Weaken I: Attacking the Gap

Weaken I: Attacking the Gap

1. The "Would Hurt" Standard

Like Strengthen, Weaken doesn't need to definitively refute the conclusion — it needs to make the gap more concerning. A partial weakener is still correct if it's the strongest attack among the five choices.

2. Attacking Causal Arguments

Day 9's five attacks apply directly: introduce an alternate cause, suggest reversed causation, or point to a case where the cause occurred without the effect.

3. Attacking Non-Causal Gaps

For scope-shift or concept-shift gaps, the weakener usually shows the shift doesn't hold — e.g., that the subgroup discussed in the premise differs in a relevant way from the group in the conclusion.