PrepTest 127

Incorrect. The evidence cited—that the poem is usually sung, that it's the only Arabic epic poem still publicly performed—could be corroborated. Even if there's a question about whether past instances could be corroborated (they could be by historical documents), those instances aren't things that are impossible to prove in principle—that requires something that is impossible to prove by its very nature, such as subjective beliefs.

Incorrect. There's no information as to what sources the author is citing, so we can't say that those sources are biased.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Errors in Reasoning

Stimulus Summary:
The only Arabic epic poem that is still performed is also unusual in that it's usually sung, so the musical nature must be why it's still performed.

Answer Anticipation:
This argument attempts to explain a phenomenon—why is a certain Arabic epic poem the only one that's still performed? Explaining why a phenomenon happened is inherently asking about causality—we could rephrase the question to be—what caused this Arabic epic poem to continue to be performed? The answer the author presents is that it's the musical nature of the performance.

A causal conclusion suggests a correlation/causation flaw, so we should check the premises to see if they're correlative. And they are! The evidence that the musical nature is the cause of the longevity is that . . . the poem is different from most other poems in that it's usually sung. In other words, the musical nature is correlated with the poem that has stood the test of time, and therefore it must have caused it.

Let's find that correlation/causation answer.

Answer Explanation:
This answer reflects the argument's flaw—it treats a certain phenomenon (the longevity of SBH) being correlated with a characteristic (musical character) as if that characteristic explains the phenomenon.

Key Takeaway:
Explanations are almost always causal, especially when they answer why? Whenever a conclusion brings up an explanation, start to think about correlation/causation flaws.

Incorrect. The popularity is ancillary to the argument—it's a throwaway piece of background information. What's relevant to the argument is that it's the only poem still publicly performed.

Incorrect. There's no conditional logic in the stimulus, so it doesn't have a Sufficient/Necessary flaw.