Ways to look for descriptive assumptions

1. Looking for Shifts in Language

One of the most reliable ways to find assumptions is to look for shifts in language between
the premises and conclusion of an argument. When new stuff appears in the conclusion that
wasn’t discussed in the premises, it usually got there by way of an assumption. Let’s look at
a simple argument:
Spinach dip has more fiber per tablespoon than does artichoke dip. Therefore, spinach dip
is a healthier snack than artichoke dip.
The premise of the argument is the first sentence, and the conclusion is the second sentence.
The premise says that spinach dip has more fiber than artichoke dip. But the conclusion
doesn’t say that spinach dip is a more fiber-rich snack than artichoke dip, it says that it’s a
healthier snack. That shift in language from fiber to health is exactly what you need to train
yourself to look for. The argument is assuming that having more fiber automatically makes
something healthier, but that’s not necessarily true. There could be other differences
between the two dips (calories, cholesterol, fat, etc.) that tell a different story. Watching for
shifts in language is one of the best ways to find assumptions.

2. Looking for the Most Common Argument Types

A causal argument claims that one thing is the cause or explanation of something else.
The Blaylock school expanded their computer lab last year and this year’s test scores are
up. If we want to increase test scores at our school, we should also expand our computer
lab.
The fundamental assumption of any causal argument is that there is no other cause. (There
are a few other minor assumptions but that’s the big one.) The previous argument is
assuming that the expansion of the computer lab is the only explanation for increased test
scores.
A sampling argument argues that because something is true of a sample of things, that
same thing will be true about the larger group.
Everyone I’ve talked to has raved about the movie “Justice Delayed.” It will surely be
loved throughout the country.
The fundamental assumption of any sampling argument is that the sample is representative.
The argument above is assuming that everyone I’ve talked to is a representative sample of
the country’s population.
Lastly, an analogy argument makes a comparison between two things and claims that
because something is true of the first thing, it will also be true of the second thing.
Justin already has his pilot’s license for small planes. It will be easy for him to learn to fly
a helicopter.
The fundamental assumption of any analogy argument is that the two things are similar.
The argument above is assuming that flying a plane is similar enough to flying a helicopter
that being able to do the former will make the latter easy.
If you approach arguments with a critical mindset, look for shifts in language, and look for
common argument types, you’ll have much more success finding assumptions in Critical
 Reasoning questions.
Source: https://www.qsleap.com/gmat/resources/3-tools-for-spotting-assumptions

Practice
I. Find the hidden assumptions in the following cases

1. Dogs are annoying because they need lots of attention.

2. Juanita has a college degree, so she must make a lot of money.
3. Getting an English degree is a waste of an education because you'll never get rich
from it.
4. This building is in bad condition, and therefore the rent should be lowered.
5. Drugs should remain illegal because they injure your health.
6. Boxing causes injury, so this is not a sport we should encourage.
7. The defendant should not be sent to prison for stealing because she's a good person at
heart.
8. Brad lives in California, so he must spend his weekends surfing.
9. No one should have to pay for art because art makes people feel good.
10. Bob is an athlete, so he has plenty of self-discipline.
11. These new violent computer games will never become widespread, because most
parents don’t like their children decapitating people with chainsaws, even if it is ‘only
a game’.
12. Life on Earth is in deadly peril. If we had not burnt so much fossil fuel in the late 20th
century, there would not have been so much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. If
there were less carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the greenhouse effect would not be
running out of control.
13. H2O is abundant on Earth. 70% of the world’s surface area is water.
14. Many people argue that testing drugs on animals is cruel. In some cases this is true.
However, it would be much crueler to test new drugs on people or children or to let
people die because there was not enough research on a new drug.
15. Human behaviour is determined by genetics not social conditioning. Clearly, if the
authorities brought in a rule banning growing hair, we would all be imprisoned.
Likewise, a ban on ‘being hungry’ or ‘being thirsty’ would be unenforceable. Social
conditioning cannot override our genetic inheritance.

