This is a Miscellaneous question.
According to the question stem, the analysis portion of the stimulus applies to the situation portion of the stimulus in the same appropriate way that would also apply to four of the answer choices. Note the word “EXCEPT” in the stem.
The question tests reasoning by analogy, reasoning from principle to application, and causal reasoning.
The situation is that a physical therapist (1) wants her patients to derive more enjoyment from the challenge of developing physical skills. She also (2) wants them to spend more time practicing those skills.
The analysis says success in meeting the first objective (derive enjoyment) will bring about success in meeting the second objective (spend more time).
The analysis seems appropriate for the situation as along as we make the (quite reasonable) assumption that enjoyment of an activity causes more time to be spent on that activity. If we view that causal assumption (extracted from the analysis) as a principle, then the situation can be viewed as an application of that principle. The analysis itself is a more general version of that causal principle.
In evaluating the answer choices, we can continue to use that framework and look for four more applications of the general principle. Alternatively, we can use the framework of analogies. We’re on the lookout for four analogous situations. On what grounds do we judge how analogous the new situations are to the existing one? In other words, what counts as “relevant similarity”? How well the new situations conform to the causal principle. The two frameworks converge.
Answer Choice (A) says a math teacher (1) wants her students to understand the mathematical principles taught in her course and (2) wants them to apply these principles routinely in everyday life. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If a math teacher is successful in getting her students to understand the principles of geometry, algebra, or statistics, then that will have a positive causal impact on their applying those principles in everyday life.
Answer Choice (B) says a software manufacturer (1) wants its customers to be more satisfied with the product and (2) wants them to place fewer calls to the service representative about how to use the product. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If the software manufacturer is successful in getting its customers to be more satisfied with the product, then its customers will be less likely to place calls about how to use it. There are many ways in which one can be unsatisfied with a product, of course, but one of those ways is not understanding how to use the product, which leads to (causes) customer support calls. If overall satisfaction is improved, then the problem of not understanding how to use the product will be mitigated to some degree. Whatever that level of improvement is should lead to (cause) fewer customer support calls.
Answer Choice (C) says a librarian (1) wants fewer of the books borrowed from the library to be lost or stolen, and he also (2) wants more of the books to be returned on time. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
Of the entire set of books that are borrowed, some of them are lost and some of them are stolen. Lost is accidental whereas stolen is intentional. If the librarian is successful in reducing the number of lost or stolen books, then it is very likely that that will cause more books to be returned on time. Why? Because it’s precisely the books that would otherwise have been lost or stolen (which guarantees that they won’t be returned on time) that will now be returned on time.
Correct Answer Choice (D) says a hardware retail company (1) wants to construct a new, larger warehouse, and it also (2) wants its employees to help plan how the old warehouse will be expanded. This is not analogous. This is not an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
The first objective and the second are disconnected, and hence success in meeting the first has no causal bearing on success in meeting the second.
Success in meeting the first objective seems just as likely to have a positively causal impact on the second objective as it is to have a negative causal impact.
Imagine the first objective is successfully achieved. Congrats. You built a new, larger warehouse. How does that impact your second objective? I don't know. It could be positive or negative.
Maybe the old employees from the original warehouse are like, “I am revitalized with energy to make this work because we can't have the crew at the new warehouse show us up. We'd better do a really good job of expanding the old warehouse.”
But maybe the old employees are instead demoralized. They look at the second, new, larger warehouse and they don’t see why they need to do a good job planning the expansion of their current warehouse.
Answer Choice (E) says a concert series director (1) wants to present a more varied repertoire and (2) wants to attract new patrons. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If the director is successful in presenting a more varied repertoire (doing stuff that they haven't done before, new stuff), then it seems reasonably likely that they’ll attract (cause) new patrons (people who didn't come to the concert before because the repertoire was narrow).
This is an NA question.
The stimulus is abstract so to better understand what it’s saying, we should translate it into something more tangible.
Let’s take “Friends” as the example of the popular TV show. The stimulus is saying that selling reruns of “Friends” while “Friends” is still running on NBC can lead to decreased revenues for NBC. So in other words, new episodes of “Friends” are still being released on NBC but simultaneously, Season 1, 2, 3, etc.’s reruns are also being broadcast on, say, Netflix. The first sentence is saying that would be bad for NBC’s revenues. Okay, but why? I suspect that’s the conclusion.
