Logical Reasoning

PT159 · S3 · Q17 Manufacturer: If our biggest competitor were to go out of business

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Manufacturer: If our biggest competitor were to go out of business, some of the specialized suppliers that we both use would be bankrupted.

Conclusion

In order for the manufacturer to stay in business, its biggest competitor must stay in business.

stay in ----------------------------→ biggest competitor business stays in business

Evidence

If the biggest competitor went out of business, some specialized suppliers shared by both companies would be bankrupted.

biggest competitor -------------------→ some spec supp not stay in business shared go bankrupt

Evaluate

When we compare our conclusion to our evidence, the overlapping term about the biggest competitor isn't lined up, so we need to either contrapose our evidence or our conclusion (doesn't matter).

If we contrapose the conclusion, we're trying to prove: biggest comp ---------------------------------→ we not stay out of business in business

What the evidence provided was biggest comp ----→ some shared SS out of business go bankrupt

So the missing piece we need to create the logic path in the conclusion is, some shared SS --→ we not stay go bankrupt in business

Those two pieces would combine to give us .

Goal

Our answer should be saying, ,

or its contrapositive, .

17.

The conclusion drawn above follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?

  1. The manufacturer's specialized suppliers will

    Too Strong

    This would trigger the contrapositive of the first sentence and allow to logically conclude that "our biggest competitors will not go out of business". But it doesn't help us conclude anything about "what we need in order for us to stay in business". "In order for us to stay in business" is a New Concept in the Conclusion; it never appears in the evidence, so it definitely needs to be in the correct answer or else we'd never be able to combine answer + evidence and logically derive a conclusion about it.

    2% picked this

  2. The manufacturer will stay in

    Reversal / Negation

    This is just an illegal reversal of the conclusion. CONC: we stay in business → biggest comp stays in biz (A) biggest comp stays in biz → we stay in business We wouldn't ever expect a correct answer to look like the rewording of an individual claim. We expect it to connect some language from one claim to some language from another claim.

    12% picked this

  3. If the manufacturer goes out

    Reversal / Negation

    This is just an illegal negation of the conclusion. CONC: we stay in business → biggest comp stays in biz (C) we not stay in business → biggest comp not stay in biz We wouldn't ever expect a correct answer to look like the rewording of an individual claim. We expect it to connect some language from one claim to some language from another claim.

    2% picked this

  4. The manufacturer will stay in

    Reversal / Negation

    This is an illegal negation of what we wanted. We wanted if spec supplies go bankrupt → we go out of business This says if spec suppliers not go bankrupt → we stay in business Our premise (contraposed) says if spec supplies not go bankrupt → biggest comp stay in biz This answer and the premise would have the same trigger. They can't interact. They can't chain together. They don't go anywhere by combining them. If we have A → B and A → C we can't derive B → C

    26% picked this

  5. Correct

    The manufacturer will stay in

    Why this is right

    This says (by contrapositive), spec supp go bankrupt → we not stay in business The premise said biggest comp not stay in biz → spec supp go bankrupt We can connect this answer to that premise to derive this chain: biggest comp → spec supp → we not stay not stay in biz go bankrupt in business We can logically derive that biggest comp ----------------→ we not stay not stay in biz in business Or, by contrapositive, "For us to stay in business, it's required that our biggest competitor stay in business"

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

    57% picked this

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