Logical Reasoning

PT127 · S2 · Q24 Over 40,000 lead seals

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Over 40,000 lead seals from the early Byzantine Empire remain today.

Conclusion (thus)

The number of documents sealed with a lead seal was many times the number of remaining lead seals.

Evidence

There are about 40,000 lead seals that remain.

Most lead seals would serve their purpose when the document was opened, and once they had served their purpose, most lead lead seals would be recast (i.e. recycled so that they could be used again).

Evaluate

This is a tough conclusion to disagree with. It's just saying that, .

Let's just say "3 times as many" to make this more concrete. That means that the author is claiming that if we've found 40,000 remaining lead seals, then there must have been at least 120,000 documents sealed with lead seals.

Why?

Because the author is assuming that lead seals got reused, because it cost money to make each one. She is thinking that they would make a lead seal, attach it to a document, that document would be opened (and thus the seal had served its purpose), and then the seal would be recast to be used again.

If we were trying to fight the conclusion, we'd either have to say that a ton of these 40,000 lead seals that remain were never attached to a document, or we'd have to say that they were attached to a document but weren't recycled multiple times and used on several documents.

Goal

Since we want to strengthen, we want to counter those possible objections. We want to be more convinced that the remaining seals WERE attached to documents; the seals attached to documents WERE recycled multiple times.

24.

Which one of the following statements, if true, most strengthens the argument?

  1. Correct

    Most of the lead seals

    Why this is right

    This actually helps us with both of our goals. It gives us more reason to think that any seals that were produced were probably attached to documents, and it gives us more reason to think that seals attached to documents got recycled. There are a pair of MOST statements in the evidence that are easy to miss "If opened, then probably served purpose" "If served purpose, then probably recast" Neither one of those were actually triggered by any facts in the evidence. We were never told that any of these documents were opened, so we don't know what proportion of seals ever "served their purpose and then got recast". This answer doesn't mathematically guarantee the conclusion (that the number of docs is many times the number of remaining seals), but it definitely moves us in that direction. It sounds like most seals got recycled at least once.

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

    57% picked this

  2. Most of the lead seals

    Unclear Impact

    That the documents have since been destroyed doesn't tell us whether the seals attached to them were also destroyed or whether that document was ever opened. It's possible that there were 40,000 documents with seals. Most of those documents have since been destroyed, but we saved all the lead seals.

    17% picked this

  3. The amount of lead available

    Weaken

    This makes it less likely that there was a need to recast the lead since an abundance of lead would make it worth less, thereby reducing the incentive to recast it once it had served its purpose.

    9% picked this

  4. During the time of the

    Too Weak

    This range includes a number of documents [5] that would support the argument and a number of documents [40,000] that would undermine the argument.

    13% picked this

  5. During the time of the

    Opposite (if anything)

    We want to know that the number of documents that had seals on them was well above 120,000 documents. The fact that this answer puts an upper limit on how many documents had seals would, if anything, undermine our author's argument. It would be more helpful for us to hear that "during this empire, there were more than 40,000 seals affixed to documents at any given time", since we're trying to argue that at least 120,000 documents used lead seals.

    5% picked this

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