At the end of 1997

Answer choices

1. A

   Unknown Comparison20% picked this

   For any nation with oil reserves, it is more likely that the nation was mistaken in its statements about changes in its oil reserves

   The argument was only about the countries who claimed their oil reserves stayed the same. This answer requires ideas about countries who claimed their oil reserves went up or went down. We have no idea whether our author thinks that most of the other countries accurately reported changes to their oil reserves or whether many of those countries were mistaken. (f.e. maybe some countries said their oil reserves went up, when in reality they went down) Since the author never addressed whether other nations are accurate / inaccurate in their oil reserve reporting, we have no way to say she's assuming anything about them, specifically that the probability of being wrong about your reserves is higher than the probability of having unchanged reserves. We could fix this answer by saying, For any nation that claimed its oil reserves were unchanged, it is more likely that the nation was mistaken than that their oil reserves remained unchanged. But this "fixed" version would essentially just be a rephrasing of the conclusion, not an assumption that got our author there.

   20%
2. B

   Correct53% picked this

   It is likely that in 1997, in most of the nations that stated that their oil reserves were unchanged, old oil fields were drained

   Why this is right

   Our author's conclusion is "they're probably wrong", which translates into "their oil reserves probably changed". How do oil reserves change? Either an old field is drained, a new one is discovered, or both. So the author is assuming that in these nations that are wrong about their supposedly unchanged reserves, either an old field was drained, a new one was discovered, or both.

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

   53%
3. C

   Too Specific8% picked this

   During the course of 1997, the oil reserves of at least one nation not only gradually dropped

   Gradual drops occur when old fields are drained, and sudden rises occur when new fields are discovered. So this answer is essentially saying, "in at least one country, they drained an old field and discovered a new one". Even though that seems like a very plausible speculation, it's not necessary for the author's logic. If we negated this and got, "No nation had both a drain and a discovery in 1997", the author could still make her argument: Sure, none of them had both. But none of them had neither. They all either drained a field or discovered a field, so everybody's reserves changed.

   8%
4. D

   If "Conclusion"13% picked this

   If a nation incorrectly stated at the end of 1997 that its oil reserves had not changed since the end of 1996, then during

   With conditional answers, we want to think about how they look and consider whether they match a "If this is true, then that is true" move that the author made. Did the author go from "we know that they incorrectly stated unchanged" to concluding "thus, they must have had a drain and a discovery"? No. This answer actually has the always-wrong format of "If conclusion". Since the conclusion is "these nations probably incorrectly stated their reserves were unchanged", we would never want an answer that looks like, IF they incorrectly stated their reserves were unchanged ....

   13%
5. E

   Out of Scope: obligated6% picked this

   If a nation's oil reserves change from one year to the next, then that nation is obligated to

   This answer also starts off "If [conclusion], ..." in a disguised way. The author's conclusion is, "The nations saying unchanged are wrong", which means her conclusion is "these nations' oil reserves did change". More easy to spot as a dealbreaker would be the brand new concept of obligated to report the change correctly. This argument is only discussing whether nations are / aren't reporting change correctly (descriptive), not whether nations are obligated / not obligated to do so (normative).

   6%