PrepTest 137, Section 2, Question 13
Although most builders do not consider the experimental(48 more words not shown)
The argument is most vulnerable(7 more words not shown)
- Aconfuses what is(11 more words not shown)
- Bpresumes that what(12 more words not shown)
- Cequivocates between two(6 more words not shown)
- Ddoes not consider(14 more words not shown)
- Efails to consider(16 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Experience building a small house isn't automatically experience building a skyscraper. That's my first concern about trusting people who mainly use papercrete on small projects to judge its prospects for large construction.
The argument favors those users because they know the material's properties. That is a reason to listen to them. But we need to examine whether it justifies preferring their optimistic judgment over the judgment of most builders.
What we’re looking for
For the flaw question, keep the claim precise: the author thinks papercrete is promising for large-scale construction because its regular users think so. My concern about small-project experience may help us question that support, but the answer still has to describe a mistake the argument actually makes.
Working the answers
- A
This resembles my initial small-house-versus-skyscraper concern, but it changes what the argument says. The regular users don't merely say papercrete is promising for small projects. They ‘think otherwise’ about the preceding claim concerning large-scale construction. Their reported opinion is already about large-scale prospects.
The author relies on that opinion because of their familiarity with the material. It doesn't explicitly start with a judgment of small-scale promise and transfer that judgment to large projects. A describes a different route to the conclusion.
- B
The majority of builders takes the opposite view: most do not consider papercrete promising for large construction. The author favors the regular users over that majority. B reverses whose opinion the argument treats as persuasive.
- C
‘Promising’ keeps the same meaning: having favorable prospects as a construction material. The argument doesn't shift, for example, from promising someone to do something to describing a material as promising. The disagreement is over whether papercrete has good prospects, not over two meanings of the word.
- D
The views of people who regularly work with papercrete are the very basis of the argument. The problem isn't that the author ignores experienced users. It's whether their experience gives adequate reason to favor their opinion over the opposing one.
- ECorrect
Perhaps the builders who avoid papercrete understand it very well. Their knowledge of its limitations could be exactly why they don't regularly use it. Not using a material doesn't establish unfamiliarity with it.
That gives us a reason to doubt the author's preference for the regular users' judgment. Both groups might know the material, while the nonusers recognize reasons it is unsuitable for large projects. E doesn't prove papercrete is unsuitable; it exposes an overlooked possibility that weakens the basis for trusting one group over the other.
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