Self-study
Consumer advocate: Support The introduction of a new drug into the marketplace should be contingent upon our having a good understanding of its social impact. ████████ ███ ██████ ██████ ██ ███ █████ ████████ █████████████ ██ ███ ████ ██████ ██ ██ ████████ █████ ████ █████ ██████ ██ █ ███████ █████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ████████ ██ ███ ███████████ ███ █████ ████ ███ ███ █████ ███████
Argument Summary
The consumer advocate lays out a principle: a new drug should be introduced to the market only if we have a good understanding of its social impact. In other words, no good understanding → shouldn't introduce the drug.
She then points to the antihistamine as a case where this principle was violated. The antihistamine is already on the market, but its social impact is far from clear. So by the advocate's own standard, this drug probably shouldn't have been rushed to market.
From this, she draws a broader conclusion: there should be a general reduction in the pace of bringing new drugs currently being tested to market.
The principle plus the antihistamine example tells us only that one drug was brought to market without sufficient understanding. Why should that justify slowing down most new drugs being tested? Maybe the antihistamine was uniquely under-studied. Maybe other drugs in the pipeline have been researched much more thoroughly. The argument needs some reason to think the antihistamine's situation extends to drugs generally.
Anticipation
To strengthen the argument, we need information that makes the leap from one example to a general conclusion more justified. The principle already handles the "if social impact is unclear, then slow down" step. What's missing is evidence that unclear social impact is a widespread problem among drugs being tested, not just an issue with this one antihistamine.
20.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ████ ███████████ ███ █████████
a
The social impact ██ ███ ███ █████████████ ██ ████ ██████ ██████████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ███ █████ █████ ███████
If the antihistamine is much better understood than most new drugs being tested, and even it has unclear social impact, then most new drugs being tested must be even more poorly understood. Combined with the principle that drugs shouldn't be marketed without a good understanding of their social impact, this gives us strong reason to slow things down across the board.
b
The social impact ██ ████ ██ ███ ███ █████ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███████████
"Some" is too weak to justify a general reduction. A general reduction in pace means slowing down across the board, which requires the problem to be widespread. But "some" could mean two drugs out of hundreds. If only a small handful of drugs have poorly understood social impacts while the rest have been thoroughly studied, there's no reason to slow down the entire pipeline. The scope of the evidence in (B) doesn't match the scope of the conclusion.
c
The economic success ██ ████ █████ ██ █████████ ████████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ██████████ █████ ██████ ███████
The argument's principle concerns whether drugs should be introduced to market, not whether they'll be economically successful once they get there. (C) tells us that drugs with poorly understood social impacts tend to sell well. But commercial performance has no bearing on whether we understand a drug's social impact well enough to justify bringing it to market. Even if poorly understood drugs are profitable, the principle still says they shouldn't be introduced until their social impact is clear.
d
The new antihistamine ██ ██████████ ███████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ███ █████ █████ ███████
Chemical similarity doesn't imply similar levels of understanding about social impact. You could have two chemically similar drugs where one has been extensively studied for its effects on society and the other hasn't been studied at all. The research that's been done (or not done) on a drug's social impact isn't determined by its chemical structure.
e
The new antihistamine ██████ ██ ██ ███ ██████ ████ ██ ████ ███ █████ █████ ██████ ██████ ██ ██ ███ ██████ █████
(E) says the antihistamine should be on the market only if most new drugs should be on the market too. "Only if" introduces a necessary condition, so this means: if the antihistamine should be on the market, then most new drugs should be too.
But that's the reverse of what we want. We want to conclude that most new drugs should be slowed down. Even if we think the antihistamine shouldn't have been marketed (because its social impact is unclear), (E) doesn't let us conclude anything about other drugs from that. We'd need "if the antihistamine shouldn't be on the market, then most new drugs shouldn't be either." That's the reverse of what (E) says.