Some gardening books published by Garden Path Press recommend tilling the soil and adding compost before starting a new garden on a site, but Support they do not explain the difference between hot and cold composting. █████ ███ █████████ ████ ████ ██████████ ██████ ███████ ██ ██████ ██ ██ ████ ███ ███████ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████████ ████ █████ █████████ ██ ██████ ████ ███ ███████
The author concludes that some books published by Garden Path are flawed. She builds her argument on two premises:
(1) Some composting books by Garden Path do not explain the differences between hot and cold composting.
(2) If a composting book does not explain the basics of composting, then it is flawed.
The author is attempting to read the conditional statement in the second premise from left to right, but we do not know if any of Garden Path’s books activate the sufficient condition. What we do know about their composting books, however, is that some of them don’t explain the difference between hot and cold composting. Assuming that if this information is omitted, then the basics are not explained bridges this gap, so this is the assumption we’re looking for.
The argument requires the assumption ████
some gardening books ████ █████████ ███████ ███ ████ ███ ██████ ███████ ██████ ████████ █ ███ ██████ ███ ███ ██████
(A) could only weaken the argument. We need to know that some gardening books are flawed, not that some aren’t.
gardeners should not ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ██████ ████ ████ █ ████████ █████████████ ██ ██████████
Regardless of whether gardeners should try composting before understanding the basics, the conclusion is unaffected. Is composting before knowing the basics a flawed approach? Does Garden Path recommend this approach? Does this make the books flawed? There are too many unanswered questions with (B), so it is not necessary.
an explanation of ███ ██████ ██ ██████████ ████ ███████ ██ ███████████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███████ ███ ███ ████ ██████████
We know some of Garden Path’s books don’t address hot and cold composting, so (C) lets us conclude that they don’t explain the basics. Any book that fails to explain the basics is flawed, so some of Garden Path’s books are flawed. Answer choices that bridge conditional gaps between the premises and conclusion are necessary, so (C) is necessary.
everyone who understands ███ ██████████ ███████ ███ ███ ████ ██████████ ███████████ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████
We are looking for information on the books themselves, not about the people using them. Even if someone out there understands hot and cold composting but doesn’t understand the basics, it’s still entirely possible some of Garden Path’s books don’t explain these basics and thus are flawed.
no gardening book ████ ████████ ██ ███████████ ██ ██ █████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████ ██ ██████
(E) represents an inaccurate contrapositive of one of the premises. We know that if the basics are not explained, then the book is flawed. (E) gives us, if the basics are explained, then the book is not flawed. We need to know that some gardening books are flawed, not that some aren’t, so (E) isn’t necessary.
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