This next sentence, however, doesn't support this. It just says the show's producers do earn a great deal of money from the sale of the syndication rights because the stations rerunning the programs are assured of a successful show. Okay, so when Netflix buys “Friends,” it’s assured of a successful show so it’s happy to pay the producers a great deal of money. But what does this have to do with NBC, the network, suffering a decrease in revenue? Nothing. This seems like just a throwaway claim. A concession claim.
"However" signals a transition from this throwaway claim, this concession point, to a premise. Good, I’m eager to know why NBC is going to lose money on this deal.
A recent study shows that over 80% of the programs that are made available as reruns and as first-run episodes during the same season suffer an immediate ratings drop for their first-run episodes.
Hmm, okay. So if Season 8 Episode 1 of “Friends” is premiering on NBC, but you've already sold the rights for Seasons 1 through 7 to Netflix, then it's likely that Season 8 Episode 1 is going to suffer an immediate ratings drop. Because that’s what happens 80% of the time.
So that's why NBC will lose money.
Wait a second. The premise is about ratings drop, but the conclusion is about losing revenues. Well, I know what kind of NA question this is. It's one where we have to connect some concept from the premise to some concept in the conclusion. We have to build a bridge from the premise to the conclusion.
For example, a bridge that says ratings drop is relevant to revenue decrease. If that’s not the case, then we have no premise. I mean it, because for something to be a premise, it has to lend at least some support. So if ratings drop had nothing to do with revenue decrease, then there is no premise because there's no support, in which case the argument falls apart.
That’s why (B) is the Correct Answer Choice. A drop in ratings has a negative effect on the network's revenues. This must be true.
Answer Choice (A) says programs that are sold into syndication early tend to be long-running hits that are likely to decline soon.
If this were an RRE question, maybe (A) would be relevant. Imagine the stimulus said something like, a recent study showed that over 80% of programs that are sold into syndication early suffered a ratings drop, and networks consequently experienced decreased revenues as a result. In spite of this, programs are still sold into syndication early. Why? Resolve, reconcile, explain it.
Well, now (A) might do some work. Why? Because the producers of the programs know that they are on the decline anyway and so they want to maximize the value of the shows before they’re completely worthless.
Answer Choice (C) says the price of syndication rights includes some compensation for the network's probable losses. This is not necessary. What if the price of syndication rights didn't include any compensation for the network's probable loss? Who cares? It's not like we're trying to figure out ways to incentivize the network to actually proceed with the deal of selling the syndication rights.
That’s what (C) is concerned with. (C)'s like, “Oh man, I'd better add something to sweeten the deal, otherwise NBC is going to back out of this. Oh, I know. I'm going to tell NBC that my purchase price for the syndication rights for “Friends” will include compensation for what you, NBC, might lose as a result of this deal.”
(C) makes sense in that way, but (C) doesn't make sense at all as a necessary assumption. In the argument, the deal is already done and we're just trying to say what the probable consequences are. It can lead to decreased revenue. And the only premise upon which we have to make this conclusion is because of the study showing the ratings drop. So once again, the assumption is between ratings and revenue. Nothing to do with (C).
Answer Choice (D) says the audience of a popular program will usually prefer first-run episodes to reruns. Okay, so the audience of “Friends,” they usually will prefer a new episode to reruns. That's not necessary.
Imagine it were false. The audience is either indifferent or actually they slightly prefer older episodes. What does that matter? It doesn’t because the premise is still what it is. A study came out that says 80% of programs that are made as reruns and as first-run episodes experienced an immediate ratings drop. On the back of that premise, which is still the only premise we have, we’re arguing that if you sell the syndication rights, it's going to lead to decreased revenue.
So what is (D) doing? How does (D) relate to the argument, if at all? I think (D) might be trying to explain why the study found what it found. Why is it that 80% of the programs experience ratings drop? Maybe it’s because of something having to do with what the audience prefers. But okay, that’s not our job. This isn’t a situation where we have a phenomenon (the study) and then we’re being asked to supply some hypothesis to explain the phenomenon.
Answer Choice (E) says most programs are never sold into syndication. This is not necessary. What if this were false? Imagine that all programs are sold into syndication at some point. It doesn’t matter. The argument is still what it is, with the same missing link that it always had. That missing link has nothing to do with what happens to most programs, whether they eventually get sold into syndication or not.
This is a Miscellaneous question.
