Critical Reasoning

A law is being proposed that would require the installation of defibrillators, which are used to treat heart attacks, in new restaurants. However, a leading local restauranteur opposes the law, saying that the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the restauranteur's argument?

A.Most individuals have no formal training in cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
B.Since new restaurants are but a small fraction of all restaurants in the area, the new law would be extremely narrow in scope.
C.The installation of defibrillators in new restaurants costs significantly less than the installation of fire suppression equipment.
D.In the area that the proposed law would cover, the average time required for emergency personnel to respond to medical emergencies was far less than that of the whole country.
E.The largest proportion of heart attack deaths result from situations in which no cardiopulmonary resuscitation-trained individuals are present

OA:E


Not very much convinced with the given.
I am not a medical person, but what if even the use of defibrillators requires training?
I think D is the best choice because it calls into question the restaurater's assumption about delay being the primary cause.

Experts please help!

IMO D

yeah what if the other thing than CPR also requires some training.
then the statement E would be flawed.
while elimination other options
E is the best.

Do not ASSUME anything. When you saying what if even the use of defibrillators requires training you are assuming its possibility BUT NOT happening of same thing has same weightage. Since both are possible we cannot assume anything.

For D, following is not mentioned in the argument.

I think D is the best choice because it calls into question the restaurater's assumption about delay being the primary cause.

can you please justify
why E is the correct answer.

The largest proportion of heart attack deaths result from situations in which no cardiopulmonary resuscitation-trained individuals are present

People can be saved by timely employment of CR but largeest % of people are dying because there is CR was not available TIMELY for whatever reason (we dont care). It means we need some other method because somehow we are not able to use CR.

Dont try to go in a direction to find out what might be the reason for not able to timely employ CR because that will only confuse you and more importantly we DONT BOTHER for it

A vs E, IMO: E

P1: A new law is proposed that defibrillators to be installed in new restaurants.
P2: A person opposes, saying use of CPR can prevent the majority of preventable heart attacks.

We have to find an answer to make less likely to believe P2.

A. Most individuals don't have training in CPR, but few people can have and they can treat.
B. Does not explain about P2
C. Does not talking about P2
D. Not talking about P2
E. This statement says, even if we install CPR, but may be we don't have trained individual - so P2 will fail.

vikram4689 wrote:Do not ASSUME anything. When you saying what if even the use of defibrillators requires training you are assuming its possibility BUT NOT happening of same thing has same weightage. Since both are possible we cannot assume anything.

For D, following is not mentioned in the argument.

I think D is the best choice because it calls into question the restaurater's assumption about delay being the primary cause.

Well then isn't it that E is making that assumption about training.

I wish if some Kaplan experts could throw a few cents..

shubhamkumar wrote:A law is being proposed that would require the installation of defibrillators, which are used to treat heart attacks, in new restaurants. However, a leading local restauranteur opposes the law, saying that the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the restauranteur's argument?

We've identified that we have a weakening question, so let's go to step 2 of the Kaplan method for CR: untangle the stimulus.

First, it's essential to identify the restaurateur's conclusion - I think that part of the problem has been that people haven't properly figured out what the main point is. There are no traditional conclusion keywords here (e.g. thus, therefore, hence, ...), so we can use the one sentence test: if the author had only been allowed to speak one thought, what would he have chosen to say. In this stimulus, the big opinion is that the author opposes the new law. In other words, if he were only allowed to tell us one thing, it would be "don't pass the defibrillator law!"

Next, let's think about the evidence. WHY don't we need defibrillators? BECAUSE the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of CPR.

Let's also focus on a key qualification word in the evidence: can. The author doesn't say that CPR does prevent these deaths, just that it can do so. Well, what's the missing link between "can" and "does"? The author has to be assuming that there's nothing preventing CPR from working.

To weaken an argument we attack the author's assumption. Step 3 of the Kaplan Method for CR is to make a prediction. Our prediction: there's a reason why CPR won't actually save these people's lives.

With that prediction in mind, (E) should jump out as the correct answer. If most of these deaths happen when there's no one around who knows how to do CPR, then how is CPR saving anyone's life?

(A) may also have been tempting, but it's a classic GMAT trap. Words like "most" are usually too ambiguous to be helpful. "Most" means more than 50%. So it would be consistent with (A) that 49% of people have CPR training. Further, (A) talks about the population at large. It would also be consistent with (A) for 99% of the general population to be CPR-ignorant but 100% of restaurant staff to be fully CPR trained. Since (A) is open to too many interpretations - some of which weaken, some of which are irrelevant and some of which strengthen - it's irrelevant to the argument.

(D) also leaves too many unanswered questions. First, it has nothing to do with the CPR vs defibrillator debate. Second, what does "average response time" actually translate too in terms of speed? Just because that area is below the country average, does that actually tell us whether it's fast enough to save people dying from a heart attack?

Since the author is saying that defibrillators are unnecessary, we really don't care if they require experts to operate. If anything, knowing that defibrillators require expert operators would be another reason why they shouldn't be required in restaurants - and that plays right into the restaurateur's argument.

shubhamkumar wrote:

vikram4689 wrote:Do not ASSUME anything. When you saying what if even the use of defibrillators requires training you are assuming its possibility BUT NOT happening of same thing has same weightage. Since both are possible we cannot assume anything.

