vishy007 wrote:
George Bernard Shaw wrote: That any sane nation, having observed that you could provide for the supply of bread by giving bakers a pecuniary interest in baking for you, should go on to give a surgeon a pecuniary interest in cutting off your leg is enough to make one despair of political humanity.
Shaw's statement would best serve as an illustration in an argument criticizing which of the following?
(A) Dentists who perform unnecessary dental work in order to earn a profit
(B) Doctors who increase their profits by specializing only in diseases that affect a large percentage of the population
(C) Grocers who raise the price of food in order to increase their profit margins
(D) Oil companies that decrease the price of their oil in order to increase their market share
(E) Bakers and surgeons who earn a profit by supplying other peoples basic needs
Shaw's statement would best serve as an illustration in an argument criticizing which of the following?
(A) Dentists who perform unnecessary dental work in order to earn a profit
(B) Doctors who increase their profits by specializing only in diseases that affect a large percentage of the population
(C) Grocers who raise the price of food in order to increase their profit margins
(D) Oil companies that decrease the price of their oil in order to increase their market share
(E) Bakers and surgeons who earn a profit by supplying other peoples basic needs
It took me awhile to understand what GB Shaw was saying so I read the prompt multiple times. Once I understood it, this was pretty straightforward.
A basic explanation of the prompt (IMO) is that GB thinks it sane to give a baker a monetary interest in making bread for you. But that sanity stops when it is stretched to giving someone a profit motive for doing something that can have a devastating impact on someone's life. This is part of a larger argument of private vs. public sector. For example - imagine a for profit fire department? Police department? Can you imagine what would happen if those two things were privately owned? So having a profit motive of having someone cut off legs makes GB lack faith in "political" humanity - or humanity period. Moving on to the actual answer choices:
A - Fits with this perfectly. Dentist pulling teeth unnecessarily to make money follows the same line of thinking.
B - These doctors aren't given the opportunity to perform things that aren't needed. They are making a personal decision on what field they are going into. Not relevant as far as I'm concerned.
C - Someone selling groceries is similar to a baker not someone cutting off legs. This isn't relevant either.
D - Once again this is not something with a twisted motive of causing personal harm. Yes you could argue it harms people's wallets if they decide to monopolize or oligopolize a particular industry but that is NOT equivalent to physically harming someone.
E - This is completely irrelevant. GB Shaw is not saying how they both provide needed services. He's critiquing the fact that surgeons provide a service that can be quite harmful if it is strictly a profit motive.
A jumped out at me for this one.