According to the question stem, the analysis portion of the stimulus applies to the situation portion of the stimulus in the same appropriate way that would also apply to four of the answer choices. Note the word “EXCEPT” in the stem.
The question tests reasoning by analogy, reasoning from principle to application, and causal reasoning.
The situation is that a physical therapist (1) wants her patients to derive more enjoyment from the challenge of developing physical skills. She also (2) wants them to spend more time practicing those skills.
The analysis says success in meeting the first objective (derive enjoyment) will bring about success in meeting the second objective (spend more time).
The analysis seems appropriate for the situation as along as we make the (quite reasonable) assumption that enjoyment of an activity causes more time to be spent on that activity. If we view that causal assumption (extracted from the analysis) as a principle, then the situation can be viewed as an application of that principle. The analysis itself is a more general version of that causal principle.
In evaluating the answer choices, we can continue to use that framework and look for four more applications of the general principle. Alternatively, we can use the framework of analogies. We’re on the lookout for four analogous situations. On what grounds do we judge how analogous the new situations are to the existing one? In other words, what counts as “relevant similarity”? How well the new situations conform to the causal principle. The two frameworks converge.
Answer Choice (A) says a math teacher (1) wants her students to understand the mathematical principles taught in her course and (2) wants them to apply these principles routinely in everyday life. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If a math teacher is successful in getting her students to understand the principles of geometry, algebra, or statistics, then that will have a positive causal impact on their applying those principles in everyday life.
Answer Choice (B) says a software manufacturer (1) wants its customers to be more satisfied with the product and (2) wants them to place fewer calls to the service representative about how to use the product. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If the software manufacturer is successful in getting its customers to be more satisfied with the product, then its customers will be less likely to place calls about how to use it. There are many ways in which one can be unsatisfied with a product, of course, but one of those ways is not understanding how to use the product, which leads to (causes) customer support calls. If overall satisfaction is improved, then the problem of not understanding how to use the product will be mitigated to some degree. Whatever that level of improvement is should lead to (cause) fewer customer support calls.
Answer Choice (C) says a librarian (1) wants fewer of the books borrowed from the library to be lost or stolen, and he also (2) wants more of the books to be returned on time. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
Of the entire set of books that are borrowed, some of them are lost and some of them are stolen. Lost is accidental whereas stolen is intentional. If the librarian is successful in reducing the number of lost or stolen books, then it is very likely that that will cause more books to be returned on time. Why? Because it’s precisely the books that would otherwise have been lost or stolen (which guarantees that they won’t be returned on time) that will now be returned on time.
Correct Answer Choice (D) says a hardware retail company (1) wants to construct a new, larger warehouse, and it also (2) wants its employees to help plan how the old warehouse will be expanded. This is not analogous. This is not an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
The first objective and the second are disconnected, and hence success in meeting the first has no causal bearing on success in meeting the second.
Success in meeting the first objective seems just as likely to have a positively causal impact on the second objective as it is to have a negative causal impact.
Imagine the first objective is successfully achieved. Congrats. You built a new, larger warehouse. How does that impact your second objective? I don't know. It could be positive or negative.
Maybe the old employees from the original warehouse are like, “I am revitalized with energy to make this work because we can't have the crew at the new warehouse show us up. We'd better do a really good job of expanding the old warehouse.”
But maybe the old employees are instead demoralized. They look at the second, new, larger warehouse and they don’t see why they need to do a good job planning the expansion of their current warehouse.
Answer Choice (E) says a concert series director (1) wants to present a more varied repertoire and (2) wants to attract new patrons. This is analogous. This is an appropriate application of the causal principle in the analysis.
If the director is successful in presenting a more varied repertoire (doing stuff that they haven't done before, new stuff), then it seems reasonably likely that they’ll attract (cause) new patrons (people who didn't come to the concert before because the repertoire was narrow).
This is a Parallel Flaw Method of Reasoning question.
The question tests your understanding of quantifier and conditional logic.
The argument in the stimulus translates to:
fl-journalist ←s→ sell-lax-mag → /self-respecting
__________________
/fl-journalist ←s→ self-respecting
The conclusion is flawed. The valid conclusion that could have been drawn is:
fl-journalist ←s→ /self-respecting
Generalizing from this particular flawed argument, the form is this:
A ←s→ B → /C
__________________
/A ←s→ C
We need to find the same form in one of the answer choices.
