Critical Reasoning

Columnist: George Orwell's book 1984 has exercised much influence on a great number of this newspaper's readers. One thousand readers were surveyed and asked to name the one book that had the most influence on their lives. The book chosen most often was the Bible; 1984 was second.

The answer to which one of the following questions would most help in evaluating the columnist's argument?

A. How many books had each person surveyed read?
B. How many people chose books other than 1984?
C. How many people read the columnist's newspaper?
D. How many books by George Orwell other than 1984 were chosen?
E. How many of those surveyed had actually read the books they chose?
[spoiler]

The OA is B.[/spoiler]

I got stuck with the option E.

Kindly discuss this question in detail...

Hi Amit:

We know that
a: The conclusion: George Orwell's book 1984 has exercised much influence on a great number of the newspaper readers.
b: Factual premise:There were 1000 people who were surveyed.
c: Factual premise: Most chosen book was the Bible, 1984 was second most chosen.

Now let's review the choices.
A. How many books had each person read?
INCORRECT, since there is no mention that the survey asked that question. The only question asked was to name one book that was most influential.

B: How many people chose books other than 1984?
A CONTENDER, let's only 2 or 20 or 50 people chose the 1984, and rest chose the other books, the columnist can't claim that "a great number" was influenced by the book. So, answer to this question is important. I'll come to this option again.

C:How many people read the columnist's newspaper?
A CONTENDER, since this may talk about the statistical significance of the data, as the survey was done on only 1000 of the readers on which the conclusion rests.

D:How many books by George Orwell other than 1984 were chosen?
D: INCORRECT, Since the conclusion is about 1984 and not George Orwell himself.

E: How many of those surveyed had actually read the books they chose?
E: INCORRECT, again, this was not asked in the survey and it is outside the scope discussed as nowhere in the articles does the columnist mention that the people actually had to read the book. It just had to have influenced them in some way.

So we have eliminated A,D,E and the competition is between B and C.

Now between B and C, we choose B for the following 2 reasons.
1. By knowing how many people chose other books, we get how many chose 1984 (by subtracting that number from 1000). Hence we can find what percentage of people chose 1984. (and verify that it was indeed a great number).
2. The answer of C cannot be verified from the information contained in the survey and is out of the survey's scope.

Let me know if this helps:)

[email protected] wrote:Columnist: George Orwell's book 1984 has exercised much influence on a great number of this newspaper's readers. One thousand readers were surveyed and asked to name the one book that had the most influence on their lives. The book chosen most often was the Bible; 1984 was second.

The answer to which one of the following questions would most help in evaluating the columnist's argument?

A. How many books had each person surveyed read?
B. How many people chose books other than 1984?
C. How many people read the columnist's newspaper?
D. How many books by George Orwell other than 1984 were chosen?
E. How many of those surveyed had actually read the books they chose?

Hi!

Relevant information questions are really scope questions - we want the answer that's most inside the scope of the issue. These questions belong to the assumption family.

A great approach is to break down the argument just as you would for any assumption/str/wkn question: find the conclusion, summarize the evidence and identify the author's assumption. The correct answer will help you evaluate whether the assumption is valid.

Deconstructing the argument:

The author concludes that 1984 influenced a great number of the paper's readers. The author bases that conclusion on the book being the 2nd most popular choice in a survey.

What does the author have to be assuming in order for the conclusion to follow from the evidence? That being the 2nd most popular actually means that a large number of survey respondents chose 1984 in the survey.

With that assumption in mind, let's go to the choices, looking for the one that helps us evaluate the assumption.

a) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
b) perfect! (b) tells us how many people actually chose the book, not just where it ranked in the survey. If almost everyone chose other books, then the argument is weakened; if a large number of people actually did choose 1984, then the argument is strengthened. Since different answers to (b) make us feel differently about the conclusion, (b) is a relevant question.

On test day we should pick (b) and happily move on to the next question; let's go into review mode and take a peek at the other choices:

c) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
d) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
e) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.

Let's take a closer look at (e), since it was your evil temptress. The survey asked people which book had the most influence on their lives. Does it mention how the book influenced them? NO! So, in fact, it's irrelevant whether they actually read the books. For example, maybe the book had a huge influence because carrying it around made them look like an intellectual and get girls! Maybe it fell on them in a bookstore and broke their arm, ruining their dreams of becoming a professional piano player. While it may seem strange, whether they actually read the book is outside the scope of the argument.

