PrepTest 149, Section 3, Question 23
Each new car in the lot at Rollway(45 more words not shown)
The pattern of reasoning in(15 more words not shown)
- AEach apartment above(37 more words not shown)
- BEach apartment above(37 more words not shown)
- CNo apartment above(41 more words not shown)
- DNo apartment above(35 more words not shown)
- EEach apartment above(40 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The price rules out both ends of the age range.
A car priced between $5,000 and $18,000 can't be new: every new car costs more than $18,000. It can't be ten or more years old either: every car that old costs less than $5,000. That leaves a used car less than ten years old. The reasoning works.
What we’re looking for
For the parallel, I'm looking for the same two eliminations. One category requires a value above our case's value; another requires a value below it. Our case fits neither category, so it belongs in the middle.
Working the answers
- A
This is close, but it runs the final step in the wrong direction. The premises exclude two-bedroom apartments from floors above and below the fourth. They would let us conclude that a two-bedroom apartment must be on the fourth floor. They don't tell us that every fourth-floor apartment has two bedrooms. A fourth-floor apartment could have one or three bedrooms without violating either premise. A infers the bedroom count from the floor, whereas our argument infers the age category from the price.
- B
Three bedrooms rules out being below the fourth floor, since those apartments have at most two. But a three-bedroom apartment could be above the fourth: the first premise expressly allows that. So B makes only one of the two exclusions our argument makes. Its conclusion leaves the apartment on the fourth floor or higher, rather than locating it between the two outside categories.
- CCorrect
Take an apartment with exactly two bedrooms. It can't be above the fourth floor, because apartments there have at least three. It can't be below the fourth, because apartments there have fewer than two. So it must be on the fourth.
The two bedrooms play the role of the middle-range price. Above and below the fourth floor play the roles of new and ten-or-more-years-old. In each argument, the given value excludes both outside categories, leaving the middle. We don't need to establish that any two-bedroom apartment exists; C states where it would have to be if one does.
- D
A balcony requires three bedrooms. Above the fourth floor, apartments have at most two, so a balcony apartment can't be above the fourth. That reasoning works, but it follows a chain from balcony to bedroom count to a limit on location. It doesn't use a middle value to rule out both higher and lower locations. Its conclusion also leaves several floors possible.
- E
A vacant apartment can't be on or below the fourth floor, so it must be above the fourth. Those apartments have more than two bedrooms. Again, this is a chain: vacancy leads to a floor range, which leads to a bedroom count. Our argument starts with the numeric range and uses two separate exclusions to locate the car's age category. E has a different sequence of steps.
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