II. Choose the correct answer that show the hidden assumption behind these
arguments. Evaluate whether the assumptions are true or false.
1. You should be able to laugh aloud whenever you want to, wherever you are,
because it's good for your mind and body.
A. Laughter helps you relax.
B. You should be able to do anything that is good for your mind and body whenever you
want to, wherever you are.
C. You are laughing and can’t stop.
2. Tom would never hurt anyone's feelings because he's very sensitive himself.
A. Sensitive people never hurt anyone's feelings.
B. Tom is very easily hurt.
C. Tom has been accused of hurting someone's feelings.
3. Cats don't lay eggs because they're mammals.
A. Cats have viviparous young.
B. Mammals don't lay eggs.
C. Cats are mammals.
4. The accused killer had been brought up as a devout Christian, so the community
was very surprised when he turned out to be a violent psychopath.
A. The accused killer was a violent psychopath.
B. People brought up as Christians can't be psychopaths.
C. The accused had committed a violent crime.
5. Because he played and sang Irish music so beautifully, Torvald astonished his fans
when he revealed that he was actually Norwegian.
A. Norwegians are bad musicians.
B. Torvald had kept his identity secret.
C. Only the Irish can play Irish music.
6. John is an attorney, so all he cares about is money.
A. John is like all attorneys.
B. Attorneys only care about money.
C. If he wasn't an attorney, he wouldn't care about money.
7. Rock music is definitely a part of today's society, so it must be basically a good
thing.
A. Anything that is part of today's society is basically a good thing.
B. Rock music must be part of today's society.
C. Rock music must be a good thing.
8. The animal rights activist who beat up the butcher shouldn't go to prison because
he is really sincere about what he's doing.
A. The animal rights activist was sincere about beating up the butcher.
B. Animal rights activism is not a crime.
C. People who are sincere about their "crimes" should be excused from punishment.
9. Schools can't stop Sikh students from wearing small swords in their turbans,
despite the "No Weapons" policy, because it's part of Sikh religion to do so.
A. Turbans are religious artifacts for Sikhs.
B. Schools can't stop students from doing things that their religion tells them to do.
C. Schools should not have a "No Weapons" policy.
10. "Cow-Abunga" yoghurts must be good for you since they're made with 100%
natural and organic ingredients!
A. Anything natural and organic is good for you.
B. "Cow-abunga" yoghurts are made with 100% natural and organic ingredients.
C. Yoghurts are good for you.

Answer Key
Task 1
Key:
1. Anything that needs lots of attention is annoying.
2. Everyone with a college degree makes a lot of money.
3. Any education that doesn't make you rich is a waste of time.
4. Any building in bad condition loses value.
5. Anything that injures your health should be illegal.
6. No sport that causes injury should be encouraged.
7. Good people shouldn't go to prison for their actions.
8. All Californians spend their weekends surfing.
9. No one should have to pay for anything that makes him or her feel good.
10. Athletes have plenty of self-discipline.
11. Parents control whether their children buy and play computer games.
12. When the greenhouse effect runs out of control, life on earth is in deadly peril.
13. H2O and water are the same thing.
14. i. Human lives are more valuable than animal lives.
ii. Preventing non-fatal human suffering (such as a temporary illness) is intrinsically
more important than preventing the loss of life of an indefinite number of laboratory
animals.
iii. Testing on animals is the only way to effectively test how safe a drug is for human
consumption.
15. The examples given (‘growing hair’, ‘feeling hungry’ etc) are examples of human
behavior.
(This assumption is weak because we normally describe these activities as
involuntary physiological events, whereas ‘behavior’ normally refers to actions that
we can choose, or not, to perform.)

