Critical Reasoning Question 16-Editorials

This editorial cannot be a good argument because it is barely literate.  Run-on sentences, slang, and perfectly dreadful grammar appear regularly throughout.  Anything that poorly written cannot be making very much sense.

Which of the following identifies an assumption in the argument above?

A.  This editorial was written by someone other than the usual editor.

B.  Generally speaking, very few editorials are poor in style or grammar.

C.  The language of an argument is indicative of its validity.

D.  Generally speaking, the majority of editorials are poor in style and grammar.

E.  The author of the editorial purposely uses poor grammar to disguise what he knows is a bad argument.

Think you know the answer?

The correct answer is C.

The author’s claim that the editorial’s argument is no good because it is poorly written depends on the assumption hat an argument’s validity is related to its use of language.  After all, if an argument’s language didn’t indicate its validity, the author’s argument wouldn’t make any sense at all.

(A)’s not assumed because the argument doesn’t concern who’s to blame for the bad editorial.  (B) and (D) fail because the argument addresses this editorial only, so there’s nothing assumed about what happens generally.  And (E) goes too far: The author needn’t assume that the writer deliberately wrote badly to hide a bad argument, just that, as (C) says, the poor writing indicates a poor argument.

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