Logical Reasoning

PT9 · S4 · Q17 G: The group of works

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G: The group of works exhibited in this year’s Metropolitan Art Show reveals a bias in favor of photographers.

Conclusion

There is a bias in favor of photographers in this year's Metropolitan Art Show.

Evidence

Equal numbers of photographers, sculptors, and painters submitted works that met the traditional criteria for the show.

Yet, more photographs were exhibited than either sculptures or paintings.

Each artist was allowed to submit work in one medium only.

Evaluate

Our author is presenting an asymmetric comparison in the evidence and concluding a potential explanation for that curious fact.

CURIOUS FACT How come more photos were exhibited than sculptures or paintings?

EXPLANATION The people deciding on which artists would be exhibited were biased to liking photographers more than sculptors or painters.

Goal

We can strengthen this by ruling out an alternate explanation for the curious fact (maybe there just a ton more submissions in the photography category) or by making it more plausible that the selection committee had a preference for photography.

17.

Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports G’s allegation of bias?

  1. If an artist has had

    No Impact

    This answer discusses how having exhibited works at the show provides a future advantage for artists. However, it has nothing to do with solving the causal mystery of why more photographs were exhibited this year.

    2% picked this

  2. Correct

    The fee for entering photographs

    Why this is right

    If the fee for entering photographs was only $25 compared to $75 for other media, more photographers might have been economically incentivized to submit their work. This financial disparity could lead to a predisposition toward having more photographs exhibited, indicating biased favoring toward photographers. This is a weird answer because in a sense it sounds like an alternate explanation for the lopsided exhibition numbers (there weren't more photography exhibits because they're biased in favor of photography, but just because there were more submissions in that category). However, if the reason there are more submissions is because the entry fee was 1/3 as expensive, then that DOES still seem like a bias in favor of photography.

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

    66% picked this

  3. The committee that selected from

    Opposite Impact

    The equal representation of the selection committee would actually undermine the idea of bias.

    3% picked this

  4. Reviews of this year’s Metropolitan

    No Impact

    While media reviews may focus more on photographs, this relates to attention post-exhibition, not a cause or evidence of bias in the exhibition process itself. It doesn't demonstrate how bias affected the selection of works to be exhibited. Maybe someone would try to argue, "it shows that OTHER people are also biased towards photography, which supports the plausibility of the author's story". But the paper might just be giving more coverage to photographs because there were more photographs in the show!

    19% picked this

  5. In previous years, it has

    Opposite Impact

    This makes it seem like there's no real bias at play; there's just some variance that equals out in the long run. Sometimes paintings are most common, sometimes sculptures, sometimes photos. This just happened to be a photo year.

    11% picked this

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