Compared to us, people who

Answer choices

1. A

   Small Impact: many2% picked this

   Many of the books published a century ago were of low

   If we said that all or almost all of the books published a century ago were very unenjoyable to read, then that would help us make the case that people from back then didn't do much reading. But this answer is too weak. "Many" is an unspecific quantity that means "at least a handful". So saying, "There were at least 5-10 books a century ago that were of low literary quality" doesn't have much impact. We know, naturally, that there are at least 5-10 books nowadays that have low literary quality. So we're not saying much.

   2%
2. B

   Correct79% picked this

   On average, people who lived a century ago had considerably less leisure time than

   Why this is right

   This points to another difference between then and now, and this difference helps us argue that people back then would do less reading than people nowadays. Sure they had fewer options for amusement, but they also had considerably less leisure time. If you're plowing the fields or working the factory floor for 15 hours a day, then you might only have 30 minutes to read at night, and so you're not really reading more than people nowadays. "Considerably less" has some punch, which is what we want on Strengthen / Weaken / Paradox. This answer by no means proves they did less reading back then, but that's not the job of a correct answer. It weakens by introducing a new factor that works against the author's conclusion. The more leisure time people have, the more they could potentially read for pleasure. The less leisure time people have, the less they can read. By introducing a distinction between then and now that makes it sound like "nowadays, we have much more leisure time", it makes it harder to argue that people back then read much more than we do today.

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

   79%
3. C

   Unclear Impact13% picked this

   The number of books sold today is larger than it was

   On its face, the idea that more books are sold today definitely sounds like it could help us argue that people nowadays read just as much or more than did people 100 years ago. But it's hard to know if "books sold" is a great metric of how much people read. 100 years ago there wouldn't have been nearly as many publishing houses or digital printers. It's way easier to produce and sell books nowadays. The population has also grown a lot since 100 years ago. A more persuasive metric would be "the average number books owned by each person is larger today than it was a century ago". With this answer, the author can say, "Sure there are more books sold, but that's because it's easy to print a book and there are just more people alive. Just because the book is sold, though, doesn't mean that people read it. After all, they have many more diversions to amuse themselves." The author doesn't think that people today don't read because we don't have access to lots of books, but rather because we do have access to lots of leisure activities that aren't reading-books.

   13%
4. D

   Weak Impact: slightly less2% picked this

   On the average, books today cost slightly less in relation to other goods than they

   If 100 years ago, books cost slightly more in relation to other goods than books cost nowadays, that somewhat helps us weaken the idea that people back then read more. We can try to argue that people back then would have been less likely to buy a book because books were slightly more expensive than they are today. But the author can quickly counter with, "Yes, but people 100 years ago had very few other options for entertainment, so that outweighs the fact that books cost slightly more than they do today, relative to other goods".

   2%
5. E

   No Impact5% picked this

   One of the popular diversions of a century ago was

   We know that book-reading wasn't the only diversion available to people 100 years ago. The salient fact is that there were very few diversions. This answer just names one of the other ones that existed, but that has no impact on the conversation.

   5%