In parts of South America

[jlucero]

I have two questions

Aren't options A and D contradicting each other?

A. There are other vegetables currently grown in the region that contain more beta-carotene than the currently cultivated varieties of sweet potato do.

D. There are no other varieties of sweet potato that are significantly richer in beta-carotene than SPK004 is.


Is it because option A mentions vegetables whereas option D is restricted to potatoes only?

Yes, even if this are no other sweet potatoes with more beta-carotene than SPK004, there could be plenty of other vegetables in the area that do.

That said, it wouldn't matter if the answers did contradict each other. The prompts for these types of questions usually say "which of the following, if true, would..." Which means that the answer choices don't all have to be true at the same time.

Secondly I think option D just rephrases the information already present in the stem

"the varieties currently grown contain little beta-carotene."

In strengthen questions can we reject an option if it just rephrases the information already provided in the prompt?

Be careful here- answer choices to S/W questions will not restate previous information. If you think they do, look for subtle shifts in language:

Argument: The varieties currently grown contain little beta-carotene.

Answer Choice D: There are no other varieties of sweet potato that are significantly richer in beta-carotene than SPK004 is.

Notice that the argument is only referring to the varieties currently grown in this one area while (D) is saying that SPK004 is the most beta-carotene rich sweet potato anywhere.

[shashank.nitp]

@manhattan instructor...
I got your point about option D that
" on the other hand, is irrelevant. the argument is concerned only with showing that the plan will succeed, NOT with showing that the plan is optimal or better than other plans"

but in my view as per option D, if it is true that there are no other sweet potatoes other than SPK004, which are richer in betacarotene, our plan will work successfully. Since, SPK004 remains the only potato which is richest is BCarotene and will solve the problem of Vitamin A deficiency.

While option E, brings to picture some other nutrients which is not there in the argument.
I was keeping in my mind the point that the only thing which needs to be tackled in the deficiency of Bcarotene and not any other nutrient which Options C says about.

Request you to explain.

[jlucero]

@manhattan instructor...
I got your point about option D that
" on the other hand, is irrelevant. the argument is concerned only with showing that the plan will succeed, NOT with showing that the plan is optimal or better than other plans"

but in my view as per option D, if it is true that there are no other sweet potatoes other than SPK004, which are richer in betacarotene, our plan will work successfully. Since, SPK004 remains the only potato which is richest is BCarotene and will solve the problem of Vitamin A deficiency.

While option E, brings to picture some other nutrients which is not there in the argument.
I was keeping in my mind the point that the only thing which needs to be tackled in the deficiency of Bcarotene and not any other nutrient which Options C says about.

Request you to explain.

In regards to (E), it is not bringing "other nutrients" into the argument. The conclusion says "agriculturists hope to improve nutrition", which is different than the premise that SPK004 will address vitamin-A deficiency. We need to make sure that this additional vitamin-A won't come at the detriment of other nutrients.

As for D, it doesn't matter whether SPK004 has the most beta-carotene of all sweet potatoes or not. I can say that carrot cake is the healthiest kind of cake, but it doesn't mean that it's healthy. I can say that celery is the least healthy vegetable, but it doesn't mean that it's bad for you. What's important is that we are adding more vitamin-A (not necessarily better than any other food is capable of doing) while not sacrificing other nutrients.

[lemonperb]

Hello GMAT instructors,
After reading your post, I came to understand that I did not identify the conclusion "nutrition will be improved." at the first time so that I chose "d".

So what if the plan is to "improve Vitamin A " ? Then will D "There are no other varieties of sweet potato that are significantly richer in beta-carotene than SPK004 is. SPK004 beta-carotene" be the answer?

[RonPurewal]

Hello GMAT instructors,
After reading your post, I came to understand that I did not identify the conclusion "nutrition will be improved." at the first time so that I chose "d".

So what if the plan is to "improve Vitamin A " ? Then will D "There are no other varieties of sweet potato that are significantly richer in beta-carotene than SPK004 is. SPK004 beta-carotene" be the answer?

