Logical Reasoning

PT111 · S3 · Q23 Anna’s reply is structured to lead

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Tony: A new kind of videocassette has just been developed.

Tony's Conclusion

Video rental stores would find it way more economical to use the new kind of videocassette.

Tony's Evidence

The new one only lasts for half as many viewings, but it costs 1/3 as much.

Anna's Response

Yes but the videocassette itself is only 5% of the store's cost per copy. 95% of the price is royalties paid to the studio that produced the movie. And you'd have to pay royalties on each new copy.

Evaluate

Anna's implied conclusion seems to be the opposite of Tony's explicit conclusion. He thought that stores would save money by using the new type of cassette. They wear out faster (1/2 as long), but they cost less (1/3 the cost).

Maybe the old style lasts 6 months, whereas these new ones only last 3 months. But the old ones cost $9 and these cost $3.

You could spent $9 for one old style tape that would last 6 months. Or you could spend $3 on a new tape. It would only last 3 months, so then you'd need to buy another to get to the same 6 month mark, but you would have spent $6 vs. $9.

Anna is pointing out that you'd end up spending more on the new tapes, because you have to pay a royalty fee on every copy. Let's pretend the royalty fee is $20 (it's actually way more / it's 19 times the cost of the tape, because 95% vs. 5% is a 19:1 ratio).

6 months using Old tape: $9 for one tape + $20 royalty = $29

6 months using New tapes: $6 for two tapes + $20 royalty = $46 ($3 each) (for each tape)

Goal

Let's look for something like, .

23.

Anna's reply is structured to lead to which one of the following conclusions?

  1. The royalties paid to movie

    Unsupported: Excessively Large

    Anna doesn't offer any premises to suggest that the royalty fee is excessively high. She is only saying that royalties are way bigger than the cost of the cassette in order to make her fiscal point that switching to the new tape wouldn't save money.

    4% picked this

  2. Video rental stores should always

    Too Strong

    Too Strong: Always / Highest Out of Scope: More Important / Should Anna isn't speaking to highest-quality available. She's just comparing the cost of the currently-used type of cassette to the cost of these new ones. We don't know if the currently used type is the highest-quality. She's also not saying we should use the old type because "durability is more important than price". She's suggesting we should use the old types because "the price is lower!"

    2% picked this

  3. The largest part of the

    Inference, Not Main Conclusion

    We can infer that this is true from Anna's first sentence, but this answer's idea is really just a premise to support her main conclusion, which is, "Tony -- you're wrong. Switching to the new cassette wouldn't save money overall."

    19% picked this

  4. Correct

    The cost savings to video

    Why this is right

    This is a pretty weak version of what the correct answer could have sounded like, but it's still the best available answer in terms of saying, "Tony, you're wrong --- switching to the new cassette would not save money." She is supporting this rebuttal by explaining that the savings you'd get by switching would be small or nonexistent since most of the cost of a copy of a movie is a royalty paid to the studio, and since the new tapes wear out in half the time, you'd be paying that royalty more frequently.

    Skill tested: Must be True · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

    72% picked this

  5. If the price a video

    Out of Scope: Rental Fee

    Neither Anna nor Tony speak about the rental fee changing at all, so it doesn't seem like her conclusion is structured to lead to any claim about the rental fee.

    4% picked this

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