Logical Reasoning

PT115 · S2 · Q22 The relaxation of regulations governing

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The relaxation of regulations governing the manufacture and sale of new medicines to increase their availability should not be accompanied by a lifting of all regulations that restrict industrial activity generally.

Conclusion (should)

As we relax the regulations on making/selling new meds (to increase their availability), we should not simultaneously deregulate all industrial activity, in general.

Intermediate Conclusion

Deregulating in general could actually undermine the original intent of relaxing regulations on making/selling new meds (increasing their availability).

Evidence (since)

A large majority of new meds are derived from plants and animals, and if we got rid of our strict environmental regulations, endangered plants and animals would become extinct.

Evaluate

Whenever we're reading Main Conclusion or Role, we're priming our brain with the reminder that the Main Conclusion is usually earlier in the paragraph than are its Supporting Ideas.

We want to always read the first sentence of Main Conclusion/Role with the suspicion that it may be the Main Conclusion. If it sounds like an opinion belonging to our author, and our author goes on to try supporting it, then we correctly "hear" the conclusion from the start.

In this case, the "should" told us that yes, indeed, the first sentence was the author's opinion and therefore most likely the Main Conclusion.

The "since" in the final sentence tells us that the first half of that sentence is supporting a Conclusion in the second half. But the second half of that last sentence is still Support for our first sentence.

Goal

They're asking us about the "since" claim, so from our four main buckets (Main Conclusion, Support, Opposing, Neutral), we know to choose Support.

Any claim attached to FABS (for, after all, because, since) will be playing a Support role.

But if we wanted to get more technical with our prediction, this "since" claim is supporting the Intermediate Conclusion (the final claim of the paragraph), which supports the Main Conclusion in the first sentence.

22.

The statement that a large majority of new medicines are derived from plants and animals plays which one of the following roles in the argument?

  1. a reason for not restricting

    Wrong Conclusion

    "A reason for" correctly aligns with our desire for Support. But this claim is a reason for not loosening industrial activity generally. It's a reason against "a general deregulatory approach".

    4% picked this

  2. evidence for a point of

    Wrong Role

    This is saying that our claim is Opposing our author, whereas we wanted Supporting our author. This answer is saying, "It's support for the Opposing view (the view the author is trying to undermine)." If it's supporting the author's opponent, then it's opposing the author (or at least that's reason enough to consider it a mismatch).

    13% picked this

  3. an illustration of the potential

    Too Strong

    Too Strong: potential disaster Not an Illustration Out of Scope: continued overregulation First of all, the author is never speaking in apocalyptic terms like "potential disaster". The author is giving advice. "We should deregulate drug production but not other stuff, because deregulating other stuff would interfere with the whole point of deregulating drug production." Secondly, an illustration of the potential disaster that could result from continued overregulation would be an example of a disaster .... In Chile, they overregulated corn production and it led to famine Finally, the author does not think industrial activity is overregulated. She is actually arguing against deregulating industry (other than drug manufacturing).

    4% picked this

  4. Correct

    a link between the extinction

    Why this is right

    This sort of expresses how the two premises combine to give us our Intermediate Conclusion. Since deregulation in general would involve getting rid of strict environmental regulations, plants and animals (many of which are the basis for most new medications) would go extinct. Thus, deregulation in general could result in missing out on developing new meds based on those now-extinct animals and plants.

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

    69% picked this

  5. support for the hypothesis that

    Bad Conclusion Match

    There isn't any conclusion saying "only very narrowly focused efforts at deregulating industry have beneficial results". The author has two conclusions being supported: - deregulating medicine (in order to increase the availability of new meds) should not be accompanied by broader deregulation because ... - deregulating broadly can undermine the goal of deregulating drug production for the sake of making more new meds available.

    11% picked this

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