PrepTest 159, Section 1, Question 18
Putting a tap in a healthy maple that(51 more words not shown)
If the statements above are(10 more words not shown)
- AA maple whose(16 more words not shown)
- BThe healthiest maple(8 more words not shown)
- CA maple tree(9 more words not shown)
- DPutting a tap(16 more words not shown)
- EThe maple trees(9 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Keep both conditions in the first sentence: the maple must be healthy, and its trunk must be at least 12 inches across. If both are true, tapping won't harm it.
What happens if the tree is smaller or unhealthy? We haven't been told. Failing to meet a guarantee doesn't establish that the bad outcome must happen. Also, listing silver, red, and Manitoba maples as usable for syrup doesn't mean those are the only usable kinds. The passage immediately adds sugar maples and calls them the best.
What we’re looking for
I could wonder whether flavor, rather than sugar concentration alone, affects which maple is best. But the question tells us to accept all the statements and find what must follow. So set that debate aside. We need a consequence of the given facts, and the first sentence already supplies a useful guarantee to test the choices against.
Working the answers
- ACorrect
Suppose a maple more than 12 inches across is harmed by tapping. It satisfies the size condition. Could it also be healthy? No: a healthy tree of that size is guaranteed not to be harmed by the tap.
Picture a 13-inch tree. If it's healthy, the first sentence protects it from tapping harm. If tapping does harm it, health must be the missing condition. That's exactly what A says. We don't need any of the later facts about syrup varieties to reach it.
- B
Healthy versus unhealthy isn't a ranking from less healthy to healthiest. Nor does the rule say that larger trunks cause or indicate better health. It gives a size requirement and a health requirement together, without telling us which trees are healthiest.
- C
We aren't told how harm affects the amount of sap a tree produces. The facts discuss whether tapping harms certain trees and which kinds can be used for syrup. They don't establish that a harmed tree must produce very little sap.
- D
This is the tempting mistake: assuming that a tree outside the protected group must be harmed. A small, unhealthy tree fails both conditions, but the rule still gives us no outcome for it. Maybe tapping harms it; maybe it doesn't. Knowing when harm is ruled out isn't the same as knowing that harm occurs everywhere else.
- E
The best option need not be the most commonly used option. Sugar maples could, for example, be relatively hard to find, while people use more plentiful alternatives. That is only a possible scenario, but it shows why the claim about quality doesn't establish a claim about frequency.
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