Logical Reasoning

PT122 · S2 · Q20 Environmentalist: Discarding old appliances

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Environmentalist: Discarding old appliances can be dangerous: refrigerators contain chlorofluorocarbons; electronic circuit boards and cathode-ray tubes often contain heavy metals like lead; and old fluorescent bulbs contain mercury, another heavy metal.

Statements

Causal (doing X can be dangerous) Discarding old appliances can be dangerous, because they contain stuff like CFCs, lead, mercury.

Conditional (when) landfill operated → that stuff poses no threat properly

Pivot (however) Conditional (when) landfill not operated → lead / mercury properly contaminate groundwater

trash is incinerated → heavy metals poison ash and escape into air

Evaluate

Our job on Most Supported is to look for claims that can be combined.

When we see conditionals, we ask whether we can chain them together or apply them to a specific fact. But these two conditionals don't chain, and there's no specific fact to apply them to.

When we see causal claims, we ask whether we can chain them together, but these causal claims don't chain. It's not like we're hearing .

And when we see a Pivot, we ask ourselves whether there is some tension created that we could potentially explain (like on a Paradox question) or reconcile (by safely stating that both can be true).

But none of these typical games seem at play here.

It seems more like we have a potential Problem (discarding old appliances) and we're talking about different ways people handle that. From all we've heard, a properly operated landfill sounds like the way to go.

Improperly operated landfills can leads to groundwater contamination.

Incinerating the appliances can lead to poisonous ash.

Goal

With no clear guess in mind, let's just look for the most supportable claim, being wary as always of stuff that sounds too strong or that brings in concepts we didn't discuss.

20.

The environmentalist's statements, if true, most strongly support which one of the following inferences?

  1. Old fluorescent bulbs should be

    Out of Scope: recycled

    The concept of "recycling" old fluorescent bulbs was never discussed. It's hard to support the idea that we should do that, when we don't even know if it's an option. Furthermore, we have reason to think that we have a viable way to deal with old fluorescent bulbs if we put them in a properly operated landfill, where the mercury in them poses no threat.

    1% picked this

  2. Correct

    Appliances containing heavy metals should

    Why this is right

    This ends up being our most supportable answer, even though it's surprisingly adrift from language offered in the stimulus. The idea of "should" was never discussed. But it's pretty common sense to think that "we should not do things that result in bad things". We're told that incinerating appliances with heavy metals would cause heavy metals to escape into the air. We know we don't want to breathe in lead and mercury, so if incinerating an appliance would lead to that, then it's pretty reasonable to say, "We should not do that". It's easier to support that we shouldn't do this thing the paragraph told us had bad consequences than it is to support (A) which is saying we should do something we weren't told anything about.

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

    80% picked this

  3. Chlorofluorocarbons are harmful to the

    Out of Scope: atmosphere

    This is a mean outside knowledge trap. Yes, CFC's are really harmful to the atmosphere. Some of us may have even read the RC passage about the way they destroy the ozone layer. But there's no support within this paragraph of the idea that CFC's are harmful to the atmosphere.

    11% picked this

  4. Newer appliances are more dangerous

    Out of Scope

    Out of Scope: newer appliances Opposite, if anything The passage only addresses older appliances and does so in order to tell us about the dangers they pose. So not only have we heard nothing about newer appliances, but the information we have so far sounds like older appliances are scary.

    0% picked this

  5. Appliances should be kept out

    Too Strong: no appliances in landfills

    This sort of goes starkly against the 2nd sentence, which tells us that when landfills are operated properly, the materials found in appliances pose no threat.

    8% picked this

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