BREAKING: Target Test Prep releases Brand New 2026 On Demand GMAT prep course

Redeem

800 CR

This topic has expert replies
Post new topic Post Reply
Previous Topic Next Topic
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 489
Joined: Tue Jul 05, 2011 11:10 am
Thanked: 28 times
Followed by:5 members

800 CR

by gmatblood » Sun May 20, 2012 11:15 am
Beauty is subjective. What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly.

Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?

No current controversy exists over the beauty of certain lost works of art that are now unknown.

Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.

Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.

Those who find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful never like them as much as they like performances of older music.

Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by all who heard them.
Top
Source: — Critical Reasoning |
Legendary Member
Posts: 2789
Joined: Tue Jul 26, 2011 12:19 am
Location: Chennai, India
Thanked: 206 times
Followed by:43 members
GMAT Score:640

by GmatKiss » Sun May 20, 2012 12:14 pm
IMO:E from POE
Top
User avatar
Legendary Member
Posts: 626
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2011 2:50 am
Location: Ahmedabad
Thanked: 31 times
Followed by:10 members

by ronnie1985 » Mon May 21, 2012 6:21 am
IMO (C)

The definition of beauty is questioned by those who find the piece of music ugly.
Follow your passion, Success as perceived by others shall follow you
Top
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 150
Joined: Thu May 05, 2011 10:04 am
Thanked: 5 times
Followed by:4 members

by thestartupguy » Fri May 25, 2012 1:54 pm
I like E more than A, though I want to believe that A is completely wrong.

Any experts want to comment on this?
Top
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 181
Joined: Fri Feb 17, 2012 9:36 am
Thanked: 1 times
Followed by:1 members
GMAT Score:620

by heymayank08 » Fri May 25, 2012 11:08 pm
i like E too
Top
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 122
Joined: Tue May 01, 2012 6:05 am
Thanked: 3 times

by ihatemaths » Fri May 25, 2012 11:25 pm
OA ? is it C .

options
A-not related
B-strengthen's by saying contemporary vary in quality
D-not related
E-i dont know how to go about with negation so stuck with C
Top
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 307
Joined: Wed Feb 22, 2012 9:45 pm
Thanked: 12 times
GMAT Score:700

by Gaurav 2013-fall » Tue May 29, 2012 10:17 am
IMO E
Last edited by Gaurav 2013-fall on Fri Jun 01, 2012 1:21 am, edited 1 time in total.
Top
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 123
Joined: Fri Apr 20, 2012 4:36 am
Thanked: 29 times
Followed by:1 members

by Ashujain » Thu May 31, 2012 3:30 am
gmatblood wrote:Beauty is subjective. What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly.

Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?

No current controversy exists over the beauty of certain lost works of art that are now unknown.

Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.

Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.

Those who find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful never like them as much as they like performances of older music.

Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by all who heard them.

A) out of scope
B) Weakens. My explanation: the argument says that What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly. In this, it is assumed that the quality of music or anything under consideration is equal and it is only a matter of how someone else sees it. So if we say that the quality of the thing under consideration is not equal or similar then it definitely weakens the whole arguement.
C) out of scope
D) out of scope
E) out of scope
Top
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 435
Joined: Wed Nov 16, 2011 7:27 am
Thanked: 48 times
Followed by:16 members

by alex.gellatly » Thu May 31, 2012 5:35 am
gmatblood wrote:Beauty is subjective. What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly.

Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?

No current controversy exists over the beauty of certain lost works of art that are now unknown.

Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.

Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.

Those who find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful never like them as much as they like performances of older music.

Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by all who heard them.
I'm going with E... blood, what's the oa and source please?
Top
Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Oct 24, 2011 12:18 pm
Thanked: 3 times

by nitingoel » Thu May 31, 2012 5:55 am
IMO[spoiler](C).[/spoiler]

A - Does not weaken the argument.
B - if performances vary in quality. But some people consider this music as ugly because of it's subtle and delightful patterns which has nothing to do with quality. Hence B does not weaken the conclusion
C - The people who don't consider this music beautiful disagree amongst themseleves. This shakes the basis of the entire reasoning and hence can be considered as an argument that weakens the passage.
D- OOS
E - OOS

Regards
Nitin
Top
Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts
Posts: 41
Joined: Wed May 30, 2012 5:21 am
Thanked: 3 times

by shrutib » Thu May 31, 2012 6:01 pm
anyone knows the answer to this question?

i will go with E.
Top
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 342
Joined: Wed Jul 08, 2009 8:50 am
Thanked: 214 times
Followed by:19 members
GMAT Score:740

by Birottam Dutta » Thu May 31, 2012 10:53 pm
Let me throw in my take on the question as well:

Beauty is subjective. What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly.

Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?

No current controversy exists over the beauty of certain lost works of art that are now unknown.

Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.

Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.

Those who find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful never like them as much as they like performances of older music.

Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by all who heard them.

The question ask us to find the option which weakens the argument... Which argument is being referred here? The argument that "Beauty is subjective". We have to find a choice which clearly shows that beauty is not subjective or not dependent on individuals' choices but rather something which can be generalized and which is universal.

Going by the options:

A-- This talks about controversy which is out of context. This is not correct.
B---If music varies in quality, this does not affect its subjectivity. This is incorrect.
C---People may disagree about beauty but this again does not show beauty as not being subjective. If anything, this hints at beauty being subjective, which is the opposite of what we want.
D--- Out of context and totally irrelevant.
E--- If this is true and everyone likes a particular music piece, then this may show that beauty is not subjective but universal in nature. This is the option we are looking for. Correct choice!

Hope this is the answer as well.
Top
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 316
Joined: Sun Aug 21, 2011 6:18 am
Thanked: 16 times
Followed by:6 members

by dhonu121 » Fri Jun 01, 2012 4:10 am
Answer is B.
Also, to verify, if I negate B, it would say that
the quality of music is same all the time, and thus would strengthen the argument because then only perception of beauty would explain the difference in opinions.
hence negating B strengthens the argument.
Thus B is a weakener for sure.
A:Talking about things which are not mentioned in the passage ,plus uses words such as lost, uknown etc making it a suspect choice.
B:Correct
C:This strengthens the argument. If they are struggling among themselves, this means that they are definitely finding the topic subjective and are hence not able to come to a conclusion
D:Irrelevant comparison
E:Some performances,older music etc are keywords that make it a wrong choice.
If you've liked my post, let me know by pressing the thanks button.
Top
User avatar
GMAT Instructor
Posts: 15539
Joined: Tue May 25, 2010 12:04 pm
Location: New York, NY
Thanked: 13060 times
Followed by:1906 members
GMAT Score:790

by GMATGuruNY » Sun Jun 03, 2012 3:39 am
gmatblood wrote:Beauty is subjective. What is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else. Consider a performance of any piece of serious contemporary music. Some members of the audience discover in it subtle and delightful patterns, which they find beautiful. Others hear arbitrary and discordant sounds, which they find ugly.

Which of the following statements, if true, would most weaken the argument above?

No current controversy exists over the beauty of certain lost works of art that are now unknown.

Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.

Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.

Those who find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful never like them as much as they like performances of older music.

Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by all who heard them.
This CR exhibits a common flaw: a SHIFT IN SCOPE.

The premise is about ONE example: Consider A PERFORMANCE of any piece of serious contemporary music.
The conclusion is about ALL: BEAUTY is subjective.
The assumption is that what is true for ONE is true for ALL.

Answer choice E: Some performances of older classical music have been found beautiful by ALL who heard them.
This answer choice offers a COUNTEREXAMPLE that weakens the conclusion. If there are performances that have been found beautiful by ALL who heard them, then the conclusion that what is beautiful to one person is not always beautiful to someone else -- that beauty is SUBJECTIVE -- is weakened.

The correct answer is E.

Reasons to eliminate B and C:

B: Performances of serious contemporary music often vary considerably in quality.
Out of scope. The conclusion is not about QUALITY but about BEAUTY. Regardless, this answer choice implies that any given performance could be of HIGH quality or of LOW quality and does not dispute that some audience members will find the performance beautiful while others find it ugly. Thus, the conclusion that beauty is subjective is not weakened.

C: Those who fail to find performances of serious contemporary music beautiful disagree among themselves about what is beautiful.
Since these people disagree about what is beautiful, the conclusion that beauty is SUBJECTIVE is STRENGTHENED.
Private tutor exclusively for the GMAT and GRE, with over 20 years of experience.
Followed here and elsewhere by over 1900 test-takers.
I have worked with students based in the US, Australia, Taiwan, China, Tajikistan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia -- a long list of countries.
My students have been admitted to HBS, CBS, Tuck, Yale, Stern, Fuqua -- a long list of top programs.

As a tutor, I don't simply teach you how I would approach problems.
I unlock the best way for YOU to solve problems.

For more information, please email me (Mitch Hunt) at [email protected].
Student Review #1
Student Review #2
Student Review #3
Top
User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 148
Joined: Sun Apr 29, 2012 1:08 pm
Thanked: 8 times

by jimmyjimmy » Mon Jun 04, 2012 7:56 am
ronnie1985 wrote:IMO (C)

The definition of beauty is questioned by those who find the piece of music ugly.
same above explanation was give in the previous post which was 15 days back here, and answer was C, but nw it seems E..!!
Top
Post new topic Post Reply