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Zorluk: KolayWeaken

Argument: Last year, the Sunnyvale City Council launched a public awareness campaign promoting the health benefits of eating locally grown produce. Over the past twelve months, the sales of locally grown produce at Sunnyvale farmers' markets have doubled. The city council concludes that their public awareness campaign successfully persuaded residents to buy more local produce.

Statement: The new fact that a massive nationwide shortage of non-local produce drastically increased the prices of imported vegetables over the last twelve months actively weakens the city council's conclusion.

Cevap: Cevap

Cevap

True
The factual assertion is true. The argument relies on a causal link between the awareness campaign and the increase in sales. By introducing a different, highly practical economic reason for people to buy local produce (imported produce became too expensive), the new fact provides a strong alternative explanation for the observed phenomenon. This directly undermines the conclusion that the campaign was the driving force behind the increased sales.

Adım Adım Çözüm

1
Identify the argument's premises and conclusion.
Premise: Campaign launched, local produce sales doubled. Conclusion: The campaign caused the increase in sales.
Understanding the exact causal claim is necessary to evaluate whether it can be weakened.
2
Analyze the logical gap in the argument.
The argument assumes that because the campaign preceded the increase in sales, it must have caused the increase, ignoring other potential economic or environmental factors.
Weakening an argument usually involves exploiting its logical gap, such as a jump from correlation to causation.
3
Evaluate the impact of the new factual assertion on the argument's conclusion.
The new fact introduces a competing cause for the increased sales: high prices of alternative (imported) produce. This makes the campaign less likely to be the actual cause.
To determine if the statement is true, we must verify if the new fact actively undermines the causal relationship claimed in the conclusion.

Anahtar Kavram

Identifying alternative causes to weaken causal conclusions.
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