Self-study
Columnist: Support There are certain pesticides that, even though they have been banned for use in the United States for nearly 30 years, are still manufactured there and exported to other countries. ██ ████████ ██ ████████████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████ ██ █████ █████ ██████████ ████ ████████ ███████ █████████ ███ ██████ ████ ██ ████ ██████████ ███ █████ ██████████ ███ █████ ████ ██ ████████████ ████████ ████████ ████ ███ ██████ ███████
Summarize Argument
The author concludes that the U.S. practice of making certain pesticides that are banned for use in the U.S. and sending those pesticides to other countries greatly increases the health risk to people in the U.S. This is because those kinds of pesticides are often used on products that are imported into the U.S.
Notable Assumptions
The argument assumes that the stuff that is sprayed onto the products that are imported into the U.S. originally was made in the U.S. (This overlooks the possibility that even though the U.S. makes and exports certain pesticides, the U.S. made stuff isn’t used on the imported products. The stuff used on the imported products could be the same kind of pesticides, but made in other countries.)
22.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ████ █████████ ███████ ███ ███████████ █████████
a
Trace amounts of ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██████ ███ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ██████ ███ ██ ████████ ██ ███ ████ █████ ████ ████ ████ ██ █████ ████
The fact the pesticide is already in soil doesn’t impact whether the U.S. practice of making the pesticides and sending them to other countries hurts the U.S. We still have reason to think the U.S. practice of making/exporting the pesticide hurts people in the U.S.
b
Most of the ██████████ ████ ███ ████████████ ██ ███ ██████ ██████ ███ ████████ ███ ███ █████ █████ ██████ ███ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ███████
We still know that the banned pesticides are among the ones the U.S. makes and exports. There may be other pesticides that are not banned; the argument isn’t concerned with those.
c
The United States ██ ███ ███ ████ ███████ ████ ████████████ ███ ███████ ███ ██████████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ███████
This raises the possibility that the pesticides used on the imported products are coming from another country, not the U.S. Multiple countries may be making the same kinds of banned pesticides. So, we cannot assume that stuff sprayed on the products had a U.S. origin.
d
The banned pesticides ████ █ ███████ ████ ██ ██████ ██ ███ █████████ ██ █████ ████ ███ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██████████
Even if they pose a greater risk to people in other countries, that doesn’t suggest that might not also increase the health risk to people in the U.S.
e
There are many ██████████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ ███ ██ █████ █████████ ████ ███ ███ ██████ ███ ███ ██ ███ ██████ ███████
The argument concerns the pesticides banned for use in the U.S. Whether those pesticides are banned in other countries has no bearing on the level of danger posed by those pesticides.