Flaw question

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Flaw question

by akash singhal » Thu Oct 22, 2015 11:07 pm
Tony: I play the Big Bucks lottery. Every week, five winning numbers are drawn, and all the players who have picked those numbers share the jackpot. It's best to play only after there have been a few weeks with no winners, because the jackpot increases each week that there is no winner.

Baggs: No, you're more likely to win the lottery when the jackpot is small, because that's when the fewest people are playing.

Which one of the following most accurately describes a mistake in the reasoning of one of the two players?

(A) Tony holds that the chances of winning are unaffected by the number of times a person plays.
(B) Baggs holds that the chances of Tony's winning are affected by the number of other people playing.
(C) Tony holds that the chances of anyone's winning are unaffected by the size of the jackpot.
(D) Baggs holds that the chances of Tony's winning in a given week are unaffected by whether anyone has won the week before.
(E) Tony holds that the chances of there being a winner go up if no one has won the lottery for quite a while.

Source: Veritas Prep

OA: B

Why not E because Their is a flaw in 'Tony's hold that chance of being a winner go up if no one has won a lottery for quite a while'. The flaw is that the chance of anyone winning a lotto is equal every time a draw is made.So number of no wins should not impact on the person's chance of winning.
Please explain the reasoning and point out my fault in reasoning...
Source: — Critical Reasoning |

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by MartyMurray » Fri Oct 23, 2015 7:21 am
akash singhal wrote:OA: B

Why not E because Their is a flaw in 'Tony's hold that chance of being a winner go up if no one has won a lottery for quite a while'. The flaw is that the chance of anyone winning a lotto is equal every time a draw is made.So number of no wins should not impact on the person's chance of winning.
Please explain the reasoning and point out my fault in reasoning...
First of all, there is a flaw in the question itself which does not include an explanation of how the lottery works.

That having been said, usually lotteries work by using a given set of numbers from which winning numbers are drawn. So the odds of winning by picking a certain number remain the same, because the odds of that number being picked from the set of numbers remain the same no matter how many people have entered the lottery.

Regarding your reasoning, you mixed topics.

Tony said that it is better to play after there have been a few weeks with no winners, because the jackpot increases.

Answer choice E say that Tony holds that the chances of winning increase.

Choice E is therefore not accurate, because what choice E is discussing does not match what Tony said.

In order to get CR questions right you need to notice exactly what is going on; otherwise you will likely fall prey to trick answers designed to seem related to what is going when actually they are not.
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