Many economically useful raw materials

Answer choices

1. A

   No Impact4% picked this

   Some economically useful resources are

   The argument is about nonrenewable resources and what we accomplish using them (and whether we can still accomplish that stuff without them). Renewable resources would only be relevant to this conversation if we were told that we can use them to accomplish tasks we currently use nonrenewable resources for.

   4%
2. B

   No Impact3% picked this

   It is extremely difficult to get raw materials from

   It's totally irrelevant whether there are more materials beyond Earth and if so whether we could feasibly obtain them. The conditional conclusion tells us to pretend we're in the world where "we CANNOT get these nonrenewable resources elsewhere." It said, "If we can't get these nonrenewable resources elsewhere, then we won't be able to continue accomplishing the same tasks we currently can." With conditional conclusions, we always play along with the trigger. We essentially accept is as another premise, another given to workaround as we debate the outcome.

   3%
3. C

   Correct88% picked this

   Functionally equivalent renewable substitutes could be found for nonrenewable resources that are

   Why this is right

   If functionally equivalent renewable substitutes for nonrenewable resources could be found, then we would not need to obtain those resources from elsewhere to maintain current accomplishments. This directly weakens the argument by presenting an alternative scenario where tasks can be maintained despite the depletion of nonrenewable resources. The term "functionally equivalent" is allowing us to know that we can accomplish the same tasks. These renewables will "work the same way".

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

   88%
4. D

   No Impact1% picked this

   What is accomplished now using nonrenewable resources is sometimes not

   This is about what's worth doing, but the conclusion is about what we'd be able to do. Those are two different conversations.

   1%
5. E

   No Impact3% picked this

   It will be a few hundred years before the Earth is depleted of certain nonrenewable resources that

   The conclusion is not about when the depletion will happen but what the effect of that depletion will be. Suggesting it will take several hundred years doesn't affect the argument's prediction about the eventual inability to maintain current accomplishments without these nonrenewable resources or an alternative.

   3%