Question 18

There is a sentence that is missing in the paragraph below. Look at the paragraph and decide where (option 1, 2, 3, or 4) the following sentence would best fit.

Sentence: This philosophical cut at one’s core beliefs, values, and way of life is difficult enough.

Paragraph: The experience of reading philosophy is often disquieting. When reading philosophy, the values around which one has heretofore organised one’s life may come to look provincial, flatly wrong, or even evil. ___(1)___. When beliefs previously held as truths are rendered implausible, new beliefs, values, and ways of living may be required. ___(2)___. What’s worse, philosophers admonish each other to remain unsutured until such time as a defensible new answer is revealed or constructed. Sometimes, philosophical writing is even strictly critical in that it does not even attempt to provide an alternative after tearing down a cultural or conceptual citadel. ___(3)___. The reader of philosophy must be prepared for the possibility of this experience. While reading philosophy can help one clarify one’s values, and even make one self-conscious for the first time of the fact that there are good reasons for believing what one believes, it can also generate unremediated doubt that is difficult to live with. ___(4)___.

Solution

The sentence best fits in Blank 2 because it provides a continuation and elaboration on the disquieting experience mentioned before Blank 2. Before Blank 2, the passage introduces the disquieting nature of reading philosophy, and the sentence builds on that by explaining that the philosophical examination challenges the values around which one has organized their life, making them appear provincial, flatly wrong, or even evil. The sentence in question serves to articulate the difficulty and discomfort associated with this profound philosophical scrutiny, logically following the initial statement about the disquieting experience of reading philosophy.

We can also see that the sentence ends with “...and way of life is difficult enough.” This is immediately followed by the passage highlighting what’s worse “What’s worse, philosophers admonish each other to remain unsutured until such time as a defensible new answer is revealed or constructed.”. So we can see that Sentence 2 serves as a preceding sentence to this.

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