Critical Reasoning

The Asian American History Association receives approximately 1,000 proposals each year from individuals who wish to present papers at its annual meeting. The association’s officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted.
Of the following, the best criticism of the officers’ plan is that the plan assumes that
(A) Professional associations cannot accept all papers submitted for presentation at their annual meetings.
(B) The total number of proposals submitted to the association will remain at approximately 1,000 in future years.
(C) Each proposal submitted to the association deserves to be considered a serious candidate for presentation.
(D) It is difficult to judge the quality of a paper on the basis of the proposal alone.
(E) The best 300 papers submitted to the association for presentation will be of the same quality from year to year.

rajibgmat wrote:The Asian American History Association receives approximately 1,000 proposals each year from individuals who wish to present papers at its annual meeting. The association’s officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted.
Of the following, the best criticism of the officers’ plan is that the plan assumes that
(A) Professional associations cannot accept all papers submitted for presentation at their annual meetings.
(B) The total number of proposals submitted to the association will remain at approximately 1,000 in future years.
(C) Each proposal submitted to the association deserves to be considered a serious candidate for presentation.
(D) It is difficult to judge the quality of a paper on the basis of the proposal alone.
(E) The best 300 papers submitted to the association for presentation will be of the same quality from year to year.

i go with E . The proposal focuses too much on the number " 300" and assumes the level of quality to remain same every yr . what if next only only 100 papers are of good quality .

rajibgmat wrote:The Asian American History Association receives approximately 1,000 proposals each year from individuals who wish to present papers at its annual meeting. The association’s officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted.
Of the following, the best criticism of the officers’ plan is that the plan assumes that
(A) Professional associations cannot accept all papers submitted for presentation at their annual meetings.
(B) The total number of proposals submitted to the association will remain at approximately 1,000 in future years.
(C) Each proposal submitted to the association deserves to be considered a serious candidate for presentation.
(D) It is difficult to judge the quality of a paper on the basis of the proposal alone.
(E) The best 300 papers submitted to the association for presentation will be of the same quality from year to year.

D?
the associations equate the quality of proposal with that of the paper and decide based on the quality of the proposal

A: seems to support the associations plan

B: out of scope. no of proposals in future not relevant

C: its the paper which is more important than the proposal

D: correct. it could be that deserving papers lose out because of poor quality proposals or vice versa

E: out of scope. consistency in quality is not relevant

rajibgmat wrote:The Asian American History Association receives approximately 1,000 proposals each year from individuals who wish to present papers at its annual meeting. The association’s officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted.
Of the following, the best criticism of the officers’ plan is that the plan assumes that
(A) Professional associations cannot accept all papers submitted for presentation at their annual meetings.
(B) The total number of proposals submitted to the association will remain at approximately 1,000 in future years.
(C) Each proposal submitted to the association deserves to be considered a serious candidate for presentation.
(D) It is difficult to judge the quality of a paper on the basis of the proposal alone.
(E) The best 300 papers submitted to the association for presentation will be of the same quality from year to year.

Here officers are assuming selecting best 300 papers based on quality of proposal would help to maintain the constant quality of paper presentation !!
So they are assuming.
1)The best 300 papers are of the same standards compared to last year and so on
2)Good quality proposal ==> good quality presentation.

which are given in D and E :roll:

I think i would go with D

I picked E.
The same reason as sudhir3127

IMO E

My reasoning same as sudhir3127's.

My reason to vote out D: Let's combine the question and option D. The best criticism of the officers’ plan is that the plan assumes that it is difficult to judge the quality of a paper on the basis of the proposal alone. . While, the plan never assumes that it's difficult to judge quality on the basis of the proposal alone. Rather, proposal is the soul criteria for selection.

OA plz?

OA is E.

One more vote for E).

The association’s officers would like to ensure constant standards of quality in the presentations from year to year. The officers have therefore decided to accept for presentation each year only the best 300 papers selected on the basis of the quality of the proposals submitted

Choice E) brings out the unstated assumption by the officers that the 300 papers submitted will be of constant standard quality (as this is their goal i.e ensure constant standards )

E here as well. The numbers 300 and 1000 are a distraction here. The key point the whole argument hinges on "maintaining constant standards of quality".

IMO E

I was thinking and thinking D or E, D or E. Initially D. But after further reading the question a few more times I decided its E.

This is my reasoning:

The author argues that the standards of quality can be maintained year to year if he chooses 300 presentations based on their proposal.

KEY WORD: STANDARDS.

The difference between D and E is D says it is difficult to judge quality. Difficulty in judging quality holds no relation to standards of quality.

If he chooses 300 proposals and they still have difficulkty to judge? then wont it be problem anyways.

I'd be shocked if it wasn't E.

n this type of questions we will consider every answer choices to be an assumption made about the argument.
Then we will try to criticize or attack the assumption as per the question stem.

In D if we assume that --it is difficult to judge the quality of the paper on the proposals alone-- this statement is already criticizing itself we can't attack this assumption.If it was like "it is NOT difficult to judge the quality of the paper on the proposals alone"- then we could have attack or criticize this answer choice. SO D is ruled out.

If we look at E it says "The best 300 papers submitted to the association for presentation will be of the same quality from year to year"- if this be taken an as assumption , we can criticize or weaken it because best 300 papers may not be of same quality from year to year". It can be same in 1st,2nd but may not be in 3rd or 4th years and so on.

So E is my pick.

Let me know if explanations are right.