Online Course Support | Think Again I: How to Understand Arguments

Indicate which of the proposed reconstructions best captures the italicized argument in the following passages from Steven Jay Gould, “The Panda’s Thumb”

 

(1) Orchids were not made by an ideal engineer.

(2) Orchids are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components.

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∴ (3) Orchids must have evolved from ordinary flowers. (from 1-2)

(1) Orchids were not made by an ideal engineer.

(2) Organisms that were not made by an ideal engineer must have evolved from ordinary organisms of the same kind.

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∴ (3) Orchids must have evolved from ordinary flowers. (from 1-2)

(4) Orchids are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components.

(5) Organisms that are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components must have evolved from ordinary organisms of the same kind.

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∴ (3) Orchids must have evolved from ordinary flowers. (from 4-5)

      (1) Orchids are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components.

      (2) Organisms that are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components were not made by an       ideal engineer.

    (3) Orchids are organisms.

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  ∴ (4) Orchids were not made by an ideal engineer. (from 1-3)

   (5) Organisms that were not made by an ideal engineer must have evolved from ordinary organisms of the same kind.

   (6) Orchids are a kind of flower.

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∴ (7) Orchids must have evolved from ordinary flowers. (from 3-6)

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