Self-study
Advances in photocopying technology allow criminals with no printing expertise to counterfeit paper currency. ███ ████████ ██████████████████ ██████████ ██████████████ ██████ █████ ████████ ████ ████ ███████ ████ ██████ ██ ███████████ ███████████ ████████ ████████████ ██ ████████████ ████████ ███ ██ ████████ ██████ ██ ████████ ████ ████████████ █████ █████████ ██████ ██████ █████ █████████ ██ ████████████ ██████ ████ ███████ ████████ █████████ █████ █████ ████████ ████ █ ███████ ████ ████████ ███████ ████ ███ ███ █████ ██████ █████ █████████ ██ ███ ████████ █████ ███████ ███ ███████ ███████████ ████████████ ██ ████ ████████ █████ ████ ███████ ████ █████████ █████ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███████████ ███████████ ████████ ███████ ██ ██████ ██ ███████ ███████ ██ ██████████████ ███████ ███ ████████
Summarize Argument
The author concludes that a special ink technique should be adopted as an anticounterfeiting measure, even though it's more expensive. This is because special ink would allow counterfeit money to be identified more easily than with the current microprinting technique.
Notable Assumptions
The author assumes that the special ink technique’s benefits outweigh the additional expense. That is, the author assumes that easier detection of counterfeits is more valuable than the money that would be saved by continuing to use microprinting. The author also assumes that the special ink technique is no easier to imitate than the microprinting technique.
4.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ████████ ███ ████ ███████ ███ ███ ██████████████ ████ ██ ███ █████████
a
When an anticounterfeiting █████████ ███████ ██ ███ █████████ ██ ████████████ ██ ████████ ███ ████ ██ ██████████ ██ ███████ ████ █████████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ███████ ██ ████ ██████████
While the microprinting technique is cheaper when creating bills, expert inspection is costly, so microprinting might not in fact be cheaper overall. This strengthens the case for the special ink by adding a cost to the microprinting option.
b
For any anticounterfeiting █████████ ██ ██ ██████████ ███ █████████ ██ ██████████████████ ██████████ ██████ ██ ██████ ██████████ ███ ███ ██████ ██ █████ ████████████ ███ ████████ ██████ ██ ████ ███████
This applies to both techniques in question, but we need to strengthen the case for special ink in comparison to microprinting. If anything, it could even be harder to keep the special ink method secret. Either way, it doesn't strengthen.
c
The process of █████████████ █████ ████████ ████████ █████ █████ ████ ████ ███ ████████ ██ █████ ████████ ████ ███ ███████ ████
This only reinforces the notion that microprinting is cheaper. We’re looking to strengthen the case for special ink, but this seemingly does the opposite.
d
Before photocopying technology ████████ ████ ████████████ ██ █████ ████████ ████ ████████████ ██ ██████ ██████████
We don’t care about what happened before photocopying. We’re interested in microprinting and special ink. This isn't relevant to the argument at hand.
e
Many criminals do ███ ████ ██████ ██ ███ ████████ ████████████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████ ████████████ ██ ████████████ █████ ████████ ████ ████████ ████ ██████ ██ █████
Without more information, this doesn't tell us much—how many criminals are we talking about? How many criminals even participate in counterfeiting? And even in the best case, this strengthens the argument for microprinting, not for special ink.