PrepTest 119, Section 4, Question 20
Evidence suggests that we can manufacture a car(36 more words not shown)
The flawed reasoning in the(13 more words not shown)
- ASince there is(41 more words not shown)
- BKameko might catch(33 more words not shown)
- CSusan says that(19 more words not shown)
- DIt is possible(31 more words not shown)
- EThere are machines(31 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
We can do each thing separately. Can we do both in the same car?
Maybe the design with excellent fuel efficiency is small and light, while the design meeting the side-impact standard is much bulkier. Those are hypothetical designs, not facts about actual cars. They show the missing information: the features that make one goal possible might interfere with achieving the other.
Here's a simpler example. Tomorrow I could fly to Japan, or I could stay home all day. Having each option separately doesn't mean I can both fly to Japan and stay home all day. We need evidence that the options can be combined.
What we’re looking for
The parallel question asks for that same mistake: one result is possible, another result is possible, therefore achieving both together is possible. We don't have to know that the goals really conflict. The problem is assuming they can be combined without establishing that.
Working the answers
- A
This starts with unavailable features and applies stated requirements for a well-engineered dishwasher. If a well-engineered dishwasher must use energy efficiently and none available does, the conclusion that none available is well engineered follows. We don't have two achievable results being unjustifiably combined; we have necessary requirements that no available dishwasher meets.
- B
This begins with two possibilities, which makes it tempting. But the conclusion adds a causal relationship: Kameko could catch a cold because she goes out without a hat. The original doesn't conclude that safety produces fuel efficiency or vice versa. It concludes only that one car could have both features. B's added 'because' changes the mistake.
- C
These are reports about actual conditions outside, not separate claims about what could be achieved. If both reports are accurate, it is cold and snowing. Whether the speakers are reliable is a different issue from whether two individually achievable goals can be combined.
- DCorrect
Writing a best seller corresponds to making the fuel-efficient car. Writing a novel that appeals to critics corresponds to making the car that meets the safety standard. The conclusion then combines them in one novel: critical acclaim and a large readership.
Perhaps the qualities that please critics would fail to attract a large audience, or perhaps they could work together. We haven't been told. Just as with the car, the separate possibilities don't establish the possibility of one product satisfying both goals.
- E
This explicitly tells us a combined coffee-and-toast machine is possible. That's the very point the car argument fails to establish. E then makes a different leap: because a combined machine can be made, one eventually will be made. Perhaps nobody will choose to build it. Possibility versus future occurrence isn't the original error of assuming two possibilities can be combined.
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