PrepTest 125, Section 2, Question 23

What we’re looking for

Working the answers

• A

  The first sentence works: all the apartment's food is in the refrigerator. But the second says all recently purchased food is in the refrigerator. We need the other direction: all refrigerator food was recently purchased. The refrigerator could contain both recent purchases and leftovers bought a month ago. A hasn't established the purchase date of everything in it.

• B

  Putting the refrigerator and its contents in the apartment doesn't put all the apartment's food in the refrigerator. There could be food in a cupboard. The purchase date of the refrigerator's contents wouldn't tell us when that cupboard food was bought. This is like knowing Mattress Madness is in the mall without knowing it's the mall's only mattress seller.

• C
  Correct

  Every item of food in the apartment is in the refrigerator, just as every mattress for sale in the mall is at Mattress Madness. Every item of food in the refrigerator was bought within the week, just as every mattress at the store is discounted. Therefore every item of food in the apartment was bought within the week. Both links and the conclusion match.

• D

  The premises match, but the conclusion goes the wrong way. They establish that all food in the apartment was recently purchased. D instead concludes that all recently purchased food is in the apartment. Diane could have bought some food for someone else's home. The premises tell us about the food in her apartment, not everything she's bought recently.

• E

  Both premises begin with recent purchases: those purchases are in the refrigerator, and those purchases are in the apartment. But food bought earlier could be elsewhere in the apartment. We haven't established that all apartment food belongs to the recently purchased group or the refrigerator group. Sharing a description of recent purchases doesn't connect all the apartment's food to the refrigerator.