PrepTest 27, Section 3, Question 21
Words like "employee," "payee," and "detainee" support the generalization, crudely stated, that words with the ending -ee designate the person affected in the specified way by an action performed by someone else. The word "absentee" seems to be a direct counterexample: it ends in -ee, yet, if it makes sense here to speak of an action at all�that of absenting oneself, perhaps�the word can refer to the person who actually performs that action. Clearly, however, putting forward the following resolves the impasse: if a word with the ending -ee refers to one party in a two-party transaction, it refers to the party at which the other party's action is directed.
Words like "employee," "payee," and "detainee" support the generalization, crudely stated, that words with the ending -ee designate the person affected in the specified way by an action performed by someone else. The word "absentee" seems to be a direct counterexample: it ends in -ee, yet, if it makes sense here to speak of an action at all�that of absenting oneself, perhaps�the word can refer to the person who actually performs that action. Clearly, however, putting forward the following resolves the impasse: if a word with the ending -ee refers to one party in a two-party transaction, it refers to the party at which the other party's action is directed.
Words like "employee," "payee," and "detainee" support the generalization, crudely stated, that words with the ending -ee designate the person affected in the specified way by an action performed by someone else. The word "absentee" seems to be a direct counterexample: it ends in -ee, yet, if it makes sense here to speak of an action at all�that of absenting oneself, perhaps�the word can refer to the person who actually performs that action. Clearly, however, putting forward the following resolves the impasse: if a word with the ending -ee refers to one party in a two-party transaction, it refers to the party at which the other party's action is directed.
Words like "employee," "payee," and "detainee" support the generalization, crudely stated, that words with the ending -ee designate the person affected in the specified way by an action performed by someone else. The word "absentee" seems to be a direct counterexample: it ends in -ee, yet, if it makes sense here to speak of an action at all�that of absenting oneself, perhaps�the word can refer to the person who actually performs that action. Clearly, however, putting forward the following resolves the impasse: if a word with the ending -ee refers to one party in a two-party transaction, it refers to the party at which the other party's action is directed.
The argument does which one of the following in dealing with the counterexample it offers?
provides additional support for the original generalization in part by showing that the supposed force of the counterexample derives from a misanalysis of that example
dismisses the counterexample on the grounds that its force, compared to the weight of the supporting evidence, is insignificant
concedes that the proposed counterexample is an exception to the generalization but maintains the generalization on the grounds that all generalizations have exceptions
narrows the scope of the generalization at issue in such a way that the putative counterexample is no longer relevant
shows how replacing the notion of being affected in the specified way by an action with that of having someone's action directed at oneself reveals the counterexample to be spurious
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