PrepTest 125, Section 4, Question 24
Downtown Petropolis boasted over 100 large buildings 5(44 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(7 more words not shown)
- AThe demolitions that(15 more words not shown)
- BThere have never(10 more words not shown)
- CMost of the(15 more words not shown)
- DThe large buildings(17 more words not shown)
- ESignificantly fewer than(15 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
What if Petropolis built new buildings?
Sixty demolitions tell us what disappeared. They don't tell us what was added. If the city put up 60 new large buildings during the same five years, the count could be unchanged. If it built more than 60, the count could have risen.
Also, the starting figure is over 100, not exactly 100. We can't subtract 60 and announce that only 40 large buildings remain. And even the number of surviving original buildings wouldn't settle the current total, because new buildings would count too.
The argument asks us to treat the number of large buildings as an indicator of economic health. Fine. The trouble is that the author hasn't established the substantial drop in that number used to claim a serious decline. My first way of filling the gap would be, “No new large buildings were built.”
What we’re looking for
Now the question asks for a required assumption. That means we should be willing to accept a less extreme version of our prediction. What must be true for these demolitions to support the claimed decline? New construction can't have substantially made up for the losses.
Working the answers
- A
The demolitions could be evenly spread out, concentrated in one year, or scattered irregularly. Their timing within the five-year period doesn't settle whether new construction replaced the lost buildings. The argument doesn't need an even schedule.
- B
We are comparing now with five years ago, not with every point in the city's history. Petropolis could have had far more buildings decades earlier and still have experienced a recent decline. An all-time limit isn't required.
- C
The argument doesn't depend on why the buildings were demolished. They could have been unsafe, unwanted, or cleared for another purpose. The missing information concerns the number of large buildings added, not the reason old ones came down.
- D
Small replacements on those particular sites are not required. The sites could remain empty and the argument could still work. D also doesn't rule out new large buildings elsewhere downtown. We need the overall count, not a particular use of the demolished buildings' land.
- ECorrect
Significantly fewer than 60 new large buildings means construction hasn't substantially offset the 60 demolitions. That is the less extreme version of our prediction the argument needs. It allows some new construction; it doesn't demand that absolutely nothing was built.
If new large buildings roughly matched or exceeded the losses, the demolitions would no longer establish the serious drop the author relies on. E closes that hole in the building-count evidence. It doesn't independently prove everything about the downtown economy; it supplies a required assumption in this argument.
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