For D, following is not mentioned in the argument.

I think D is the best choice because it calls into question the restaurater's assumption about delay being the primary cause.

Well then isn't it that E is making that assumption about training.

I wish if some Kaplan experts could throw a few cents..

You may refer to my post above where i have justified why E is correct and you can also see the similar reasoning that is evident in that post and Stuart's post

The only difference between the options A and E is the word 'Most'.

I would say that option E says that something more than CPR is required that is the essential skills to work on the equipment, otherwise the equipment and hence the restaneur's argument will fall.

Option A uses words like most which means more than 50%, which means that more than 50% but sill some % does have the skills.

Option E says that suppose you need X causes Y, but if I want to weaken this argument I would say that other parameters cause Y.

E is similar to that saying that X and Z both equally cause Y so if Z is absent then X alone will not cause Y.

Hence this an airtight argument.

This is a very good question for the future that Kaplan has asked.

I had heard simple causal reasoning questions or a variety of causal reasoning questions before, but this one is special.

X and Z both equally cause Y and if Z is not present then X alone will not help to form Y.

So this sentence is a combination of Causality and Conditionality.

Really a good sentence.

Hope my explanation really helped.

IMO E

Stuart Kovinsky wrote:

shubhamkumar wrote:A law is being proposed that would require the installation of defibrillators, which are used to treat heart attacks, in new restaurants. However, a leading local restauranteur opposes the law, saying that the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the restauranteur's argument?

We've identified that we have a weakening question, so let's go to step 2 of the Kaplan method for CR: untangle the stimulus.

First, it's essential to identify the restaurateur's conclusion - I think that part of the problem has been that people haven't properly figured out what the main point is. There are no traditional conclusion keywords here (e.g. thus, therefore, hence, ...), so we can use the one sentence test: if the author had only been allowed to speak one thought, what would he have chosen to say. In this stimulus, the big opinion is that the author opposes the new law. In other words, if he were only allowed to tell us one thing, it would be "don't pass the defibrillator law!"

Next, let's think about the evidence. WHY don't we need defibrillators? BECAUSE the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of CPR.

Let's also focus on a key qualification word in the evidence: can. The author doesn't say that CPR does prevent these deaths, just that it can do so. Well, what's the missing link between "can" and "does"? The author has to be assuming that there's nothing preventing CPR from working.

To weaken an argument we attack the author's assumption. Step 3 of the Kaplan Method for CR is to make a prediction. Our prediction: there's a reason why CPR won't actually save these people's lives.

With that prediction in mind, (E) should jump out as the correct answer. If most of these deaths happen when there's no one around who knows how to do CPR, then how is CPR saving anyone's life?

(A) may also have been tempting, but it's a classic GMAT trap. Words like "most" are usually too ambiguous to be helpful. "Most" means more than 50%. So it would be consistent with (A) that 49% of people have CPR training. Further, (A) talks about the population at large. It would also be consistent with (A) for 99% of the general population to be CPR-ignorant but 100% of restaurant staff to be fully CPR trained. Since (A) is open to too many interpretations - some of which weaken, some of which are irrelevant and some of which strengthen - it's irrelevant to the argument.

(D) also leaves too many unanswered questions. First, it has nothing to do with the CPR vs defibrillator debate. Second, what does "average response time" actually translate too in terms of speed? Just because that area is below the country average, does that actually tell us whether it's fast enough to save people dying from a heart attack?

Since the author is saying that defibrillators are unnecessary, we really don't care if they require experts to operate. If anything, knowing that defibrillators require expert operators would be another reason why they shouldn't be required in restaurants - and that plays right into the restaurateur's argument.

Great, Thank you expert. You detail the steps you do for a CR weakening. Great.

One question, pls,
I heard that there are 2 ways of weakening an argument. one way to weakening a argument is to cast doubt on an assumption as you do above. Another way to weaken the argument is to weaken the conclusion directly.
I see that most CR weakening question in OG belong to the way 1. I have not seen the way 2 of weakening the argument. Pls, give me an example of way 2. Thank you. Stuart.

Stuart Kovinsky wrote:

shubhamkumar wrote:A law is being proposed that would require the installation of defibrillators, which are used to treat heart attacks, in new restaurants. However, a leading local restauranteur opposes the law, saying that the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the restauranteur's argument?

We've identified that we have a weakening question, so let's go to step 2 of the Kaplan method for CR: untangle the stimulus.

First, it's essential to identify the restaurateur's conclusion - I think that part of the problem has been that people haven't properly figured out what the main point is. There are no traditional conclusion keywords here (e.g. thus, therefore, hence, ...), so we can use the one sentence test: if the author had only been allowed to speak one thought, what would he have chosen to say. In this stimulus, the big opinion is that the author opposes the new law. In other words, if he were only allowed to tell us one thing, it would be "don't pass the defibrillator law!"

Next, let's think about the evidence. WHY don't we need defibrillators? BECAUSE the vast majority of preventable heart attack deaths can be prevented by the timely employment of CPR.

Let's also focus on a key qualification word in the evidence: can. The author doesn't say that CPR does prevent these deaths, just that it can do so. Well, what's the missing link between "can" and "does"? The author has to be assuming that there's nothing preventing CPR from working......

Thanks for your inputs Stuart.Excellent explanation which certainly helped.