Self-study
Support Azalea bushes flourish in acidic soil. ████ █████ █████ ██████ ███████ ███ ██ █████ ████ █████ █████ ██ ████ ██ ██████ █ ████ ████ ██ ███████ ██████ ██████ ██████ ███ ██ ████ ██ ████████ ██ ████ █████
Summary
The author concludes that azalea bushes can be made to flourish in clay soil. The reasoning is that:
1) Azalea bushes flourish in acidic soil
2) Clay soil can be mixed with other types of soil to create an acidic soil.
Notable Assumptions
One assumption is that there are no other properties of clay soil, besides acidity, that would affect the growth of azalea bushes. Perhaps clay soil can be made to have the right acidity, but has some other feature that would prevent azaleas from flourishing.
Another assumption is that clay soil, when mixed with other soil, can still be considered clay. If a soil mixture is 30% clay and 70% acidic soils, for instance, should that still count as clay?
20.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ ████████ ████████
a
Mixing an acidic ████ ████ ███████ ████ ██ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ██ ██████ █████
This is broader than necessary. All that’s necessary for the argument is that mixing clay and one or more other soils can create an acidic soil — and that is already in the stimulus. We don’t need to know whether mixing any soil with an acidic soil will produce an acidic soil.
b
Clay soil that ██ █████ ████ ███████ █████ █████ ██ ████ ██ █████ ████ █████
If mixing clay soil with acidic soil means that the soil is no longer clay, then azaleas cannot flourish in clay soil — because as soon as we add any acidic soil to allow azaleas to flourish, it’s no longer clay. (B) fixes this problem.
c
Whenever clay soil ██ █████ ████ █████ █████ ██ █████ ██ ██████ ████ ████████
This is broader than necessary for the argument. All that’s necessary is that mixing clay with at least some type of soil creates an acidic soil. It doesn’t matter if clay can be mixed with 100% of acidic soils or only 1 — either way, we can make clay soil into an acidic soil.
d
Some plants do ███ ████████ ██ ██████ █████
The argument concludes that azaleas can flourish in clay soil, because they can flourish in acidic soil and clay soil can be turned into an acidic soil. The argument doesn’t discuss other types of plants — whether tulips can flourish in acidic soil wouldn’t impact the argument.
e
Azalea bushes do ██ ████ ██ ███████ ████ █████ ██ ██ █████████ ██████ ██████
In the context of this argument, we only care about whether the azaleas can flourish. We’re not concerned with whether they flourish slightly more in naturally acidic soils — as long as they can flourish in both soils, the argument is true.