Answer Choice (A)’s premise translates to:
high-school ←s→ bio → /kindergarten
In order for (A) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/high-school ←s→ kindergarten
Or in English, “Some kindergarten teachers are not high school teachers.” But it doesn’t say that. It says “Biology is not taught by all teachers.” That’s a valid conclusion. It follows simply from the premise that kindergarten teachers don’t teach biology.
Answer Choice (B)’s premise translates to:
sbm —m→ teacher → /prefer
Like (A), this is a good setup for (B) to be right. In order for (B) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/sbm ←s→ prefer
Or in English, “Some non-school board members prefer admin work to teaching.” But it doesn’t say that. It says, “Few school board members prefer admin work to teaching.”
Correct Answer Choice (C)’s premise translates to:
student ←s→ prefer → /member
In order for (C) to be right, the conclusion needs to say:
/student ←s→ member
Or in English, “Some members of the Calculus Club are not students.” That’s exactly what the conclusion in (C) says. This is an invalid conclusion. The valid conclusion is “student ←s→ /member” or “Some students are not members of the Calculus Club.”
Answer Choice (D)’s premise translates to:
princ ←s→ harsh-disc → /adviser
In order for (D) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/princ ←s→ adviser
Or in English, “Some advisers to a debate team are not principals.” But it doesn’t say that. It says, “Some principals are not advisers to a debate team.” That’s a valid conclusion.
Answer Choice (E)’s premise translates to:
popular ←s→ leave-early
coaches → /leave-before-3
(E) is already wrong for the fact that the premises do not connect.
As a Blind Review exercise, we can fix (E) up:
popular ←s→ leave-early → /coach
Fixing the premises like this gives (E) a chance. (E) could say that, therefore, some coaches are not popular teachers. That would be the same formal flaw in the stimulus and therefore make (E) the right answer.
This is a Parallel Flaw Method of Reasoning question.
The question tests your understanding of quantifier and conditional logic.
The argument in the stimulus translates to:
fl-journalist ←s→ sell-lax-mag → /self-respecting
__________________
/fl-journalist ←s→ self-respecting
The conclusion is flawed. The valid conclusion that could have been drawn is:
fl-journalist ←s→ /self-respecting
Generalizing from this particular flawed argument, the form is this:
A ←s→ B → /C
__________________
/A ←s→ C
We need to find the same form in one of the answer choices.
Answer Choice (A)’s premise translates to:
high-school ←s→ bio → /kindergarten
In order for (A) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/high-school ←s→ kindergarten
Or in English, “Some kindergarten teachers are not high school teachers.” But it doesn’t say that. It says “Biology is not taught by all teachers.” That’s a valid conclusion. It follows simply from the premise that kindergarten teachers don’t teach biology.
Answer Choice (B)’s premise translates to:
sbm —m→ teacher → /prefer
Like (A), this is a good setup for (B) to be right. In order for (B) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/sbm ←s→ prefer
Or in English, “Some non-school board members prefer admin work to teaching.” But it doesn’t say that. It says, “Few school board members prefer admin work to teaching.”
Correct Answer Choice (C)’s premise translates to:
student ←s→ prefer → /member
In order for (C) to be right, the conclusion needs to say:
/student ←s→ member
Or in English, “Some members of the Calculus Club are not students.” That’s exactly what the conclusion in (C) says. This is an invalid conclusion. The valid conclusion is “student ←s→ /member” or “Some students are not members of the Calculus Club.”
Answer Choice (D)’s premise translates to:
princ ←s→ harsh-disc → /adviser
In order for (D) to be right, the conclusion should have said:
/princ ←s→ adviser
Or in English, “Some advisers to a debate team are not principals.” But it doesn’t say that. It says, “Some principals are not advisers to a debate team.” That’s a valid conclusion.
Answer Choice (E)’s premise translates to:
popular ←s→ leave-early
coaches → /leave-before-3
(E) is already wrong for the fact that the premises do not connect.
As a Blind Review exercise, we can fix (E) up:
popular ←s→ leave-early → /coach
Fixing the premises like this gives (E) a chance. (E) could say that, therefore, some coaches are not popular teachers. That would be the same formal flaw in the stimulus and therefore make (E) the right answer.
This is an NA question.
The question tests reasoning about sets and intersections between sets.
The argument tells us that while the audience for part one of a documentary TV series was small, the audience for part two was not that much smaller. Thus, most of the viewers who watched the program the first night (the “small” set) liked it enough to tune in again the next night.