Task 2

1. A: No. This is said aloud, more or less, when the speaker asserts that laughter is good
for
the mind and body.
B: Yes. The reason why it is OK to laugh in public, according to this speaker, is
specifically
because laughter is one of those things that makes you feel good. This necessarily implies
that everything that makes you feel good should be permitted anywhere, anytime. This
might include crying, yelling, being sick, or any number of very private activities!
C: No. This is background information, perhaps, to the statement. But it is not necessarily
implied. It doesn’t help us connect the kind of thing (something that is good for you) with
its quality (being able to do it anywhere, anytime). The hidden assumption, however,
does make this connection.
2. A: Yes. This is one of those unexamined assumptions the, when you look at it, is not all
that convincing. The implication is that sensitive people never hurt others, and indeed, that
suggests that to be “sensitive” to one’s own feelings necessarily means that you care
about other peoples’. Unfortunately, this is not the case. People who are very keen to
protect their own feelings may not care one bit about yours.
B: No. He may be easily hurt, but that is what “sensitive” means, and we are told directly
that he is very sensitive. What we are not told, however, is the connection between his
sensitivity and his reluctance to hurt the feelings of others.
C: No. This is background information, perhaps. Tom may or may not have been accused
of
hurting someone’s feelings, and this may or may not be the reason why the speaker
makes this statement. But it is not part of the logical structure of the remark.
3. A: No. This is suggested by the statement that they do not lay eggs (“viviparous” means
to give birth to live young), but it is not embedded in the logic.
B: Yes. The statement clearly implies, without directly stating it, that being a mammal
means you do not lay eggs.
C: No. The speaker tells us they are mammals in the second part of the sentence.
4. A: No. We are told explicitly that he is a violent psychopath; it is not implied.
B: Yes. Implied here is the notion that because someone has been brought up as a devout
Christian, that person is less likely to suffer from the specific personality disorder of
psychopathology. In fact, there is nothing to suggest that a Christian upbringing can
prevent a person from mental defects such as a psychopathic personality. Indeed, there is
nothing to suggest that a Christian upbringing is necessarily gentler, kinder or more likely
to promote a non-violent individual than any other kind of upbringing.
C: No. This may be background to the statement, but it’s not a hidden generalization or
connection. What does the statement imply about a Christian upbringing?
5. A: No. There is nothing here to suggest that Norwegians are bad musicians, necessarily.
B: No. This background information is suggested by the statement, but not necessarily
implied. Perhaps no one had bothered to ask where he was from! You need to look at the
statement implied here.
C: Yes. The implication is that only Irish people can really play their own music. This in
turn could imply that music can only ever be played well by people brought up in that
culture — which is clearly untrue, since we see Hungarians playing German music,
Israelis playing Spanish music, New Yorkers playing Nigerian music, etc. etc.
6. A: No. This is another way of phrasing the arguments. If you can conclude something
about John’s character because he is an attorney, then he must be like all attorneys — but
in
what particular way? That’s the generalization you need.
B: Yes. Unless you assume that all attorneys are money-grubbing, the connection between
John, money and the law makes no sense.
C: No. Even if the argument were logical, many other groups care about money, like
bank managers or yoga instructors or actors. Another statement is implied here which is
essential to link John’s occupation to his money-grubbiness.
7. A: Yes. You can see where the speaker is going here: he means that the musical tastes
of so many people should not be dismissed out of hand. But he does not actually say this.
Instead, he makes a sort of disheveled version of this idea; and the result is that he
implies that anything that exists today must be good. Does this make sense to you? Lots
of things are part of today’s world — poverty, racism, crime, reruns of “Friends” — that
we would be lots happier without!
B: No. This just rephrases the opening premise, that rock music is part of today’s society.
C: No. This just rephrases the conclusion: the speaker says that it must be a good thing.
But
why?
8. A: No. That premise is stated aloud; he is sincere about what he is doing (including,
presumably, butcher-beating).
B: No. You are almost there. More important, though, is why this activism is not a crime
—
or rather, why this speaker implies that it should not be a crime. Suppose the animal
rights activist had not been sincere about his cause, but had merely joined to impress his
girlfriend. He would not get the same lenient treatment, according to this argument. It is
the activist’s sincerity, not the specific cause, that gets him exonerated. So what does this
tell you about sincerity?
C: Yes. It is precisely the person’s sincerity that should excuse him from a jail sentence,
according to this speaker. This means that any activity, sincerely undertaken, should not
result in prison. What do you think of this generalization now that it is spoken aloud?
Would you use it to defend, for instance, Timothy McVeigh, who murdered 168 people
in Oklahoma City? He was very sincere. So was the Unabomber. If this is what the
speaker means, he needs to do a lot more explaining!
9. A: No. This rephrases the premise that wearing certain artifacts is part of Sikh religion.
B: Yes. Good! You have an example of a specific student activity (carrying small swords
to
school) and you decide that it cannot be prevented, because of the kind of activity it is
(religious-inspired). The speaker clearly implies that any religious practice activity must
thus be permitted in school. Like so many generalizations, once you get this out into the
open, you can see that it needs a lot more explaining. The Constitution does not defend
any and all religious practices. Rastafarian religion, for instance, mandate the smoking of
marijuana, but you just tr explaining that to your homeroom teacher.
C: No. Maybe they should and maybe they should not, but that is not the discussion here.
You need to connect the sword-wearing to religion.
10. A: Yes. And like so many hidden generalizations, this one crumbles when you drag it
into the light. Think of all the organic, natural things that are not good for you: botulism,
the
bubonic plague, toadstools, leopards.
B: No. This just restates one of the given premises; it is not implied.
C: No. This rephrases, in more general terms, the conclusion that Cowabunga yoghurts are
good for you. But the real question is, why are they good for you? The speaker answers
by telling you what kind of yoghurt they are. So what does that tell us about the kind of
yoghurt?