Logical Reasoning

PT148 · S1 · Q15 Sanchez: The sixteen new computers

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Sanchez: The sixteen new computers that the school purchased were not as expensive as many people assume.

Sanchez's Claims

1. The 16 new computers that the school bought weren't as expensive as people assume.

2. It's not true that too much was spent on computers (i.e. an appropriate amount was spent)

Merriweather's Responses

1. No comment. She isn't trying to argue that the computers were as expensive as people assume. She deals only with whether they were more/less/comparable to what they were worth.

2. Disagree. It sounds like Merriweather is nudging towards the idea that . After all, even though they paid the right price for the computer they bought, they bought a computer that was needlessly elaborate (and thus needlessly pricey).

Goal

Since Merriweather disagrees with one of Sanchez's explicit claims, we can just head to the answers with that prephrase in mind. It's possible the correct answer will test one of Sanchez's assumptions, but let's not deal with that until we have to.

Let's look for .

15.

The dialogue provides the most support for the claim that Sanchez and Merriweather disagree over whether the school

  1. needed sixteen new computers

    Out of Scope: need

    We can't support the Agree position or the Disagree position for this answer, because neither person spoke to whether or not the school needed sixteen new computers.

    1% picked this

  2. purchased more computers than it

    Out of Scope: more computers

    We can't support the Agree position or the Disagree position for this answer, because neither person is talking about whether the school bought too many computers. They're arguing over whether the school spend too much money on new computers. The dispute is about the money spent, not about the quantity purchased.

    2% picked this

  3. Correct

    spent more in purchasing the

    Why this is right

    Sanchez pretty much states the Disagree position: it isn't true that too much was spent on computers. And Merrieweather supports the Agree position: it is true that too much was spent on computers. After all, the computers that were purchased were much more elaborate than they needed to be.

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

    88% picked this

  4. paid more for each computer

    Unsupported Agree Position

    We know that Merriweather supports the Disagree position, because she states that the school did not "pay more for each computer than it was worth". But we can't support the Agree position from Sanchez's statements. Nothing he says suggests that the school paid more for each computer than it was worth. If anything, he's insinuating that the school got a good price on the computers, because he says "they weren't as expensive as people assume".

    6% picked this

  5. has been harshly criticized for

    Out of Scope: harshly criticized

    We can't support Agree or Disagree with this, because neither person talked about whether or not the school had been harshly criticized.

    4% picked this

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