to this argument that the evolution of the thumb relates to the brain? No.
(B) is out of scope.
(D) is out of scope -- our ability to determine whether a judgment is true or false is irrelevant.
(E) is out of scope -- proliferation of the species?

By the way, there's another assumption in this argument: that aesthetic judgments originate in the brain!

[deedubbew]

Even though (A) is indeed extreme, does it not still provide strong justification if we assumed it to be true? I chose (A) because it seemed to link the gap between the premise and the first conclusion signaled by "Thus."

This argument boils down to this: We should judge a person's aesthetic judgments based on how much those judgments keep him or her alive. Why? Because the human brain evolved to keep us alive, and so our aesthetic judgment (our ability to decide if things are pretty) evolved because of some past environment in which we lived.

This would be like saying this:

Cars were developed to make it easier for folks in cities to have an easy way to travel (since horses are difficult to maintain in a city), so when you're deciding on which car to buy, you must make your choose the car that makes it easiest for you to travel.

What's the gap? In both of them, there's an assumption that we should evaluate something based on the reason that that thing developed. Perhaps we should now evaluate cars based on their fuel efficiency (or, ability to brake ), and for aesthetic judgments, maybe we should evaluate them based on whether they are developed based on an established system. If (C) were added to the argument, it would be a tighter argument, as that large assumption would become a premise. If we negate (C), we find the argument not making much sense.

(A) is too extreme -- do we need ALL human adaptations to be like that?
(B) is out of scope.
(D) is out of scope -- our ability to determine whether a judgment is true or false is irrelevant.
(E) is out of scope -- proliferation of the species?

By the way, there's another assumption in this argument: that aesthetic judgments originate in the brain!

[noah]

Even though (A) is indeed extreme, does it not still provide strong justification if we assumed it to be true? I chose (A) because it seemed to link the gap between the premise and the first conclusion signaled by "Thus."

I realize my explanation was a bit misleading. (A) is both extreme and not filling the gap.

It's irrelevant if all human adaptations were based on the same things. To see this, consider whether it's a problem for this argument if the human adaptation of body hair has nothing to do with the human brain. (I know this isn't a necessary assumption argument, but the thought experiment should bring to light the issue.) (A) shifts the discussion from a mental capacity to all human adaptations.

Make sense now?

[deedubbew]

I think I see the problem now; I was trying to bridge the gap between the first two sentences--the premise and the subsidiary conclusion instead of filling the gap between the main conclusion in the last sentence and the first two sentences. Though irrelevant, answer choice A does bridge the gap between the premise and the subsidiary conclusion though, doesn't it?

[WaltGrace1983]

I think I see the problem now; I was trying to bridge the gap between the first two sentences--the premise and the subsidiary conclusion instead of filling the gap between the main conclusion in the last sentence and the first two sentences. Though irrelevant, answer choice A does bridge the gap between the premise and the subsidiary conclusion though, doesn't it?

My thought would be "no" because we haven't actually established that the capacity to make aesthetic judgments is an adaptation to past environments. The author concludes it but that doesn't mean that it is true.

Thus, the only thing we could use (A) to support would be the gap between the intermediate conclusion and the conclusion.

HOWEVER, if (A) had said "The capacity to make aesthetic judgments was based on the human brain and its associated mental capacities," then I'm pretty sure that would bridge the gap. This is because it is talking about the thing we want - the capacity to make aesthetic judgements - directly.

If we don't talk about this directly, how would we know that the "capacity to make aesthetic judgments" is included within the "all human adaptations to past environments" group? We wouldn't because we are CONCLUDING that.

This would be very reminiscent of a Sufficient Assumption question.


The human brain and its associated mental capacities assists self-preservation
-->
Thus, the capacity to make aesthetic judgments assists self-preservation


A correct answer choice would say...
(A) The capacity to make aesthetic judgments is an aspect of the human brain and its associated mental capacities.

An incorrect answer would say
(B) Everything that assists self-preservation is an aspect of the human brain and its associated mental capacities.

The reason the hypothetical (B) choice is wrong is that we DO NOT know if the "capacity to make aesthetic judgments" falls under the umbrella of "everything that assists self-preservation." After all, this is what the author argues for! Meanwhile, the hypothetical (A) choice deals with the subject directly - we KNOW something about it.

Does that make sense? *cough* let me know if I am wrong *cough*

[WaltGrace1983]

If we negate (C), we find the argument not making much sense.

Why are we negating things in a Principle question?

[rinagoldfield]

noah wrote:
If we negate (C), we find the argument not making much sense.


Why are we negating things in a Principle question?

Agreed, negation generally isn’t a good strategy for principle questions. Good eye.

deedubbew wrote:
I think I see the problem now; I was trying to bridge the gap between the first two sentences--the premise and the subsidiary conclusion instead of filling the gap between the main conclusion in the last sentence and the first two sentences. Though irrelevant, answer choice A does bridge the gap between the premise and the subsidiary conclusion though, doesn't it?


My thought would be "no" because we haven't actually established that the capacity to make aesthetic judgments is an adaptation to past environments. The author concludes it but that doesn't mean that it is true.

Thus, the only thing we could use (A) to support would be the gap between the intermediate conclusion and the conclusion.

HOWEVER, if (A) had said "The capacity to make aesthetic judgments was based on the human brain and its associated mental capacities," then I'm pretty sure that would bridge the gap. This is because it is talking about the thing we want - the capacity to make aesthetic judgements - directly.

If we don't talk about this directly, how would we know that the "capacity to make aesthetic judgments" is included within the "all human adaptations to past environments" group? We wouldn't because we are CONCLUDING that.

I see what you’re saying here, but I don’t think we need to address aesthetic judgments directly to bridge the premise and the intermediate conclusion.

Here’s my breakdown of those parts of the argument:

All capacities evolved to assist self preservation

-->

One specific capacity [aesthetic judgment] is an adaptation to past environments

Because aesthetic judgment is an example of the capacities discussed in the premise, it’s covered by the premise.

Analogy:

All cats meow

-->

That alley cat over there must be nice .

The movement from all cats to specific cat is fine. The jump is between meow and nice. A sufficient assumption would be:

(A) Anything that meows is nice

Going back to the original argument, the movement from all capacities to a specific capacity is fine. Instead, we need to connect the premise and the intermediate conclusion with something like this:

(A) Anything that evolved to assist self preservation is an adaptation to a past environment

By the by, the actual answer choice (A) doesn't give us that. It moves from adaptations to mental capacities. To go back to my cats analogy, that’s like saying “All nice things are cats.” It just links the wrong parts of the argument; we need to connect “assisting self preservation” to “adaptation to past environments.”

Lemme know your thoughts Walt!