Question #1561

Vague Numerical Indicator(s)

Started by JosephH · started 2024-07-17 19:09 · last activity 2024-07-23 13:10 · 1 reply

I could tell from the sentence "Overall, however, most mail arrives three business days or more after being sent" that most of the mail wasn't correctly addressed. I was looking for something an answer choice that said this, but I figured that answer choice B was a trap because it was phrased sort of vaguely, and we have been told elsewhere to avoid answer choices where the numerical indicator was vague. I am talking specifically about the word "large," because it doesn't tell you what it is large in contrast to, or what threshold constitutes large. From here on should I assume that if an answer choice says "a large proportion" it actually means "most" or "a majority of" ?

Replies

  1. Emil-Kunkin · 2024-07-23 13:10

    I don't know if we should avoid vague numerical indicators, if they are proved by the passage. But is just saying that something is quite common, which is indeed what the passage says. The issue with vagueness is that it's hard to prove, there's nothing inherently wrong with it as long as the passage proves it. The passage also doesn't strictly show that most mail is incorrectly addressed. It's possible that 51 percent of mail arrives late, of which 90 percent is incorrectly addressed and 10 percent is correct. This would mean that slightly under half of all mail was incorrectly addressed.

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