Stuart Kovinsky wrote:

[email protected] wrote:Columnist: George Orwell's book 1984 has exercised much influence on a great number of this newspaper's readers. One thousand readers were surveyed and asked to name the one book that had the most influence on their lives. The book chosen most often was the Bible; 1984 was second.

The answer to which one of the following questions would most help in evaluating the columnist's argument?

A. How many books had each person surveyed read?
B. How many people chose books other than 1984?
C. How many people read the columnist's newspaper?
D. How many books by George Orwell other than 1984 were chosen?
E. How many of those surveyed had actually read the books they chose?

Hi!

Relevant information questions are really scope questions - we want the answer that's most inside the scope of the issue. These questions belong to the assumption family.

A great approach is to break down the argument just as you would for any assumption/str/wkn question: find the conclusion, summarize the evidence and identify the author's assumption. The correct answer will help you evaluate whether the assumption is valid.

Deconstructing the argument:

The author concludes that 1984 influenced a great number of the paper's readers. The author bases that conclusion on the book being the 2nd most popular choice in a survey.

What does the author have to be assuming in order for the conclusion to follow from the evidence? That being the 2nd most popular actually means that a large number of survey respondents chose 1984 in the survey.

With that assumption in mind, let's go to the choices, looking for the one that helps us evaluate the assumption.

a) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
b) perfect! (b) tells us how many people actually chose the book, not just where it ranked in the survey. If almost everyone chose other books, then the argument is weakened; if a large number of people actually did choose 1984, then the argument is strengthened. Since different answers to (b) make us feel differently about the conclusion, (b) is a relevant question.

On test day we should pick (b) and happily move on to the next question; let's go into review mode and take a peek at the other choices:

c) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
d) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.
e) nothing to do with the book - eliminate.

Let's take a closer look at (e), since it was your evil temptress. The survey asked people which book had the most influence on their lives. Does it mention how the book influenced them? NO! So, in fact, it's irrelevant whether they actually read the books. For example, maybe the book had a huge influence because carrying it around made them look like an intellectual and get girls! Maybe it fell on them in a bookstore and broke their arm, ruining their dreams of becoming a professional piano player. While it may seem strange, whether they actually read the book is outside the scope of the argument.

Reg. your explanation for (B)- we are already told that Bible came first and 1984 came second. We dont need B to evaluate.

Gaurav 2013-fall wrote: Reg. your explanation for (B)- we are already told that Bible came first and 1984 came second. We dont need B to evaluate.

But what does "coming second" mean?

If the Bible got 999 votes and 1984 got 1 vote, then 1984 came second; if the Bible got 501 votes and 1984 got 499 votes, then 1984 came second. Do both scenarios make us think that 1984 actually affected a lot of people's lives?

Thanks Stuart! I am convinced.

Stuart Kovinsky wrote:

[email protected] wrote: chose?

Hi!

Relevant information questions are really scope questions - we want the answer that's most inside the scope of the issue. These questions belong to the assumption family.

A great approach is to break down the argument just as you would for any assumption/str/wkn question: find the conclusion, summarize the evidence and identify the author's assumption. The correct answer will help you evaluate whether the assumption is valid.

Deconstructing the argument:

The author concludes that 1984 influenced a great number of the paper's readers. The author bases that conclusion on the book being the 2nd most popular choice in a survey.

What does the author have to be assuming in order for the conclusion to follow from the evidence? That being the 2nd most popular actually means that a large number of survey respondents chose 1984 in the survey.

With that assumption in mind, let's go to the choices,

Hi Stuart,

Could you help how to understand whether an option is within scope in the following gmatprep question:
Lyme disease is caused by a bacterium transmitted to humans by deer ticks. Generally, deer ticks pick up the bacterium while in the larval stage by feeding on infected white-footed mice. However, certain other species on which the larvae feed do not harbor the bacterium. If the population of these species increased, more of the larvae would be feeding on uninfected hosts, so the number of ticks acquiring the bacterium would likely decline.

Which of the following would it be most important to ascertain in evaluating the argument?

(A) Whether populations of the other species on which deer tick larvae feed are found only in the areas also inhabited by white-footed mice.
(B) Whether the size of the deer tick population is currently limited by the availability of animals for the tick's larval stage to feed on.
(C) Whether the infected deer tick population could be controlled by increasing the number of animals that prey on white-footed mice.
(D) Whether deer ticks that were not infected as larvae can become infected as adults by feeding on deer on which infected deer ticks have fed.
(E) Whether the other species on which deer tick larvae feed harbor any other bacteria that ticks transmit to humans

I esp struggled between B and D. How can I drop D on scope.

Could you also share the assumption author is making in the above argument.

Pls help