Q17 - Increasing the electrical load carried on a

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Inference (most supported)

Stimulus Breakdown:
READ FOR Conditional, Causal, Quantitative, or Comparative.
Causal: more load on a line, higher temp.
Causal: too high a load -> exceeds max temp.
Causal: the stronger the wind and/or the more directly it blows across the line, the cooler the line gets.

Answer Anticipation:
If we were trying to synthesize these causal claims, I would anticipate something like "a transmission line can accommodate a higher electrical load when strong winds are blowing across it".

Correct Answer:
C

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) We don't have any information about what utility companies TYPICALLY do, even though this makes sense.

(B) This is the opposite of what we'd expect. Parallel to wind is less cool than perpendicular to wind, so it could generally carry smaller electrical loads.

(C) YES, this seems fair. Strong winds cool the line more than light winds, and the cooler the line is, the more we can increase the electrical load before we hit max temp.

(D) We never talk about air temperature.

(E) The max temperature doesn't necessarily ever change. On windy days, the lines would be cooled and we could increase the electrical load, but the max temp is what it is on any day.

Takeaway/Pattern: The causal language we saw was "X increases Y". "Too much X will cause Y". "X is affected by Y". And then there were comparative distinctions that "X has more effect than Y". If there's a chain of causality, normally the correct answer will reward us for seeing it. We can usually synthesize ideas when they contain overlapping information. "Electrical load increases temp" + "Strong winds lower temp" = "when wind increases, we have more room to increase the electrical load".

#officialexplanation

[NicholasL580]

In the stimuli breakdown, you say we should "READ FOR Conditional, Causal, Quantitative, or Comparative. " Is this the case/strategy for all inference questions? I got it right but I haven't been consciously looking for conditional, quantitative, or comparative claims!

Thanks in advance!!

[ohthatpatrick]

Sorry for the criminally late reply, but YES!

We are ultimately at the mercy of Inference answer choices, needing to pick whichever idea is most provable.

But I've found that I can make my brain more receptive to the eventual answer if I actively read for the common sources of synthesis.

If you want to cruise through some like-minded Inference questions and see if you pick up on some of the language / inference patterns I'm seeing, try some of these "buckets".


inference – causal distinctions
Use the distinction drawn to make a safely-worded inference

64, sec 3: 1, 22
67, sec4: 17, 20
68, sec2: 10
69, sec1: 16
69, sec4: 2, 9
70, sec1: 14

inference – conditional
Look out for conditional wording (see if you can chain conditionals together or apply the conditional to specific fact)

64, sec1: 2, 18, 20
64, sec 3: 20
65, sec1: 25
67, sec2: 7
67, sec 4: 15
68, sec2: 1
69, sec1: 10, 12
69, sec4: 6, 9
70, sec1: 6
70, sec1: 24
70, sec4: 21
71, sec1: 17, 19, 25
71, sec3: 10, 17

inference – causality
Look for causal wording. See if there’s a chain of causality or a “causal difference maker”. Or pick answer that seems like most conservative guess about what could explain the provided facts.

64, sec 3: 3
65, sec4: 6, 9
67, sec2: 5, 7, 24
67, sec4: 5, 17
68, sec2: 8, 10
68, sec3: 2, 4, 10, 13
69, sec4: 20
70, sec1: 8
71, sec1: 8
71, sec3: 13, 23


inference – quantitative
Look for math-y inferences or quantity overlap inferences

67, sec4: 17, 21
70, sec1: 22