PrepTest 117, Section 4, Question 10
Council member P: Alarmists are those who see(89 more words not shown)
Council members P and Q(3 more words not shown)
- Apollution should be(3 more words not shown)
- Bactions tend to(6 more words not shown)
- Cpeople are responsible(2 more words not shown)
- Dpeople can change(5 more words not shown)
- Epeople are inclined(2 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
P's second sentence needs a careful read. It separates the pollution incident and the behavior behind it from people's disposition not to pollute. It isn't separating the incident from the behavior that caused it. In simpler terms, P thinks someone can point to a real pollution incident and still overreach by treating it as proof of a broad fault in society. A bad action doesn't necessarily settle what people are generally inclined to do.
Q responds with a different idea: people tend to take the easier path, and polluting is easier than avoiding pollution. That is supposed to support taking a serious incident as evidence of a broader pattern.
What we’re looking for
I don't yet have a clean, exact statement of the disagreement. We can still handle the question. For each choice, ask what P would say and what Q would say. We need opposing positions on the same claim. Something only one speaker discusses won't do.
Working the answers
- A
We don't get a disagreement about whether pollution should count as a problem. Q discusses how much pollution an incident suggests, not whether pollution is good or bad. P's criticism of alarmists also doesn't amount to a claim that pollution is harmless. We can't assign opposite views here.
- B
Q explicitly uses the idea that actions follow the path of least resistance. P doesn't reject that principle. P might accept it but disagree about which path people are inclined to take in this context. We have Q's position but no contrary position from P.
- C
P refers to the behavior causing an incident, and Q talks about actions that produce pollution. Neither speaker argues that people aren't responsible for pollution. They dispute what an incident tells us about people's general disposition, not whether humans can cause pollution.
- D
The ability to change behavior isn't what they dispute. A person could be inclined to do something while remaining capable of resisting that inclination. Q's claim about the easier path doesn't say people cannot choose differently, and P doesn't discuss a process of behavioral change. There are no opposing positions on this claim.
- ECorrect
This is the disagreement their wording supports. P refers to people's disposition not to pollute and criticizes treating a pollution incident as proof of a general fault. P therefore rejects the claim that people are inclined to pollute.
Q takes the other side. People tend to choose the easier path, and pollution is easier than avoiding it. Those two claims support the view that people are inclined to pollute.
Now we have both positions on the same issue: P says no, Q says yes. We didn't need to decide whose reasoning was better. We needed to identify a claim on which they take opposite sides.
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