Critic: The perennial image of the "city on a hill" associates elevated locations with elevated purposes. The city's concert hall—its newest civic building—is located on a spectacular hilltop site. But because Support it is far from the center of the city, Conclusion it cannot fulfill the purpose of a civic building. Conclusion An example of a successful civic building is the art museum, which is situated in a densely populated downtown area. Support It encourages social cohesion and makes the city more alive.
The critic comes to two parallel conclusions. The first is that the concert hall isn’t a successful civic building; the support is that it’s far from the center of the city. The second is that the city’s downtown art museum represents a successful civic building; the support is that it encourages social cohesion and enlivens the city.
The support establishes that the art museum encourages social cohesion and makes the city more alive, but fails to explain how this makes it a successful civic building. We’re never told what it takes to be a successful civic building—in other words, what makes a civil building successful is something that the critic assumes.
The critic’s reasoning conforms to the principle that a civic building should encourage social cohesion and makes the city more alive. The critic claims that the concert hall isn't a successful civil building because it doesn't possess this quality, and that the art museum is successful because it does possess this quality. The correct answer will state an equivalent principle.
The critic's reasoning most closely conforms to which one of the following principles?
A civic building that is located in a downtown area should, if possible, be located on an elevated site.
The critic's idea of what makes a successful civil building is about its effect on the life of the city, not whether it's elevated. The idea of a hilltop site doesn't actually play into the argument; it's effectively irrelevant.
A city needs to have civic buildings if it is to have social cohesion.
The critic doesn't make any claims about the necessary factors for a city to have social cohesion. The critic's argument is purely focused on what makes a civil building successful, and this principle isn't relevant to that.
A civic building with an elevated purpose should be located on a spectacular site.
Like (A), this isn't a relevant principle to the critic’s argument, which is only concerned with judging the success of civic buildings. Elevated purposes are just mentioned for context, not to judge whether those buildings should be built on special sites.
The downtown area of a city should be designed in a way that complements the area's civic buildings.
The critic takes no position on how downtown areas should be designed, so this principle has no relation to the argument. The critic is just focused on the purpose and success of civil buildings, not the design of larger areas of a city.
The purpose of a civic building is to encourage social cohesion and to make a city more alive.
This principle aligns with both of the critic's conclusions: that the art museum fulfills its purpose because it encourages social cohesion and makes the city more alive, and that the concert hall is unsuccessful because it lacks this quality.
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