Q19 - Munroe was elected in a landslide.

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Match Reasoning

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: There's been a fundamental shift in the how the electorate feels.
Evidence: M was elected in a landslide, and that couldn't have happened unless there was both a fundamental shift in how the electorate feels and it was a well-run campaign.

Answer Anticipation:
This is valid reasoning. The author has two premises, one is a conditional and one is a fact. The conclusion is a certain fact.

P1 (conditional): X requires Y and Z.
P2 (fact) X happened.
Conclusion (fact) Y happened.

The conclusion could also be that Z happened. The idea is that since X happened, we know that Y and Z both happened.

Correct Answer:
B

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Couldn't find a conditional premise, so I moved on.

(B) Conditional premise: Closed --requires--> Strong Compet and Unsatisfied Customers.
Factual premise: Closed.
Conclusion: Strong Compet.
This looks great; I would pick (B) and circle #19 in case I had time at the end of the section to come back and read the other answers.

(C) The appearance of an "even if" is enough to make me not read this. If we did analyze it, we would find a conditional premise, but one that only has ONE consequence: Closed --> Strong Compet. There is no factual premise that tells us it closed. Any of these mismatches are disqualifying.

(D) Conclusion mismatch, no need to read. "One cannot rule out the possibility" is saying something is possible. The original conclusion was "One cannot escape the possibility", which means that something is certain.

(E) The factual premise doesn't match the trigger of the conditional. The conditional is "Staying open ---requires ---> ~Compet and Satisfied Customers." The factual premie says it did NOT stay open, so it doesn't trigger the rule.

Takeaway/Pattern: The better we get at itemizing the type and strength of claims in the original argument, the easier it is to make quick, decisive eliminations based on early mismatches. The main types of claims are conditional, causal, normative, either/or, statement of fact, comparative, superlative. The three strengths of claims are certain, probable, or possible.

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