Critical Reasoning

How do the airlines expect to prevent commercial plane crashes? Studies have shown that pilot error contributes to two-thirds of all such crashes. To address this problem, the airlines have upgraded their training programs by increasing the hours of classroom instruction and emphasizing communication skills in the cockpit. But it is unrealistic to expect such measures to compensate for pilots"Ÿ lack of actual flying time. Therefore, the airlines should rethink their training approach to reducing commercial crashes.
Which one of the following is an assumption upon which the argument depends?
(A) Training programs can eliminate pilot errors.
(B) Commercial pilots routinely undergo additional training throughout their careers.
(C) The number of airline crashes will decrease if pilot training programs focus on increasing actual flying time.
(D) Lack of actual flying time is an important contributor to pilot error in commercial plane crashes.
(E) Communication skills are not important to pilot training programs.
OA is D

I cant make my mind between answer C and answer D...

Answer C mentions 'The number of airline crashes' whereas the stimulus mentions 'commercial plane crashes', is it a valid reason to discredit answer C?

Any suggestions?

Thanks

I think answer C doesn't really direct attack to the pilot error which is a major cause for crashes. On the other hand, op D directly mentioned about pilot error.

That's my 2 cents

Can someone please explain the OA? Even i chose answer C over D. Is it because that the answer C is more of an inference than an assumption?

I was also stuck between C and D and finally chose C. Need help regarding this one...

Premise : Airlines crashes because of pilot errors, and errors are due to lack of actual flying time spent during the training instead of hours of classroom instructions and cockpit's communication skills.

Conclusion : Rethink their training approach to reduce crashes which will help to reduce crashes

Assumption : lack of actual flying time is causing crashes.

(A) Training programs can eliminate pilot errors. There are already training programs but they need to upgrade it, upgrading can eliminate errors
(B) Commercial pilots routinely undergo additional training throughout their careers. irrelevant
(C) The number of airline crashes will decrease if pilot training programs focus on increasing actual flying time. this is conclusion not assumption
(D) Lack of actual flying time is an important contributor to pilot error in commercial plane crashes.
(E) Communication skills are not important to pilot training programs. irrelevant


I am not an expert, Experts, please correct me if I am wrong.

Option C is incorrect as increasing the actual flying time may not necessarily result in decrease in the Air Crashes.

Reason is because, lets assume that minimum 100hrs (flying time) is required to prevent crashes.

Initially lets assume that the hours of flying was only 40. Increasing it to 80 will still not prevent the crashes. That is why option C falls out.

And option D perfectly fits in as it points out the reason behind the crashes.

Sid

Got a PM on this one...

dv2020 you are right this is in the line of an LSAT type of question.

If I can break out a little LSAT technique...one way to spot the assumption is to play "connect the dots"

So here is the game...

The argument tells us where the dots need to go - in this case from the fact that we want to reduce airline crashes all the way to the conclusion that airlines should rethink their training (to add more actual flight time).

Now we want to see how far the argument takes us and the answer choice is a bridge that we can use to bridge the gap.

Now the argument gives us the fact pilot error contributes to most crashes. In response airlines have added to their training program. But this does not "compensate for lack of flying time" The only thing that we are missing here is the actual statement that more flying time is necessary!

See where the dots take us - from pilot error in crashes to better training put into place to the fact that this training does not emphasize flying time -- and then answer choice D steps in to tell us that flying time is important -- and finally we reach the conclusion that airlines need to rethink their approach.

Thank you very much David you are prompt and crisp as ever. Although I have understood what you mean here but what is really wrong with C isn't it saying the same thing. itsmebharat quoted in an earlier post that C is a conclusion is this one of the ways we can cancel out and answer choice in asssumption questions. D is filling the dots I agree totally but isn't C saying the same thing in different words. Or am I missing something....

David@VeritasPrep wrote:Got a PM on this one...

dv2020 you are right this is in the line of an LSAT type of question.

If I can break out a little LSAT technique...one way to spot the assumption is to play "connect the dots"

So here is the game...

The argument tells us where the dots need to go - in this case from the fact that we want to reduce airline crashes all the way to the conclusion that airlines should rethink their training (to add more actual flight time).

Now we want to see how far the argument takes us and the answer choice is a bridge that we can use to bridge the gap.

Now the argument gives us the fact pilot error contributes to most crashes. In response airlines have added to their training program. But this does not "compensate for lack of flying time" The only thing that we are missing here is the actual statement that more flying time is necessary!

See where the dots take us - from pilot error in crashes to better training put into place to the fact that this training does not emphasize flying time -- and then answer choice D steps in to tell us that flying time is important -- and finally we reach the conclusion that airlines need to rethink their approach.

I also looked at choice C twice before picking choice D and my reason for eliminating choice C was the word "will"...airline crashes will decrease. Just because pilots are spending more time in training does not mean there "will" be no crashes.