Hospital executive: At a recent conference on nonprofit management, several computer experts maintained that the most significant threat faced by large institutions such as universities and hospitals is unauthorized access to confidential data. In light of this testimony, we should make the protection of our clients’ confidentiality our highest priority.
The hospital executive’s argument is most vulnerable to which one of the following objections?
(A) The argument confuses the causes of a problem with the appropriate solutions to that problem.
(B) The argument relies on the testimony of experts whose expertise is not shown to be sufficiently broad to support their general claim.
(C) The argument assumes that a correlation between two phenomena is evidence that one is the cause of the other.
(D) The argument draws a general conclusion about a group based on data about an unrepresentative sample of that group.
(E) The argument infers that a property belonging to large institutions belongs to all institutions.
A. This flaw didn’t occur.
Example: My house is on fire, so I’ll fix it by setting the fire on fire. That’s using the problem as the solution—clearly illogical, but not what happened here.
B. Correct. This matches the flaw. The argument relies on the opinion of computer experts without establishing that they understand the broader range of threats faced by large organizations. If their expertise is limited to computer threats, their opinion may not be sufficient.
C. This flaw didn’t occur.
Example: There’s been more computer hacking since cars were invented. Therefore, cars must cause hacking. That’s a faulty causal link—but not relevant here.
D. This flaw didn’t occur.
Example: Bob is a computer expert and from Arkansas. Therefore, all computer experts are from Arkansas. That’s a clear unrepresentative sample issue, which doesn’t apply in this case.
E. This overgeneralization didn’t happen here.
Example: Large companies need HR departments, so your small corner store should have one too. That’s overextending a generalization, which isn't the flaw in the stimulus.