Wait, what? How do we know this? All we know is that on the first night, a small set of people watched part one and that on the second night, a smaller (but not by much) set of people watched part two. That doesn’t imply there has to be significant overlap in the two sets.
So that’s a huge gap we need to fill. How we fill the gap depends on what the answers give us because filling the gap in a necessary assumption manner can generate a very weak statement. That’s what Correct Answer Choice (A) does. It says most viewers who tuned in to the program on the second night had also watched the first night. Because the second night is the smaller set, at least half of that set must overlap with the first (larger) night set. Otherwise, there’s no way that more than half of the first (larger) night set can find itself within the second night set. That’s stating the issue in abstract terms, in terms of sets and intersections. The advantage of abstracting is to help you recognize patterns. Other questions will (and have) manifest(ed) the same issue.
In concrete terms, imagine you have 100 people in the first (larger) night set and 80 people in the second (smaller) night set. (A) claims that at least 41 from the second night set must have come from the first night set. That must be true. Imagine if it were false. If only 40 (of the 80) came from the first night set, then that means 60 (of the 100) from the first night set did not watch on the second night. That contradicts the conclusion.
Note that just because (A) is true, that doesn’t guarantee that the conclusion is true. It’s still possible for the conclusion to be false. But that doesn’t matter since this is an NA question and not an SA question. We need (A) as an NA because its truth is what makes it possible for (as opposed to guarantees) the conclusion to follow.
Answer Choice (B) says most of the viewers who tuned in to the program the second night liked it. This is not necessary. We don't care about the second-night viewers' enjoyment of the program. Even if every single viewer who tuned in on the second night hated it, the argument can still follow. It’s still possible that more than half of the first-night viewers tuned in on the second night. (B) would simply mean that they probably regretted that decision.
Answer Choice (C) says most of the viewers who watched the program both nights enjoyed the first night more than the second night. This is not necessary. We do not need to compare how much the viewers enjoyed the program on the first versus the second nights. Whether they liked the first night more than the second has no bearing on the argument.
Answer Choice (D) says many of the viewers who tuned in to the program the first night but not the second night were unable to watch the program on the second night. This is not necessary. The argument would be just fine even if all of the first-night-only viewers were able to (but chose not to) watch on the second night. (D) is about why some people are first-night-only viewers. (D) says it’s because they were unable to watch the second night (maybe scheduling conflict, or their power went out, or whatever). But the argument doesn’t care.
Answer Choice (E) says many of the viewers who watched the program on the first night were people who generally like to watch TV documentaries. This is not necessary. We already know that the first-night people watched this documentary regardless of whether they generally like documentaries.
This is an NA question.
The question tests reasoning about sets and intersections between sets.
The argument tells us that while the audience for part one of a documentary TV series was small, the audience for part two was not that much smaller. Thus, most of the viewers who watched the program the first night (the “small” set) liked it enough to tune in again the next night.
Wait, what? How do we know this? All we know is that on the first night, a small set of people watched part one and that on the second night, a smaller (but not by much) set of people watched part two. That doesn’t imply there has to be significant overlap in the two sets.
So that’s a huge gap we need to fill. How we fill the gap depends on what the answers give us because filling the gap in a necessary assumption manner can generate a very weak statement. That’s what Correct Answer Choice (A) does. It says most viewers who tuned in to the program on the second night had also watched the first night. Because the second night is the smaller set, at least half of that set must overlap with the first (larger) night set. Otherwise, there’s no way that more than half of the first (larger) night set can find itself within the second night set. That’s stating the issue in abstract terms, in terms of sets and intersections. The advantage of abstracting is to help you recognize patterns. Other questions will (and have) manifest(ed) the same issue.
In concrete terms, imagine you have 100 people in the first (larger) night set and 80 people in the second (smaller) night set. (A) claims that at least 41 from the second night set must have come from the first night set. That must be true. Imagine if it were false. If only 40 (of the 80) came from the first night set, then that means 60 (of the 100) from the first night set did not watch on the second night. That contradicts the conclusion.
Note that just because (A) is true, that doesn’t guarantee that the conclusion is true. It’s still possible for the conclusion to be false. But that doesn’t matter since this is an NA question and not an SA question. We need (A) as an NA because its truth is what makes it possible for (as opposed to guarantees) the conclusion to follow.
