Critical Reasoning

One of the most vexing problems in historiography is dating an event when the usual sources offer conflicting chronologies of the event. Historians should attempt to minimize the number of competing sources, perhaps by eliminating the less credible ones. Once this is achieved and several sources are left, as often happens, historians may try, though on occasion unsuccessfully, to determine independently of the usual sources which date is more likely to be right.

Which one of the following inferences is most strongly supported by the information above?

A. We have no plausible chronology of most of the events for which attempts have been made by historians to determine the right date.
B. Some of the events for which there are conflicting chronologies and for which attempts have been made by historians to determine the right date cannot be dated reliably by historians.
C. Attaching a reliable date to any event requires determining which of several conflicting chronologies is most likely to be true.
D. Determining independently of the usual sources which of several conflicting chronologies is more likely to be right is an ineffective way of dating events.
E. The soundest approach to dating an event for which the usual sources give conflicting chronologies is to undermine the credibility of as many of these sources as possible.

I have seen this problem in some other thread..But not convinced with the explanation. [spoiler]My doubt here is. the aanswer choice says "attempts have been made by historians".. but no where in the passage, there is mentioning that attempts have been made. It only says "Historians Should attempt" and "Historians should try". [/spoiler]Can some one please explain in detail.

Issue: Dating an event, when sources do not agree about the time periods, is difficult.
Method: Try to minimize the number of competing sources. eg. by eliminating less credible ones.
Result: If this is done, the historians can use the sources which are remaining (mostly several of them will still be left) to arrive at the date which is more probably correct. They are sometimes unsuccessful.

INFERENCE? Ok first things first - your question is a VERY good one, and here is where the subtleties of the GMAT are in play. The reason you are expecting to see predictions / recommendations in the answer choices, is because you think the question is asking you to infer something from an argument / claim / recommendation.

In truth, the question stem reads, "most strongly supported by the information above". Now the word information is key here. Whenever we have a question like this, and it looks like there is a recommendation in there, you need to question whether that is truly a prediction or simply a "directive" that is already in use.

For example, if I say that "Nurses should wash their hands. This has been proven to prevent infection." Though I seem to be making a recommendation, this has already been proven, and it is only a general directive which is actually already in effect. Nurses do wash their hands, as it seems to be proven that this prevents infection. I am just reaffirming that they should.

Similarly, though it looks like the author is recommending a strategy for historians, he is actually reaffirming that this is the correct method. We should take this as a fact, such as from a textbook, that is already being used by these historians. There are also a lot of tells in the passage that point to this... "several sources are left, as often happens..." and "...on occasion unsuccessfully..."

This clearly indicates that historians have in the past tried to eliminate sources and seek a new estimation of dates.

I hope this makes sense. Thus, now we will approach the answer choices to infer what historians do, based on these directives in the information.

A. Too extreme. The passage only talks about events that involve multiple, conflicting sources.

B. We can infer on the basis of the recommendation, that in the past, when faced with an event like this, historians would try to eliminate some sources, and try to determine the date, BUT SOMETIMES UNSUCCESSFULLY. Thus, some of these events cannot be dated reliably by historians.

C. This is out of scope, the passage only says "eliminate less credible ones", not to "identify ones most likely to be true". Also there's no way to know if we can even do this or not.

D. Again out of scope and probably untrue.

E. "undermine the credibility of as many sources as possible" No- this is not the aim. You can only try to eliminate the ones that are less credible, you should not try actively to undermine the sources -- too extreme.

Pick B.

Thanks Abhay!! You are genius..

Though I dont feel 100% comfortable.. I am feeling much much better... Somewhere deep inside I feel, the passage is very badly written.. But Anyways, cant blame the test makers..

Given even 30 mins... I wouldnt have thought that way..

Do you really think, such questions are answerable on the real exam?

Thanks once again for your effort!!

albatross86 wrote:
In truth, the question stem reads, "most strongly supported by the information above". Now the word information is key here. Whenever we have a question like this, and it looks like there is a recommendation in there, you need to question whether that is truly a prediction or simply a "directive" that is already in use.

For example, if I say that "Nurses should wash their hands. This has been proven to prevent infection." Though I seem to be making a recommendation, this has already been proven, and it is only a general directive which is actually already in effect. Nurses do wash their hands, as it seems to be proven that this prevents infection. I am just reaffirming that they should.

This is a new learning a a must takeaway for me!!

I agree with you kvcpk, the passage really reads a lot like a recommendation!

But I think a good takeaway is that when you see the words "based on the information above", try to take the facts as they are. It is not like an argument or claim where you have to find the flaw, but simply like an RC passage where you have to come to a logical inference of the statements.

Thus if it looks like there is a recommendation, it's probably better to take it as a true fact when solving such questions.

Also, look for giveaways that this is actually a directive disguised as a recommendation - see if there are clues that this has already been tried and tested or not.

I am confused between B and C. Please can some one elaborate these two options.

B. Some of the events for which there are conflicting chronologies and for which attempts have been made by historians to determine the right date cannot be dated reliably by historians.
The last line tells us that historians are unsuccessful on some occasions. Hence we can infer from this statement that there can be some of the events which are not dated reliably by the historians.

C. Attaching a reliable date to any event requires determining which of several conflicting chronologies is most likely to be true.
This is simply out of the scope of the discussion. We have been told that less credible ones were eliminated. Nothing has been talked about attaching a credible date.

Let me know if this solves your queries.