Record of Poetry problem

This topic has expert replies
Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts
Posts: 96
Joined: Mon Mar 07, 2011 8:43 pm
Thanked: 1 times
Followed by:1 members

Record of Poetry problem

by yvonne0923 » Fri May 06, 2011 3:08 pm
A scholar discovered an unlabeled 19th century recording of somone reciting a poem, written by Walt Whitman. During the 19th century, recordings of poetry were not made for wide commerical sale. Rather, they were made either as rare private souvenirs of the voices of famous poets or else as publicity stunts, in which actors recorded poems that were familiar to the public. Since the whitman poem in the recording was never even published, it is likely that the voice in the recording is actually whitman's.

The argument proceeds by...

A. offering several pieces of evidence each of which independently points to the same conclusion
B. distinguising a phenomenon into two subtypes and then for a particular case eliminating one of those subtypes.
C. offering a gnereal principle and then demonstrating that the general principle is violated in a particular.
D. showing that two apparently mutually exclusive alternatives are actually compatible with one another.
E. explaining the historical context of an incident in order to demonstrate that each of the two possible scenarios involving that incident is as likely as the other.




































_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
[spoiler]O.A: B[/spoiler]

Can anyone explain how do I attack this problem? What this question ask for without looking at the answers?
Thanks,

Legendary Member
Posts: 1112
Joined: Sat Feb 26, 2011 11:16 am
Thanked: 77 times
Followed by:49 members

by atulmangal » Fri May 06, 2011 4:57 pm
IMO B though i find Op E also tempting

firstly author state that:

Recordings of poetry were not made for wide commerical sale.

Then he explain why someone records:

1) Rare private souvenirs of the voices of famous poets
2) as publicity stunts, in which actors recorded poems that were familiar to the public

Finally, author concludes that:

it is likely that the voice in the recording is actually whitman's.

To support this conclusion the extra premise given is:

Since the whitman poem in the recording was never even published

So here for this particular case the author is actually suggested that (2) point mentioned above didn't happened that why only first case is possibly happened....Op B is close to this but the doubt coming in my mind is the language Op B uses..."eliminating one of those types", i mean author is actually not eliminating while author is suggesting that type-2 didn't happened...there is a difference between something eliminated and something didn't happen...

What's the source and the OA ????

Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts
Posts: 96
Joined: Mon Mar 07, 2011 8:43 pm
Thanked: 1 times
Followed by:1 members

by yvonne0923 » Sat May 07, 2011 12:05 pm
atulmangal wrote:IMO B though i find Op E also tempting

firstly author state that:

Recordings of poetry were not made for wide commerical sale.

Then he explain why someone records:

1) Rare private souvenirs of the voices of famous poets
2) as publicity stunts, in which actors recorded poems that were familiar to the public

Finally, author concludes that:

it is likely that the voice in the recording is actually whitman's.

To support this conclusion the extra premise given is:

Since the whitman poem in the recording was never even published

So here for this particular case the author is actually suggested that (2) point mentioned above didn't happened that why only first case is possibly happened....Op B is close to this but the doubt coming in my mind is the language Op B uses..."eliminating one of those types", i mean author is actually not eliminating while author is suggesting that type-2 didn't happened...there is a difference between something eliminated and something didn't happen...

What's the source and the OA ????
O.A is B, and the source is Veritas Prep.

User avatar
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 135
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2011 12:01 pm
Thanked: 21 times
Followed by:3 members
GMAT Score:720

by sourabh33 » Sat May 07, 2011 3:32 pm
B
In my opinion the author is actually eliminating the second possibility.

The author concludes that since the poem in recording never got published (as a result of which the poem was publicly unavailable for actors to record) the probability of whitman recording the poem in his own voice could be very high. Earlier in the paragraph, he states that during 19th century people recorded mainly for two reasons out of which one is not possible.