Self-study
Literary historian: William Shakespeare, a humble actor, could have written the love poetry attributed to him. ███ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ ███ ██████ ████ ███████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ████████ ██████ ████ ████ █████ ████ ████ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ███ ███ █████ ████ ████ █████ █████ ███████ █████ ██████████ ████ ███████ ███ ███████████ ███ ████
Summary
Shakespeare could have written the love poetry attributed to him. However, the dramas attributed to him could only have been written by someone who had spent much time among powerful rulers. (In other words, if one did not spend much time among powerful rulers, then that person could not have written the dramas attributed to Shakespeare.) Francis Bacon associated with rulers, but Shakespeare did not.
Notable Valid Inferences
Shakespeare did not write the dramas attributed to him.
2.
Which one of the following █████████ ███████ ████ ███ ████████ ███████████ ███████
a
Bacon wrote the ██████ ██████████ ██ ████████████ ███ █████ ███ ████ ███████ ███ ████ ███████
Could be false. We don’t know for certain whether Bacon wrote the dramas. Although Bacon associated with rulers, this just means he meets a necessary condition for having written the dramas. But the fact he meets a necessary condition for having written the dramas does not guarantee that he must have written the dramas. There could be other people who also associated with rulers who wrote the dramas.
b
Bacon wrote both ███ ████ ██████ ███ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ ████████████
Could be false. We don’t know for certain whether Bacon wrote the dramas. Although Bacon associated with rulers, this just means he meets a necessary condition for having written the dramas. But the fact he meets a necessary condition for having written the dramas does not guarantee that he must have written the dramas. There could be other people who also associated with rulers who wrote the dramas. We also have no reason to think Bacon must have written the love poetry.
c
Shakespeare wrote neither ███ ████ ██████ ███ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ ████
Could be false. The stimulus tells us that Shakespeare could have written the love poetry attributed to him.
d
One person could ███ ████ ███████ ████ ███ ████ ██████ ███ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ ████████████
Could be false. The stimulus tells us that Shakespeare could have written the love poetry, but this does not mean that he absolutely did. It is possible that Shakespeare wrote neither the love poetry nor the dramas, and that the true author of both the love poetry and the dramas is a single person.
e
Shakespeare may have ███████ ███ ████ ██████ ███ ███ ███ █████ ███ ██████ ██████████ ██ ████
Must be true. We know Shakespeare did not write the dramas because they could have been written only by someone who spent much time among rulers, and Shakespeare did not associate with rulers. So he did not meet a necessary condition for having written the dramas.