Almost all of the books published

Answer choices

1. A

   Correct49% picked this

   If a book was published in the past 150 years and is historically insignificant, it

   Why this is right

   This sounds like what we were thinking. If it was published in the past 150 years, it's probably on acidic paper (almost all of them are). Acidic paper will deteriorate completely eventually. If it's not historically significant, then it's ineligible for the de-acidification rescue plan, so it's probably screwed.

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

   49%
2. B

   Too Strong: almost all35% picked this

   Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years will

   We know that almost all these books are at risk of gradually destroying themselves, but we have a potential solution for some of them: deacidify. We're only doing that to historically significant ones, but let's say that 30% of them ... that would mean that around 70% of the books from the past 150 years will gradually destroy themselves, but 70% is no longer almost all. The fact that we don't know what proportion of these books are historically significant books, we're not sure how big a share of the "almost all" might be saved via de-acidification.

   35%
3. C

   Reversal5% picked this

   Almost all of the books that gradually deteriorate are made of

   We know that made of acidic paper ? gradually deteriorate This is trying to make that move backwards gradually deteriorate ? almost all acidic paper

   5%
4. D

   Opposite10% picked this

   If a book is of historical significance and was printed before 150 years ago, it

   The conditional rule in the last sentence allows us to say not historically ? won't be deacidified significant This answer is trying to illegally flip these ideas and say is historically ? will be deacidified significant

   10%
5. E

   Too Strong: all the same rate1% picked this

   Books published on acidic paper in 1900 should now all be at about the same

   Given that we heard about the possibility that books stored in a cool, dry environment would deteriorate at a slower rate, there's no way we could speculate that books made in 1900 would all be at the same level. How they were used and how they were stored would introduce a lot of variation into how deteriorated they are.

   1%