Logical Reasoning

PT118 · S1 · Q19 Columnist: Much of North America and

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Columnist: Much of North America and western Europe is more heavily forested and has less acid rain and better air quality now than five decades ago.

Conclusion

Maybe those people saying, we're not in imminent ecological doom, and if we're too stringent with environmental regulations, we might lose the revenue that pays for these preservation programs are correct.

Evidence

Much of North America and western Europe is better forested and has less acid rain now, compared to five decades ago.

Evaluate

This has a very loose argument structure, so I would assume we can treat it pretty conversationally. Just picture the age old debate about the environment.

the Left: by 2050 Earth will be unlivable if we don't immediately take drastic measures!

the Right: c'mon, you've been prophesying imminent doom forever and things aren't as bad as you thought. plus, if we take drastic measures, we'll mess up the economy, and the economy is what's currently able to pay for the environmental initiatives

The author is saying that the recent successes we're seeing (two continents have more forest and less acid rain than before) is support for the people on the Right.

Goal

Look for something that helps the Right — the environment is not on the brink of doom / the environmental victories we've achieved over the last five decades were paid for with natural resource wealth (i.e. oil money) / were we to restrict use of natural resources, it could lead to less funding for future environmental initiatives.

19.

Which one of the following, if true, most strengthens the columnist's reasoning?

  1. Correct

    Nations sustain their wealth largely

    Why this is right

    This sounds like something the Right could say, since it emphasizes how vital natural resource wealth is to a nation's capacity to pay for environmental initiatives. We know that restricting natural resources via environmental policies would lead to less extraction, so it would lead to less revenue for companies that deal in natural resource extraction / usage. But we don't know, from the argument, whether this is a significant share of the economy. Maybe we could reduce this revenue stream and still have plenty of public money to pay for future environmental initiatives. This answer is ruling out that objection and reassuring everybody that the wealth derived from natural resource usage is the biggest slice of a nation's revenue pie.

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

    66% picked this

  2. The more advanced the technology

    Unclear Impact: more advanced tech

    It doesn't make any inherent sense why the Right would start talking about more advanced technology. This argument is just talking about - raising revenue from use of natural resources vs. policies that would limit use - having enough money to pay for future environmental initiatives Neither one of those has any clear tie-in to "the more advanced a nation's industries are".

    6% picked this

  3. A majority of ecological disasters

    Too Weak

    Since this answer is saying, "Most of the scary stuff that occurs in nature is beyond human control, anyway", it would somewhat fit as something someone on the Right might say. "It's unwise to excessively restrict the use of natural resources (in the hope of the averting ecological disasters), since most ecological disasters are beyond human control." However, that's a very weak retort. Even if we can't prevent a majority of ecological disasters, that doesn't mean that we give up on trying to prevent the ones that are under human control. And we shouldn't love the feel of this answer since it isn't reinforcing language from the premise or the conclusion (other than "ecological doom" being a cousin of "ecological disasters").

    4% picked this

  4. If a compromise between the

    Weakens, if anything

    This answer would be saying, "If the Right had achieved more concessions from the Left when they enacted this environmental bill, then the environment wouldn't have gotten better as much." Someone on the Right wouldn't want to admit that.

    17% picked this

  5. The concern demonstrated by a

    Weakens, if anything

    The voices on the Right are saying that "excessive concern for natural ecosystems (restricted usage of resources) would lead to a decrease in the nation's wealth". This answer is saying "concern for natural ecosystems leads to an increase in the nation's wealth."

    8% picked this

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