Imagine that you are a reader of a newspaper that has a sectionthat allows ‘letters to the editor.’ (This is where readers areable to write and submit a short article arguing for some point ofview). Three such hypothetical letters are below. Imagine that youare writing a response to these letters. Write a response in whichyou use your social psychology knowledge to argue against theletter writer.

(2) How anyone could have been fooled by Edward Fresno’smoney-making program is beyond me. These are supposedly intelligentpeople who joined this group (cult is more like it!), who werepromised to make millions of dollars. What a scam it turned out tobe when it was discovered that the whole program was a pyramidscheme! There have been a lot of explanations for how this occurred– for instance, how Edward Fresno was a charismatic person whoenticed these people by offering them gradual rewards for beingpart of the group, or how these people were isolated from otherswho were not part of the group and thus came to reach really poordecisions because of the lack of outside criticism – but let’s lookat the facts. These people had to give up everything to join thisgroup – how could an intelligent person come to enjoy being part ofa group like that? How could this Edward Fresno individual persuadeintelligent people? Obviously these people weren’t that smart.Anyone with half a brain could have seen years ago that this was ascam! -Josh M. Grant