Answer Choice (B) says most of the viewers who tuned in to the program the second night liked it. This is not necessary. We don't care about the second-night viewers' enjoyment of the program. Even if every single viewer who tuned in on the second night hated it, the argument can still follow. It’s still possible that more than half of the first-night viewers tuned in on the second night. (B) would simply mean that they probably regretted that decision.
Answer Choice (C) says most of the viewers who watched the program both nights enjoyed the first night more than the second night. This is not necessary. We do not need to compare how much the viewers enjoyed the program on the first versus the second nights. Whether they liked the first night more than the second has no bearing on the argument.
Answer Choice (D) says many of the viewers who tuned in to the program the first night but not the second night were unable to watch the program on the second night. This is not necessary. The argument would be just fine even if all of the first-night-only viewers were able to (but chose not to) watch on the second night. (D) is about why some people are first-night-only viewers. (D) says it’s because they were unable to watch the second night (maybe scheduling conflict, or their power went out, or whatever). But the argument doesn’t care.
Answer Choice (E) says many of the viewers who watched the program on the first night were people who generally like to watch TV documentaries. This is not necessary. We already know that the first-night people watched this documentary regardless of whether they generally like documentaries.
This is a Parallel Flawed Method of Reasoning question.
The argument makes the oldest mistake in the book: sufficiency-necessity confusion.
The argument lays out a rule: if no high school diploma and no demonstrated competence, then no license.
/hs and /dc → /license
The argument then applies this rule to Marie but makes a logical mistake in doing so.
Marie has both a high school diploma and a demonstrated competence. That means she has failed the sufficient condition of the rule. That means the rule goes away. We cannot draw a conclusion about whether Marie will be licensed.
Yet that’s just what the argument does. It concludes that Marie will be licensed.
/hs and /dc → /license
hsmarie and dcmarie
________
licensemarie
That’s the sufficiency-necessity confusion.
Answer Choice (A) says without having either an excellent ear or exceptional manual dexterity, a person cannot play the piano well. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If no excellent ear and no manual dexterity, then no play piano well.
If (A) wants to be the correct answer, it just has to apply this general rule to Paul in the same sufficiency-necessity confused way that the rule was applied to Marie. (A) needs to show that Paul has an excellent ear and he has manual dexterity. Then (A) needs to conclude that Paul plays the piano well.
But (A) doesn’t do that and so (A) is wrong.
Instead, (A) has Paul fail the necessary condition by showing that he plays the piano well. That means Paul must have either an excellent ear or exceptional manual dexterity. That would be a valid conclusion. Yet (A) invalidly concludes that he must have both an excellent ear and exceptional manual dexterity.
Correct Answer Choice (B) says it's not possible to be an effective foreign language teacher without being fluent in at least two languages. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If not fluent in at least two languages, then not effective.
Already we encounter a trick. (B) tries to hide itself. We’re expecting a conjunctive sufficient condition, yet (B) gives us just a single sufficient condition. (B) is hoping that we would just move on.
But (B) is the correct answer, and it's correct because it commits the same sufficiency-necessity flaw.
Take this general rule and apply it to Professor Y. It says that Professor Y is fluent in Greek, English, and Persian. So Professor Y is fluent in at least two languages. She fails the sufficient condition just like Marie failed her sufficient condition. (B) just needs to invalidly conclude that Professor Y will be effective in order to be the correct answer choice. That’s exactly what (B) does.
/at-least-2 → /effective
at-least-2prof-y
________
effectiveprof-y
Answer Choice (C) says a person cannot be a licensed plumbing contractor without having completed an apprenticeship. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If licensed plumbing contractor, then completed apprenticeship.
Take this rule and apply it to Martin. Martin is a licensed plumber. I'm assuming that to mean the same thing as licensed plumbing contractor. Therefore, Martin completed his apprenticeship. This is valid.
Answer Choice (D) says no one can be an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport without a thorough knowledge of both national and international affairs. “Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If effective mayor of a major industrial seaport, then have thorough knowledge of national and international affairs.
Take this rule and apply it to Mayor L. Mayor L is an effective mayor. Does that trigger the sufficient condition? No, because we don’t know if Mayor L is an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport.
Okay, so (D) assumes that being an effective mayor is the same thing as being an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport. That’s not a reasonable assumption but it’s also not a sufficiency-necessity error. If we patch up that assumption, then (D) is valid. (D)’s conclusion would follow.
Answer Choice (E) says the only way to make a delicious vegetable soup is to use fresh vegetables. "The only" is group 1.
