I bang my head on this one 100 times and left with no energy

[RonPurewal]

basically, you just have to use normal common sense here.

if something is "increasingly" happening and there's nothing to suggest a change, then what does common sense say? that's how you're supposed to read the options.

[thanghnvn]

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Although the discount stores in Goreville’s central shopping district are expected to close within five years as a result of competition from a SpendLess discount department store that just opened, those locations will not stay vacant for long. In the five years since the opening of Colson’s, a nondiscount department store, a new store has opened at the location of every store in the shopping district that closed because it could not compete with Colson’s.

Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument?

A. Many customers of Colson’s are expected to do less shopping there than they did before the SpendLess store opened.

B. Increasingly, the stores that have opened in the central shopping district since Colson’s opened have been discount stores.

C. At present, the central shopping district has as many stores operating in it as it ever had.

D. Over the course of the next five years, it is expected that Goreville’s population will grow at a faster rate than it has for the past several decades.

E. Many stores in the central shopping district sell types of merchandise that are not available at either SpendLess or Colson’s.

the key to the argument is the assumption that the previous trend will continue -- that is, that new stores will continue to replace the old ones, just as they did before.
specifically, when the previous store closures occurred, new stores took their place. the argument assumes that, should these new stores close within 5 years, still more new stores will take their place.

anything that casts doubt on this assumption - i.e., that makes it LESS likely that even more new stores will spring up to take the place of the old ones - will weaken the argument.

this is what (b) does.
if the new stores were discount stores, that's why they were able to compete with colson's. however, since spendless is a big discount store, even these discount stores won't be able to compete with it.

thank you Ron for great explanation of this problem

I see your approach here, criticizing, realizing the assumption and finaly going to an weakener.

but, in your lecture, thursday with Ron, you recommend that you should not prething an assumption for strengthen/weaken questions.

I am confused.

when do we criticize and prethink an assumption and when do we not do so for strengthen/weaken problems

I know that the criticizing skill is most important skill for cr section. can you explain more on the application of this skill? for which kinds of question, this skill is applied?

than you very much

[HemantR606]

I am still confused with this question even after reading the entire thread. Let me devide the argument and try to understand:

Argument:
Premise 1 - Discount stores in Goreville's shopping district are expected to close within 5 years as a result of competition from SpendLess, a discount store.
Premise 2 - Colson's opened in some time in the past and it led to closure of some shops. But all the shops were replaced by new shops within 5 years.
Conclusion - The locations closed because of SpendLess will not stay vacant for long.

Answer Choice B:
The stores that opened since Colson's opened are discount stores.

This answer choice can give information that the discount stores that opened in the central shopping district may close because of the competition from SpendLess. But this is already stated in the premise -
"Discount stores in Goreville's central shopping district are expected to close as a result of competition from SpendLess..."

But this answer choice is in no way affecting the Conclusion because it doesn't provide any information that exploits the idea that new stores will open in those vacant locations.


Please help me understand this.


Thanks in advance,
Hemant

[RonPurewal]

the argument is about the likelihood that new stores will open in those locations.

as you pointed out, the argument gives evidence that it's no longer viable to operate a discount store in this neighborhood.

choice B points out a trend: the new stores in this neighborhood are, largely, discount stores.
since it's no longer viable to operate such stores (as per the part you quoted), choice B means it's less likely in general that new stores will open in the neighborhood.

[RobertS114]

Greetings,
I am struggling with identifying the argument for this question. What are some clues in understanding what this argument is?

Thanks

[RonPurewal]

the most useful things you can do are the same as always -- pretend you're TALKING to an actual person about this stuff, and "translate" the passage into CONVERSATIONAL language / DIALOGUE accordingly.

if you can successfully transform the passage into a "conversation" in your head, you should be able to understand the main point pretty efficiently. (it's rare to hear a person delivering an argument -- even if it's a bad argument -- and not understand WHY the person is saying what she/he is saying, and/or what her/his ultimate point is.)