Only if you make it a stronger statement, i.e., "The new potato has significantly MORE vitamin A than do currently available varieties of potato."

[lemonperb]

Only if you make it a stronger statement, i.e., "The new potato has significantly MORE vitamin A than do currently available varieties of potato."

Thank you so much Ron!

[tim]

:)

[RonPurewal]

Yep.

[YulongW397]

In parts of South America, vitamin-A deficiency is a serious health problem, especially among children. In one region, agriculturists hope to improve nutrition by encouraging farmers to plant a new variety of sweet potato called SPK004 that is rich in betacarotene, which the body converts into vitamin A. The plan has good chances of success, since sweet potato is a staple of the region's diet and agriculture, and the varieties currently grown contain little beta-carotene.

which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the prediction that the plan will succeed?

a. There are other vegetables currently grown in the region that contain more beta-carotene than the currently cultivated varieties of sweet potato do.
b. The flesh of SPK004 differs from that of the currently cultivated sweet potatoes in colors and textures, so traditional foods would look somewhat different when prepared from SPK004.
c. For successful cultivation of SPK004, a soil significantly richer in nitrogen is needed than is needed for the varieties of sweet potato currently cultivated in the region.
d. There are no other varieties of sweet potato that are significantly richer in beta-carotene than SPK004 is.
e. the currently cultivated varieties of sweet potato contain no important nutrients that SPK004 lacks.

OA: E

i was debating between D and E, and ultimately chose D. I think they both equally support the prediction that the plan will succeed. so why is that E is better?

ok, first of all, make sure that you understand why (e) does strengthen the argument.

remember that one extremely common way to strengthen arguments is to undermine possible objections to those arguments. in this case, especially given the extant differences between the potatoes (one contains b-carotene and the other doesn't), it's quite reasonable to raise the following objection: "but what about other nutrients? if spk004 has b-carotene but other potatoes don't, then might other potatoes have some other nutrient that's lacking in spk004?"
legitimate objection.
(e) dispenses with this objection, so it strengthens the argument.

--

(d), on the other hand, is irrelevant. the argument is concerned only with showing that the plan will succeed, NOT with showing that the plan is optimal or better than other plans.

this is extremely important. make sure you realize this: unless an argument specifically compares a course of action to other courses of action, and/or states that a course of action is best/worst/optimal/etc., then other courses of action are irrelevant.

--

analogy:

let's say my argument's conclusion is "diet X will help you lose weight."
if i have an answer choice that says that diet Y will help you lose weight faster than will diet X, that's totally irrelevant. it does not weaken the claim that diet X will help you lose weight.

on the other hand, if my argument's conculsion is "diet X is the best diet for weight loss", then, all of a sudden, any such claim about diet Y will indeed weaken the argument.

see the difference?

I'm still a little bit confused over this question. In my opinion, if the "success" mentioned in the passage is helping vitamin-A deficiency(i.e, increase vitamin-A amount taken per capita) in South America, then answer D should be relevant because if there is a sweet potato specie that contains more Beta-carotene than SPK004, then SPK004 will definitely fail on its goal on providing more Vitamin-A to South America people, wouldn't it? If the "success" in the passage refers to only adding Vitamin-A to the diet regardless of the amount, will then answer D be irrelevant. Do you see what I'm saying here, Ron? English is my second language but I'll try my best to illustrate my point..

[RonPurewal]

...no.

i've already tried my best to explain this, but, i'll try again.
in broad terms, there are basically two ways to define "success".
1/ you could define "success" RELATIVE TO OTHER people/things/plans;
2/ you could define "success" according to an ABSOLUTE criterion.

if you're defining success in way #2, then OTHER people/things/plans have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with whether something is considered "successful".

as another illustration, you can use the test for which you're studying right now.
if you define "success" as getting a GMAT score that's 720 or higher, then "success" depends ONLY on YOUR gmat score.
if you get a 730, you are "successful".
if you get a 730 and your best friend gets a 750, YOU ARE STILL "SUCCESSFUL".

hopefully this makes sense.
this distinction is black-and-white, by the way -- either success is relative, or it's absolute. it can't be both.