I am also interested! I am also a reapplicant. I am trying to update my personal statement and my overall application but kind of stuck at the moment.

I was wondering if D describes circular reasoning, and here is what I found.

It is describing “No True Scotsman" fallacy(the lack of falsifiability, or unfalsifiability). It is an argument structured in a way that makes it immune to being proven wrong—meaning no possible empirical evidence or observation would ever be accepted to refute it. Essentially, rejecting or pre-emptively disallowing any counter-evidence.

Examples to this would be something like :

"No real researcher would disagree with me.”

"An invisible, undetectable dragon lives in my garage, and any test you run to detect it will fail because the dragon is immune to tests.”

I think there is another reason why B is wrong.

First is what is stated in the explanation. We don't know whether "unusually harsh penalties for some crimes" apply to violent crimes in the question.

Another reason is that it says the harsh penalties had already been imposed for many years.

The stimulus is trying to explain why our city experienced a 15 decrease in the rate of violent crime last year. If the harsh penalties had already been imposed for many years, why the sudden drop last year? Why not the same as the year before that?

B falls short of an alternate explanation because it does not fully explain why the drop happened last year.

I was having the same thought process as you, and then I realized why ONLY is valid in this case.

If the talk therapy was effective through chemical AND other methods, and pharmacological intervention works only through chemical processes (as stated in the stimulus), the pharmacological intervention would not be as EFFECTIVE as the talk therapy.

This is because the pharmacological intervention wouldn't be able to cover the effect of the other methods.

When the effect of the talk therapy is present ONLY through chemical changes, then the second method can be said to be as effective.

@Al_foroodian@sfu.ca Thank you. Your explanation is great!

@LovelyZestfulAunt Because many is not most. Many children who are taught by the WLM learn to read AL does not mean most did.