Can someone please explain and map out the logic for this question, and explain why (E) is the correct answer? The last sentence of the stimulus is tripping me up. Greatly appreciated!
The stimulus provides us with two courses of action that must obtain if either of 2 conditions occur. If unpopular with faculty, then modify. If unpop with students, then adopt. The key to this question, though, is the last sentence: the policy is bound to be unpopular with either the faculty or the students. This is a classic either/or conditional, which you can diagram like this:
/UF-->US or, by the contrapositive: /US-->UF
This leads us to answer choice E: if the policy is pop with the faculty, that means that it is unpopular with the students, by the first relationship I diagrammed above.
Pop w/ fac = not unpop w/ Faculty, and if /UF-->US, US-->adopt. Thus, E is the correct answer: PF-->US-->Adopt.
But, isn't it true that being unpopular with faculty doesn't necessarily mean it will be popular with students?
I don't understand why the statement in the stimulus that says "bound to be unpopular with either faculty or students" makes a situation where it must be popular with the other group.
But, isn't it true that being unpopular with faculty doesn't necessarily mean it will be popular with students?
I don't understand why the statement in the stimulus that says "bound to be unpopular with either faculty or students" makes a situation where it must be popular with the other group.
How is the middle ground not considered here?
The middle ground is not considered because it's just a fact. This is just a must be true stimulus so our task is not to critique like we would in a strengthen or weaken argument but to figure out what would happen from those facts given to us.
So when its bound to be unpopular with faculty or students, or task is to see does anything happen because this fact is true. And our other sentence tells us when its unpopular with faculty we will modify it and when its unpopular with students we will adopt a new policy. So because its bound to be unpopular with faculty or students we can make the inference that we will either modify it or adopt a new one.
Comments
The stimulus provides us with two courses of action that must obtain if either of 2 conditions occur. If unpopular with faculty, then modify. If unpop with students, then adopt. The key to this question, though, is the last sentence: the policy is bound to be unpopular with either the faculty or the students. This is a classic either/or conditional, which you can diagram like this:
/UF-->US
or, by the contrapositive:
/US-->UF
This leads us to answer choice E: if the policy is pop with the faculty, that means that it is unpopular with the students, by the first relationship I diagrammed above.
Pop w/ fac = not unpop w/ Faculty, and if /UF-->US, US-->adopt. Thus, E is the correct answer: PF-->US-->Adopt.
Hope this helps!
Question:
But, isn't it true that being unpopular with faculty doesn't necessarily mean it will be popular with students?
I don't understand why the statement in the stimulus that says "bound to be unpopular with either faculty or students" makes a situation where it must be popular with the other group.
How is the middle ground not considered here?
Also,
How would you go about with diagramming answer choices (B) and (C)?
(B) M --> /reduce PS
(C) M --> /reduce PF
And is it correct that since there is no information given on what comes after M and reducing popularity, these two answer choices are not inferable.
The middle ground is not considered because it's just a fact. This is just a must be true stimulus so our task is not to critique like we would in a strengthen or weaken argument but to figure out what would happen from those facts given to us.
So when its bound to be unpopular with faculty or students, or task is to see does anything happen because this fact is true. And our other sentence tells us when its unpopular with faculty we will modify it and when its unpopular with students we will adopt a new policy. So because its bound to be unpopular with faculty or students we can make the inference that we will either modify it or adopt a new one.