Unit 7 · Topic 7.3

7.3 Qualifying a claim with modifiers

Writers limit how far a claim reaches by adding modifiers: single words like "often," phrases like "in most cases" or whole clauses like "unless funding runs out." Qualifying a claim makes it more accurate and harder to attack, and noticing qualifiers helps you read arguments precisely.

Key terms

qualifier
modifier
hedging
scope
clause

What a qualifier does

A qualifier is a word, phrase or clause that limits the scope of a claim: how many, how often, how much, how certainly or under what conditions. Compare "Homework improves learning" with "Short homework assignments usually improve learning for high school students." The second claim is smaller, but much easier to defend.

What it limits	Examples
How many	most, many, some, a few, for most students
How often	often, usually, sometimes, rarely, in most cases
How much	somewhat, largely, partly, to some degree
How certain	likely, probably, may, appears to, suggests
Under what conditions	if..., when..., unless..., as long as..., at least in the short term

Words, phrases and clauses

Qualifiers come in three sizes. A single word ("often") is quick. A phrase ("in many schools," "for younger students") narrows the scope more precisely. A clause, which has its own subject and verb ("although the costs are high," "unless parents opt out"), can add a whole condition or concession.

Clauses are especially useful for complex arguments, because they let you admit a limit and make your claim in a single sentence: "Although a later start costs more for buses, it gives teenagers sleep that their health depends on."

Qualifiers in your own essays

Put the most important qualifier in your thesis, where it shapes the whole essay. Then make sure your body paragraphs argue the qualified version. If your thesis says a policy helps "most students," a paragraph about a group it doesn't help can become your concession instead of a contradiction.

Choose qualifiers that match your evidence. If your sources show a strong pattern, "usually" is honest; if they show one study, "may" or "suggests" is safer.

Reading qualifiers closely

In reading passages, qualifiers tell you exactly what the writer is claiming. Henry David Thoreau, in "Civil Disobedience" (1849), writes:

"Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient."

Thoreau stacks qualifiers to build a careful claim. "At best but an expedient" means government is merely a practical tool, never something good in itself. "Most governments are usually" inexpedient makes a broad but limited charge; "all governments are sometimes" inexpedient makes a universal claim, but only about some of the time. The pattern lets him sound bold while staying defensible.

Multiple-choice questions often hinge on qualifiers. If a passage says a policy "may reduce" a problem, an answer choice saying the writer believes it "will eliminate" the problem is wrong.

Worked examples

Try each one yourself first, then open the solution.

Example 1
Analyzing Thoreau's qualifiers
Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience" (1849; public domain): "Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient." (An expedient is a practical means to an end; inexpedient means unhelpful or unwise in practice.) Write a short analytical paragraph explaining how Thoreau's qualifiers serve his purpose for readers who believed government was necessary.
Show the solutionHide the solution
1. Step 1: List the qualifiers: "at best but," "most... usually," "all... sometimes."
2. Step 2: Explain the scope of each. "At best" puts a ceiling on government's value. "Most... usually" covers a lot but not everything. "All... sometimes" covers every government, but only on some occasions.
3. Step 3: Connect to audience. Readers who trusted government would reject "all government is bad," but they'd find it hard to deny that every government is sometimes unwise.
4. Step 4: Explain the effect: the careful wording makes a radical criticism sound like plain observation.
Answer: Model paragraph: Thoreau qualifies his criticism of government so carefully that readers who trust government find it hard to disagree. He begins by limiting government's value, calling it "at best but an expedient," a mere tool that is never good in itself. He then sorts his charge by scope: "most governments are usually" unwise, and "all governments are sometimes" unwise. The second claim is universal, yet almost impossible to deny, since even a loyal citizen can name a time their government blundered. By claiming no more than his readers already half believe, Thoreau gets them to accept the premise his more radical argument depends on: that government deserves no automatic loyalty.
Example 2
Writing a qualified thesis
Practice prompt (written for this practice set): Should schools require students to take a personal finance course? Write a thesis that uses at least one word, one phrase and one clause as qualifiers.
Show the solutionHide the solution
1. Step 1: Start with an unqualified claim: "Schools should require personal finance."
2. Step 2: Add a phrase that limits scope: "high schools," "before graduation."
3. Step 3: Add a word that limits strength: "most," "likely."
4. Step 4: Add a clause that sets a condition or concedes a cost: "as long as it doesn't replace math," "although schedules are crowded."
Answer: Model thesis: "Although schedules are already crowded, high schools should require a one-semester personal finance course before graduation, because most students will likely face decisions about loans, credit and taxes before they ever take an economics class." Word qualifiers: "most," "likely." Phrase: "before graduation." Clause: "Although schedules are already crowded."

Common mistakes

Stacking so many qualifiers that the claim disappears ("It could perhaps sometimes be possible that...").
Ignoring qualifiers when you read, then picking an answer choice that overstates the writer's claim.
Qualifying in the thesis but writing body paragraphs that argue the absolute version.

On the exam

When two answer choices look close, compare their qualifiers against the passage. The right answer usually matches the writer's exact degree of certainty.
A thesis with a well-chosen clause ("Although..., ...") shows complexity from the first sentence and sets up a line of reasoning that addresses the other side.

Connected topics

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Check yourself

4 questions on 7.3 Qualifying a claim with modifiers. Pick an answer to see if you got it, and why.

STUDIES serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight, is in privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment, and disposition of business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one; but the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, come best, from those that are learned. To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar. They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need proyning, by study; and studies themselves, do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience. Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use; but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation. Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled books are like common distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know, that he doth not.

Francis Bacon, "Of Studies," from Essays (1625 edition); the opening of the essay, in a modernized-spelling text that keeps some older forms: "proyning" means pruning, "contemn" means scorn, "conference" means conversation, and "maketh" means makes.

Question 1 of 4

In the sentence "For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one," the word "perhaps" mainly serves to

Question 2 of 4

In the sentence "To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar," the words "too much" and "wholly" primarily

Question 3 of 4

In the sentence "Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested," the phrase "some few" mainly serves to

I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instil is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men,—that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment. Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato and Milton is that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else to-morrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.

[. . .] The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them.

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag about this corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat you have stated in this or that public place? Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day.

[. . .] A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day.—‘Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.’—Is it so bad then to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Self-Reliance," from Essays: First Series (1841). Bracketed ellipses mark omitted text.

Question 4 of 4

In the sentence "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds," the word "foolish" primarily serves to

0 of 4 answered