If delicious vegetable soup, then used fresh vegetables.
This particular vegetable soup is delicious, which means it satisfies the sufficient condition. That means (E) can validly draw the necessary condition as the conclusion. That’s exactly what (E) does.
This is a Parallel Flawed Method of Reasoning question.
The argument makes the oldest mistake in the book: sufficiency-necessity confusion.
The argument lays out a rule: if no high school diploma and no demonstrated competence, then no license.
/hs and /dc → /license
The argument then applies this rule to Marie but makes a logical mistake in doing so.
Marie has both a high school diploma and a demonstrated competence. That means she has failed the sufficient condition of the rule. That means the rule goes away. We cannot draw a conclusion about whether Marie will be licensed.
Yet that’s just what the argument does. It concludes that Marie will be licensed.
/hs and /dc → /license
hsmarie and dcmarie
________
licensemarie
That’s the sufficiency-necessity confusion.
Answer Choice (A) says without having either an excellent ear or exceptional manual dexterity, a person cannot play the piano well. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If no excellent ear and no manual dexterity, then no play piano well.
If (A) wants to be the correct answer, it just has to apply this general rule to Paul in the same sufficiency-necessity confused way that the rule was applied to Marie. (A) needs to show that Paul has an excellent ear and he has manual dexterity. Then (A) needs to conclude that Paul plays the piano well.
But (A) doesn’t do that and so (A) is wrong.
Instead, (A) has Paul fail the necessary condition by showing that he plays the piano well. That means Paul must have either an excellent ear or exceptional manual dexterity. That would be a valid conclusion. Yet (A) invalidly concludes that he must have both an excellent ear and exceptional manual dexterity.
Correct Answer Choice (B) says it's not possible to be an effective foreign language teacher without being fluent in at least two languages. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If not fluent in at least two languages, then not effective.
Already we encounter a trick. (B) tries to hide itself. We’re expecting a conjunctive sufficient condition, yet (B) gives us just a single sufficient condition. (B) is hoping that we would just move on.
But (B) is the correct answer, and it's correct because it commits the same sufficiency-necessity flaw.
Take this general rule and apply it to Professor Y. It says that Professor Y is fluent in Greek, English, and Persian. So Professor Y is fluent in at least two languages. She fails the sufficient condition just like Marie failed her sufficient condition. (B) just needs to invalidly conclude that Professor Y will be effective in order to be the correct answer choice. That’s exactly what (B) does.
/at-least-2 → /effective
at-least-2prof-y
________
effectiveprof-y
Answer Choice (C) says a person cannot be a licensed plumbing contractor without having completed an apprenticeship. "Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If licensed plumbing contractor, then completed apprenticeship.
Take this rule and apply it to Martin. Martin is a licensed plumber. I'm assuming that to mean the same thing as licensed plumbing contractor. Therefore, Martin completed his apprenticeship. This is valid.
Answer Choice (D) says no one can be an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport without a thorough knowledge of both national and international affairs. “Without" is group 3, negate sufficient.
If effective mayor of a major industrial seaport, then have thorough knowledge of national and international affairs.
Take this rule and apply it to Mayor L. Mayor L is an effective mayor. Does that trigger the sufficient condition? No, because we don’t know if Mayor L is an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport.
Okay, so (D) assumes that being an effective mayor is the same thing as being an effective mayor of a major industrial seaport. That’s not a reasonable assumption but it’s also not a sufficiency-necessity error. If we patch up that assumption, then (D) is valid. (D)’s conclusion would follow.
Answer Choice (E) says the only way to make a delicious vegetable soup is to use fresh vegetables. "The only" is group 1.
If delicious vegetable soup, then used fresh vegetables.
This particular vegetable soup is delicious, which means it satisfies the sufficient condition. That means (E) can validly draw the necessary condition as the conclusion. That’s exactly what (E) does.
This is a Principle question.
We are to extract from this argument by analogy the underlying principle. The right answer states the principle, and the argument in the stimulus is an application of that principle.
The argument contains a premise about SUV drivers and a conclusion about cancer and smoking. It’s an argument by analogy. In order for the reasoning by analogy to run through, both the premise and conclusion have to conform to some underlying principle. Otherwise, what happens with drivers and SUVs would have little bearing on cures for cancer and behaviors like smoking.
