Self-study
Film preservation requires transferring old movies from their original material—unstable, deteriorating nitrate film—to stable acetate film. ███ ████ ██ █ ███████████████ █████████ ████████ ███ █████ ██ ██ ███ ██ ████████ ███ █████████ █████████████ ███████ █████ ██ ███████ ██████ ████ █████████████ ██ ████ █████ ████ ███ ████████ █████ ██ █████████ ████ ███ ██ ██████████
Summary
The author concludes that some early Hollywood films will be lost. She asserts this because films in the old nitrate format must be transferred to the new acetate format, but there is not enough time to transfer all nitrate films before some disintegrate.
Notable Assumptions
The author assumes that just because we can’t save all films, this applies specifically to old Hollywood films. Maybe there are thousands of old movies from small producers that we don’t care about, but we have already preserved all of the important Hollywood movies.
23.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ ████████ ████████
a
No new technology ███ ████████████ ███ ██████ ████ ███████ ████ ██ ███████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ██████████
Negating (A) gives us, “new technology for transferring nitrate film to acetate will eventually be developed.” This doesn’t specify when it will be developed, however, and it could very well be after all the nitrate film has deteriorated, so (A) is not necessary.
b
Transferring films from ███████ ██ ███████ ██ ███ ███ █████ █████████ ███ ██ ██████████ █████
(B) tells us that there is another method for preserving films that is even less expensive, which could only weaken the argument. If this other method exists, it doesn’t matter if there isn’t enough time to transfer all old films to acetate—we could use this other method instead.
c
Not many films ████ ███ ████████ █████ ██ █████████ ████ ███████ ████ ███████████ ██ ████████
(C) would strengthen the argument, but it’s too strong to be necessary. The conclusion only states that some films will be lost, whereas (C) implies that a large number will be lost.
d
Some films from ███ ████████ █████ ██ █████████ █████████ █████ ██████ ██ █████ ████████ █████████
The author is assuming that just because all films can’t be preserved, this includes some old Hollywood films. (D) lets us know that we haven’t yet preserved all old Hollywood films, which is necessary to conclude that some will be lost.
e
The least popular █████ ████ ███ ████████ █████ ██ █████████ ███ ███ ████ ████ ██████ ██ ██ █████
If (E) is not true—if perhaps all old Hollywood films have the same chance of being lost—our conclusion is unimpacted. As long as some old Hollywood movies will be lost, we don’t care which ones they are.