Logical reasoning PrepTest 102 · Section 3 · Question 21

Flawed

Strengthen Questions

Medieval Arab translators translated available Greek texts when there was demand Arab poets interested in Aristotle → Wanted to read Homer Homer wasn’t translated into Arabic in medieval times Therefore - Arab poets weren’t interested in Aristotle

Our default when approaching a Strengthen question is to look for a Correlation/Causation flaw, as it’s the most common flaw in the question type. Here, however, we don’t have a causal conclusion, so we need to look elsewhere for the flaw. So let’s dig into the conclusion and see what part of it isn’t supported, then find an answer that supports it! Here, the conclusion is that Medieval Arab poets weren’t interested in Aristotle. Why is that believed? Because if they were, then they would have wanted to read Homer, but Homer wasn’t translated into Arabic until modern times. We also know that Medieval Arabs had access to many Greek texts, and they were translated as demand for them was present. So, in other words, available texts by Homer would have been translated if there was demand for them. Since there were no translations of Homeric texts until modern times, then there must not have been demand for them. However, there’s a key term in there - “available.” The stimulus notes that “many” ancient Greek texts were available, but not all of them. It’s possible that there was demand for Homer’s works, but none were available to be translated. If they were available, though, then their lack of translation means that there wasn’t an interest in reading them, and thus the poets who would have been interested if they were interested in Aristotle must then not have had that interest. So let’s find an answer establishing the availability of Homeric texts in the Medieval Arab world.