Logical reasoning PrepTest 104 · Section 4 · Question 11

Question prompt

P: Complying with the Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: D

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Argument or Facts

Argument/Argument

Valid or Flawed

Flawed/Flawed

Question Type

Point at Issue Questions

Stimulus Summary

P: The new regulations wouldn’t have prevented the lab fire, so they’re useless.
Q: The new regulations will prevent some accidents, and all accidents are costly. Regulations that prevent waste are useful (so the new regs are useful).

Answer Anticipation

P and Q here are both talking about new safety regulations, and whether or not they’re useful.
P believes that they’re useless because they wouldn’t have prevented a specific fire. This rests on the idea that the safety regulations need to prevent all accidents and address all potential dangers/causes to be useful.
Q, on the other hand, believes that regulations are useful if they prevent costly waste - so preventing any accident would make a regulation useful. Since the new safety regs would prevent some accidents, Q must believe that they are useful.
So the two disagree over what makes a regulation useful (preventing all vs. preventing some accidents), and whether the current regs are useful. Let’s find either of those as an answer.

Answer choices

  1. A
    last year's fire resulted Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    Q says that any accident is costly, so she’d agree with this answer. P doesn’t discuss cost, but he definitely believes that the fire did damage, so this is a point of agreement, if anything.

  2. B
    accidents at the laboratory Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    P discusses only a single accident, so he’s not committed to this statement about all accidents. Q says that there are accidents where no one is injured, so she disagrees with this answer.

  3. C
    the new safety regulations Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    P doesn’t believe that the new regulations address those causes. Q doesn’t speak to whether the new regs would have prevented last year’s fire - just that they would prevent some accidents. Since this answer is out of scope of Q’s argument, it can’t be a point at issue between the two.

  4. D
    it is useful to Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem
    P opens by saying that complying with the new regs is useless, so he disagrees with this answer. Q believes that any reg that can save money is useful, and the new regs will prevent some costly accidents, so she’s committed to believing that they are useful. This answer is thus a point at issue between them.

  5. E
    the new safety regulations Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    Neither speaker discusses whether people actually will comply with the regulations, so this answer is out of scope.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 7%
  2. B 3%
  3. C 3%
  4. D Credited 87%
  5. E 0%

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