Pt 54 section 4 question 24

lpadr009

"Downtown petropolis boasted over 100 large buildings 5 years ago".
By poe I kind of am able to get to the answer E , bUT I don't understand why that is the answer.
Why "significantly fewer than 60"?? Is 100 the staple number of buildings for a healthy economy?

This question is the only one I do not understand...and I have seen it before!

c.janson35

So the conclusion is that the city's economy is in serious decline, because the number of large buildings in downtown is an indicator of Econ health and 60 of the 100+ large buildings have been torn down in 5 years.

So, the number of large buildings has been decreasing, which means that the Econ health is declining, right? Well, not really, because we don't know if the number of buildings is actually decreasing. The 100 number doesn't matter, what matters is the number of buildings because less=worse according to the argument. But what if in the past 5 years, the 60 buildings that were torn down were done so in order to make room for 100 new buildings? Then the argument would fall apart!

This is what E alludes to. The negation of E is the case described above, which destroys the argument. Thus E is necessary.


Hope this helps!

lpadr009

Thank you! Omg I was so fixated with 100. And it was over 100!! Wow! Thank you!