Logical Reasoning

PT128 · S2 · Q2 Book collector: The demand for

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Book collector: The demand for out-of-print books is increasing.

Statements

The demand for out-of-print books is increasing.

causal (spurred)

The rise of the Internet, specifically the search capabilities that make it easier to locate out-of-print books caused the increasing demand for out-of-print books.

Evaluate

We have three claims: a change that has occurred, the catalyst for the change, and the specific aspect of the catalyst that is the causal difference-maker.

We could potentially assemble these three ideas into a Causal Chain

rise of ⇢ easier to locate ⇢ demand internet out-of-print books increasing

Goal

Usually when an Inference paragraph involves causal relationships, the correct answer is a safely worded restatement of that causal connection.

Maybe we'll see something like, .

Ultimately, though, our job is just to find the most provable answer. We want to be wary of language that's too strong, unknown comparisons, and out of scope ideas.

2.

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

  1. Book collectors are now using

    Too Strong: didn't know existed

    The paragraph is talking about out-of-print books that someone seeks. For example, I might be seeking an out-of-print version of Atlas Shrugged from the 1950s. It used to be harder to track those down. Now, with the Internet, it's easier to do so. We don't ever hear about people finding titles they didn't know even existed.

    2% picked this

  2. Fewer people try to find

    Unknown Comparison

    We don't have any information that allows us to count up how many people are trying to find books that are in-print vs. how many are trying to find books that are out of print. The fact that demand for out of print is surging doesn't mean it's overtaken demand for in-print books. We might say that the demand for left-handed scissors is increasing, which just means "more people want left-handed scissors this year than they did last year". We can't go from that sort of fact into a comparison like, "fewer people want right handed scissors than want left handed scissors".

    1% picked this

  3. Correct

    The amount of demand for

    Why this is right

    This actually matches our prediction pretty well. Since the stimulus presented a causal connection (X has been spurred by Y), the correct answer is synthesizing those claims. If we were told, "Pam is sleepy. This is because she spent all morning working on a crossword puzzle", then a correct answer might synthesize those and reinforce the causal connection by saying something like, "One's morning activity can influence how tired one feels". We know that the rise of the Internet, specifically its increased ease of finding out-of-print books, has spurred the increased demand for out-of-print books. And this answer is expressing that sort of causal connection.

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

    90% picked this

  4. The Internet's search capabilities make

    Too Strong: most

    All we know is that the Internet makes it easier to locate out-of-print books, but we can't get quantitatively specific and say that it's more than 50% of out-of-print books. For all we know, pre-Internet, we could locate about 10% of out-of-print books. Now, with the Internet, we can locate about 30% of out-of-print books. That conforms to the information (it's much easier to locate them now, 3 times easier in this example). But that doesn't conform to this answer, because it's still only possible to locate 30% of out-of-print books.

    7% picked this

  5. Only people who have access

    Too Strong: only

    All we know is that the Internet makes it easier to locate out-of-print books; we can't say that anyone without the Internet cannot locate out-of-print books. We know it's harder to locate them without the Internet. We were never told it's impossible to locate them without the Internet.

    0% picked this

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