If Slater wins the election,

Answer choices

1. A

   Unknown Trigger / Illegal Negation4% picked this

   If the polls are grossly inaccurate, someone more qualified than McGuinness will be appointed head

   We have a conditional (from the last sentence) that says, If the polls are not → Slater wins grossly inaccurate We don't anything about what happens if the polls are grossly inaccurate. This answer is trying to get students to think via an illegal negation. We know that "if polls are not grossly inaccurate, McGuinness will be appointed head", and this is baiting us into thinking "If the polls are grossly inaccurate, then McGuinness will not be appointed head".

   4%
2. B

   Unknown Trigger / Illegal Reversal15% picked this

   McGuinness will be appointed head of the planning commission only if the polls are a good indication of how

   "Only if" always indicates the necessary idea to the right of the arrow, so this answer is saying: McG appointed head → Polls good indication We have a conditional whose outcome is that McGuinness will be appointed head: Slater wins → McG appointed head But we don't have any conditional where McG being appointed head is the trigger. This answer is baiting us into an illegal reversal. We know: Polls good → Slater wins → McG appointed indication head And this answer is trying to backwards from the 3rd idea to the 1st idea.

   15%
3. C

   Too Strong: false choice5% picked this

   Either Slater will win the election or Yerxes will be appointed head of

   If Slater wins, then McG (not Yerxes) will be appointed head. What about it Slater doesn't win? We have no idea. They might still appoint McGuinness. They might appoint Bob. They might appoint Yerxes. We can't say. So there's no way to limit this down to two possible outcomes: Slater wins and McG is head vs. Slater loses and Yerxes is head

   5%
4. D

   Too Strong: and vs. or4% picked this

   McGuinness is not an architect and has not been on the planning commission for fifteen

   This answer would be good (especially on Most Supported) if it said, "McG is not an architect or he hasn't been on the planning commission for at least 15 years". If McGuinness were both an architect and a member of the planning commission for at least 15 years, then that would go against the idea that Yerxes is more qualified, since she is an architect who has been a member for 15 years. So we can infer that McGuinness does not have this equivalent resume. But McGuinness could still be one or the other. Maybe he's an architect, but he's only been on the planning commission for 2 years. That would still allow Yerxes to be more qualified. According to this answer, though, that's impossible. McGuinness cannot be an architect.

   4%
5. E

   Correct72% picked this

   If the polls are a good indication of how the election will turn out, someone less qualified than Yerxes will be appointed

   Why this is right

   We put together this conditional chain: Polls are not → Slater → McG app head grossly inaccurate wins of Planning C So we know that "if the polls are a good indication, then they are not grossly inaccurate, so Slater will win, and McG will be appointed head of Planning Commission". And since we were told that McG is less qualified than Yerxes, we can say that "someone less qualified that Yerxes will be appointed head of the Planning Commission".

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

   72%