| Critical Reasoning Butler: April 2025 |
| April 14 | CR 1 | CR 2 |
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CR 1 French philosopher Albert Camus was a pacificist, holding the opinion that a country that asserts its power through military dominance is fundamentally illiberal. Some biographers have suggested that Camus’s aversion to military activity was a result of the poverty his family experienced in Algeria following his father’s death fighting in the first world war.
Which of the following, if true, would cast the most serious doubt on the biographers’ claim?
A. Camus’s personal correspondence with family members reveals his belief that the poverty he and his family experienced was largely due to their background as unskilled agricultural laborers.
B. Intellectuals of the post-war period characterized the first world war as a wasteful military conflict, fought for unjust reasons.
C. Although the losses sustained in the first world war were blamed at the time for poverty in French colonies, such as Algeria, historians now acknowledge it to be a result of more complex reasons.
D. Although Camus characterized contemporary French policies as having a net positive impact on Europe, France was a major military power.
E. Camus once mentioned in an essay that, although his youth was marked by severe poverty, it was not different from the experience of his friends and neighbors in Algeria.
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CR 2 News anchor: The average resident of the state’s four major cities drives 150 miles per month, and most of the state’s residents live in these four cities. Moreover, the average distance driven by the residents of the state tends to remain stable from one month to the next. Therefore, most of the state’s residents drive at least 100 miles each month.
The argument presented by the news anchor is most susceptible to which of the following criticisms?
A. It reaches a conclusion for the entire state on the basis of data from just four cities.
B. It fails to consider the possibility that even if, on average, a certain distance is driven by the people within a certain group, many of those in the group may not drive at all.
C. It confuses a claim that would necessarily lead to the argument’s conclusion about the state’s residents with a claim that would only be highly likely to follow from the argument’s conclusion regarding the state’s residents.
D. It ignores the possibility that the residents of the cities may be driving outside of city limits.
E. It fails to consider the possibility that even if most residents of the state drive at least 100 miles each month, any given resident may not drive at all in some months.