Q16 - People are not happy unless

[acc0520]

Hi, I chose the answer (c).. and can't get it why is wrong...
In the passage, "achieve a feeling of ~~only within the sphere of hamily and friendship"..can't it mean that "happy in their private lives even if they are not happy in their job"?
so confused.....

Thanks in advance!

[maryadkins]

This is an inference question, so we take all the statements as true and infer a true statement from them. We're told:

-To feel happy, people must feel needed.
-Most people need F & F to feel indispensable.
-Everyone knows thousands of others could do their job.

(A) is too extreme. We can't draw such a sweeping conclusion from these statements.
(B) is out of scope. The nature of modern society is not dealt with.
(C) says that most people ARE happy in their private lives. We're not told anything about whether people are or aren't happy--we're only told what they NEED in order to be happy/feel indispensable.
(D) is out of scope. The stimulus doesn't deal with appreciation.
(E) is true. Since most people can only find happiness in personal relationships, that means the remainder--less than a majority--can find happiness another way.

To answer your question, just because most people can only feel needed at home/in their personal lives doesn't mean that they DO, which is what (C) is saying--that they ARE happy. Not that they can be, which is how you paraphrased it.

Hopefully that clarifies things!

[charmayne.palomba]

(E) is correct.

This is an inference question, so let’s start with what we know, and then turn to the answer choices to see what we can infer"”in other words, what is most provable given the information in the stimulus.

We know that people have to feel needed in order to be happy. We also know that since most people know their jobs can be done by other people, they can only feel needed with family and friends. Notice that the stimulus tries to obscure a pretty simply set of statements by dressing it up in fancy language"”indispensability? Using conditional logic, we can boil it down to this:

happy --> needed"”(most)--> feeling only achieved with family and friends
(Make sure you don’t forget about important modifiers like "most" if you’re going to use conditional logic to help keep things clear in your head"”it’s not necessarily the case that everyone can only feel needed with family and friends. But everyone does need to feel needed in order to be happy.)

(A) We know that people need to feel needed, and that many of them don’t feel needed in their professional lives, but we know from the argument that people can still feel needed elsewhere"”in their personal lives. This answer is way too extreme.

(B) If anything, we can infer the opposite! If the only way many people are able to feel needed (a feeling necessary to being happy) is in their sphere of family and friends, the importance of family life is strengthened, not undermined.

(C) We have no way of knowing this"”all we know is that the only way many people can feel needed is through family life. Furthermore, we don’t know that if those people do feel needed, they are necessarily happy. In other words, feeling needed is a necessary condition for being happy, but it’s not a sufficient condition. Maybe being needed by their family leads some people to be unhappy.

(D) Again, we don’t know this! Even if people feel un-needed at work, and therefore are not happy in their jobs, they could certainly still appreciate having them!

We’re left with (E), the correct answer. We know that most people (more than 50%) only feel needed within their sphere of family and friends, and that they are only able to feel happy when they are needed. From this, we can infer that those people (again, more than 50%, according to the stimulus) are not able to find happiness outside that sphere of family and friends"”"private interpersonal relationships""”because they are not able to feel needed outside of it.

[velvet]

(E) is correct.
Using conditional logic, we can boil it down to this:
happy --> needed"”(most)--> feeling only achieved with family and friends
(Make sure you don’t forget about important modifiers like "most" if you’re going to use conditional logic to help keep things clear in your head"”it’s not necessarily the case that everyone can only feel needed with family and friends. But everyone does need to feel needed in order to be happy.)

Can someone explain to me if we can get to correct answer (E) by using conditional logic:

Happy --> Needed"”MOST ppl --> feeling achieved w/in sphere

So I thought I could get to answer by inferring 'backwards' from the logic chain to get to the answer "Fewer than a majority..." by: Some people (those that feel needed w/in sphere) are happy; and I interpret the "Some" to mean fewer than a majority. Since the q stem is "Most strongly supported" instead of "MBT" I thought my interpretation was acceptable.

Does this make sense? Or am I way off? Is it wrong to connect a MOST statement after an ALL conditional statement as above?

[Pre-Law Guide]

• If Happy--> Feel Needed
• Most Feel Needed = only Family and Friends
• Most = Know Job Could be Done By Others
• Premise 3 cause Most = not feel needed by job (comes from the “because” link in sentence)

Possibly links are (1) most people only feel happy if they feel needed by family and friends or that (2) if you know many other people can do something, you will not feel needed.

A. No, there is another way to feel needed (family and friends)
B. No suggestion about Family and Friends not being linked to happiness
C. Can’t say most are happy---just that it’s only way to happiness for most people
D. Appreciation for job is not a premise=== it’s about feeling of being needed derived from it, not appreciation
E. Yes, that is just what we said the first possible link was. Of the happy people (all of whom feel needed) most feel that way ONLY because of F&F, so it's true that fewer than half feel happy without F&F (who are the only source of need, which is necessary for happiness).