Critical Reasoning

In response to expressions of public concern, the spokesperson for a manufacturer of insecticides asserts that there is no evidence that any of their products causes health problems in human beings when used in the recommended way. This testimony, if true, might be a substantial reason for believing that the recommended uses insecticides were harmless to humans, if which of the following were also true?

A) Evidence of the harmful effects of insecticides would almost certainly have been discovered by now.
B) The insecticides in question meet all of the recently adopted industry standards for safety.
C) No increased incidence of birth defects has been traced to the use of these insecticides.
D) The vast majority of users of these insecticides are federal agencies, and these agencies carefully monitor the application of these insecticides.
E) The spokesperson for the insecticide manufacturer is speaking honestly.

"A" sounds like the best choice!

A) Evidence of the harmful effects of insecticides would almost certainly have been discovered by now.

How do we know everything is discovered? There is some thing that might not have been discovered yet


B) The insecticides in question meet all of the recently adopted industry standards for safety.

Safety standards of what?

C) No increased incidence of birth defects has been traced to the use of these insecticides.

The argument says that there are no health risks to humans. In line with the argument


D) The vast majority of users of these insecticides are federal agencies, and these agencies carefully monitor the application of these insecticides.

This I believe is a trap as the federal agencies are monitoring the application of insecticides. Its not saying FA's who used this did not have any health risks for their personnel. Just because some one is monitoring does not mean that outbreak is prevented by all means

E) The spokesperson for the insecticide manufacturer is speaking honestly.

Who knows??

Hence My pick is C. What is OA?

A - "almost certainly" means not 100%. so there is still a chance (although very less) that insecticides will be harmful to some humans. hence incorrect.
B - even if B is true there is still a chance that someone will not use the insecticides in the recommended way n get harmed. hence incorrect.
C - provides only one type of harm that can be caused by insecticides.there can be many others. hence incorrect.
D - some one, not belonging to federal agencies, can be careless while using these insecticides n hence get harmed. therefore incorrect.

E - if the spokesperson is speaking the truth then there is no evidence to prove that insecticides r harmful to humans.

hence IMO E.


Thanks!

I will go with C.

We need another piece of evidence to demostrate that if the insecticides are used in the reccomended way then they are harmless.
What about if there is a insecticides production defect ? it this case, even though the insecticides were used in the raccomended way they could be harmful. C provides us the information required.

IMO: E

Spokesman has to be honest, otherwise how he can be believed.

Where did you get this question from ?

Neither of the choices are very convincing and I zeroed in on choosing between between A and C. I'm inclined to choose A

Whats the OA/OE ?

Don't have much explanation for it, E seems good