monsoon1 wrote:
Pros and Cons Versus Compare and Contrast
I usually get confused when the main point of a passage has two of its answer choices mentioning as below:
1) "The author is discussing the pros and cons of the theories "
2) "The author is comparing and contrasting the theories "
Could someone please explain the exact meaning & their appropriate usages with relevant examples ?
I'm happy to help with this.
Let's make this specific and concrete, for clarity. Let say, for the sake of argument, we are discussing President Clinton's foreign policy over his 8 year term.
If I discuss the
pros and cons of President Clinton's foreign policy, then I am only discussing President Clinton's foreign policy and no other foreign policy. I am comparing the good parts, the strengths, of President Clinton's foreign policy to the weakness & oversights & shortcomings of this same policy. The entire focus is just on President Clinton's foreign policy, the good and the bad about that one policy. I am just looking at that one thing.
If am asked to
compare and contrast President Clinton's foreign policy, then I am necessarily comparing it to something else (often, that other thing would be specified in both the RC passage and in the question). For example, I could compare and contrast President Clinton's foreign policy with the foreign policy of Reagan, or GW Bush, or Eisenhower, or Truman, etc. etc. I could even compare and contrast President Clinton's foreign policy with the foreign policy of some other contemporary world leader --- Mitterand, John Major, Yeltsin, Deng Xiaoping, etc. etc. Compare and contrast necessarily involves looking at President Clinton's foreign policy in relation to some other foreign policy. I have to look at more than one thing.
Pros & cons happen
within, but compare & contrast happens
between.
Pros & cons focus on the good vs. the bad of a single thing.
Compare & contrast necessarily involves at least two different things.
Does that make sense?
Mike