The premise says that drivers of SUVs have the correct belief that because they're in an SUV, they're better protected. They have lower risk of serious injury. As a result, their behavior changes. Because they know they’re safer, they start to drive more recklessly. They know the negative consequences are not as bad, so they start to take on more risk.
The conclusion says that the discovery of powerful cures for certain high-incidence forms of cancer would probably trigger an increase in behaviors such as smoking and overexposure to sun that are known to increase the risk of such cancers. If we have a cure for lung cancer, then more people would smoke more. If we have a cure for skin cancer, then more people would overexpose themselves to UV light.
Is this analogous to what was described in the premise? Yes, because there is an underlying principle at work here: mitigating or eliminating the negative consequences of an action invites increased participation in that action. Another way to state that is if the risk of harm is decreased, then people will engage more in that form of risky behavior. This unifying principle is what ties together these two totally different situations. It’s how this argument’s reasoning by analogy runs through.
Answer Choice (A) says when people believe that there are several measures they could take to reduce the risk associated with a certain activity, generally they will only take the measure that they believe will most reduce that risk. That’s not the principle at work here.
For the argument to conform to this principle, we’d have to show several measures to reduce the risk associated with driving and then have the driver pick the most effective one. So maybe one measure is to get into an SUV. A second measure is to put on your seatbelt. A third measure is to have airbags. The fourth measure is don't run red lights. According to (A), the principle here is that you assign some probability to each measure and then pick the measure that will most reduce the risk associated with driving.
Correct Answer Choice (B) says the development of ways to protect people from the consequences of behavior that would normally harm them often makes people less careful to avoid such behaviors.
Yes, that’s the principle. “Behaviors that would normally harm them.” What kind of behavior are we talking about here? If applied to driving, then we’re talking about reckless driving. That's behavior that normally would harm you. “The development of ways to protect you from the consequences of reckless driving” is putting you in an SUV. Because when you're in an SUV, it lowers the risk of serious injury as a result of accidents. And as a result, you are less careful to avoid reckless driving.
It’s the same in the conclusion. The behavior that normally would harm people is, say, smoking. If we develop ways to protect people from the consequences of smoking, i.e., lung cancer, then that's going to make people smoke more.
(B) is correct because it extracts the underlying principle that analogizes these two seemingly different situations.
Answer Choice (C) says that people generally take special care to avoid behaviors that they believe would likely lead to serious harm and generally do not take special care to avoid behaviors that they believe will not harm them at all. That’s not the principle at work here.
What behaviors would likely lead to serious harm that people are avoiding? Reckless driving? But if that's the behavior, there's no indication that people are taking special care to avoid reckless driving. What behaviors won't cause harm? The argument doesn’t say. (C) has a hard time mapping onto the argument.
We could make up an argument for (C) to map onto. In general, when traffic lights turn red, everybody stops. When the lights turn green, everybody goes.
This maps onto (C). People are taking special care to avoid behaviors (running a red light) that they believe will likely lead to serious injury. People are not taking special care to avoid behavior that they believe will not harm them (running a green light). In other words, people run green lights.
Answer Choice (D) says people generally exercise more care when performing activities that they know to have risky consequences than when performing activities of unknown risk. That’s not the principle at work here.
To illustrate the principle in (D), consider two activities. Activity one you know is risky. Activity two has a risk profile that’s unknown to you. It could be just as risky, less risky, or more risky than activity one. (D) is saying that people are more careful when performing activity one. This doesn’t map onto the argument.
Moreover, I'm not sure this is a reasonable attitude. If you don't even know the risk profile associated with an activity, wouldn't it be prudent to be extra careful just in case?
Answer Choice (E) says avoiding serious harm to themselves is given a high priority by people in their behavior but avoiding lesser harm is frequently outweighed by various desires. That’s not the principle at work here.
To illustrate the principle in (E), consider the serious harm of losing your arm. You’re going to be very careful to avoid that kind of harm. Now consider the less serious harm of getting a bruise. People regularly choose to risk getting bruised because they have other desires that are more important to them. For example, if you go hiking, you might get bruised. If you play basketball, you might get bruised. The desire to go hiking or play basketball often outweighs the lesser harm of getting a bruise.
If applied to driving, then avoiding serious harm is given a high priority by people in their behavior. That’s why people don’t run red lights. But avoiding less harm is frequently outweighed by various other desires like wanting to get to a destination faster. That’s why people speed. Speeding is not as serious as running a red light, but it does increase your chances of getting hurt (and hurting others).