PrepTest 135

Incorrect. Even if these historians "often" agree on "many" aspects, there are presumably many cases where that's not the case, and thus a shift in focus could still be warranted.

Incorrect. The argument is wholly about analyzing history, so other disciplines are out of scope.

Incorrect. Even if these biases have been discovered, they would still influence the work, and so it could still create a problem that would need to be addressed.

Incorrect. Historian's awareness of their biases isn't related to the argument. If anything, an answer about addressing the biases would be.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Errors in Reasoning

Stimulus Summary:
Problem - Historians are biased
Solution - Historians should focus on interpreting what the people who lived through historical events thought about them, not the events themselves

Answer Anticipation:
This argument has a Problem/Solution structure to it, and the author of the argument settles on a solution to the problem. Since the argument is an Errors in Reasoning question, there must be something wrong with that solution.

And from a high-enough level, that's the flaw! The solution here must not address the problem. That's probably not going to be specific enough to find the correct answer, but, if all else fails and you can't find the reason why it doesn't address the problem, you can head into the answers looking for one that points out that reason.

Here, however, we can dig in a bit and think about the issue here. The problem is that historians have biases, which would presumably color their interpretation of historical events. In order to get around this, the author says that they shouldn't interpret historical events, but rather try to figure out how people who were alive at the time felt about them. The assumption there appears to be that by getting outside of their own opinion about these events, they'll be able to avoid having their biases affect their interpretation.

However, they'd still be interpreting something—how people at the time felt about it. There's no indication that this shift in focus would change how the biases affect the analysis, so the correct answer will likely highlight this.

Answer Explanation:
The argument recommends a shift in focus to address a perceived problem in historical analysis. If that shift in focus won't address the problem, then there's no reason to implement it. This answer highlights an issue with the argument and is thus correct.

Key Takeaway:
Problem/Solution passages are flawed (at the highest level) because the solution doesn't actually address or solve the problem. If you can identify why that's the case, you should be in good shape to find the correct answer.