Archaeologists in Michigan have excavated a Native

[philip]

Archaeologists in Michigan have excavated a Native American camp near Dumaw Creek. Radiocarbon dating of animal bones found at the site indicates that the camp dates from some time between 1605 and 1755. However, the camp probably dates to no later than 1630, since no European trade goods were found at the site, and European traders were active in the region from the 1620's onward.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument?

(A) Due to trade among Native Americans, some European trade goods would have reached the area before the European traders themselves did.
(B) At all camps in the region that have been reliably dated to the late 1620's, remains of European trade goods have been found.
(C) The first European trade goods to reach the area would have been considered especially valuable and preserved as much as possible from loss or destruction.
(D) The first European traders in the area followed soon after the first European explorers.
(E) The site is that of a temporary camp that would have been used seasonally for a few years and then abandoned.

The OA is B, but I find no ways to eliminate A, since they both indicate that Euro goods had existed in the area by 1920's. Please help clarify. Thanks a lot!!

[RonPurewal]

Archaeologists in Michigan have excavated a Native American camp near Dumaw Creek. Radiocarbon dating of animal bones found at the site indicates that the camp dates from some time between 1605 and 1755. However, the camp probably dates to no later than 1630, since no European trade goods were found at the site, and European traders were active in the region from the 1620's onward.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument?

(A) Due to trade among Native Americans, some European trade goods would have reached the area before the European traders themselves did.
(B) At all camps in the region that have been reliably dated to the late 1620's, remains of European trade goods have been found.
(C) The first European trade goods to reach the area would have been considered especially valuable and preserved as much as possible from loss or destruction.
(D) The first European traders in the area followed soon after the first European explorers.
(E) The site is that of a temporary camp that would have been used seasonally for a few years and then abandoned.

The OA is B, but I find no ways to eliminate A, since they both indicate that Euro goods had existed in the area by 1920's. Please help clarify. Thanks a lot!!

you have a good point; choice a seems to buttress the argument a bit, by providing additional support for the idea that european good should be at the site.
however
per the directions, you're looking for the one answer choice that MOST strengthens the argument.
choice b strengthens the argument more than does choice a, because it fills in a badly needed assumption. in particular, the argument moves from a statement that no european goods were found at the site to an inference that those goods were simply never there in the first place. that's quite an inductive leap, as not everything that was ever present somewhere leaves a trace; therefore, any choice that fills in that hole will be the best choice to strengthen the argument.

this is precisely what choice b does: by providing evidence that such traces are, indeed, left behind when the trade goods in question have been present, it fills in the logical hole described above.

--

hope this helps. just remember the following:
filling in a missing assumption is considered better than reinforcing statements that have already been posited when it comes to strengthening an argument.
here's the deal, though:

[philip]

Ron, so surprised that you pop up in the midnight ... My life got saved again. Thanks a lot!!

[Pathik]

Why is C wrong?

If european goods reached the camp and people did not consider those good worthy to store, they might have thrown those goods out, leaving the impression that those goods never existed in the camp.

Ron, to accept B, we have to make another assumption that camp near Dumaw creek were similar to all other camps in the region. How can we assume this.

Pathik

[RonPurewal]

Why is C wrong?

i can think of at least 2 reasons:

#1:

read the wording carefully: preserved as much as possible from loss or destruction

this statement carries no guarantee that 'as much as possible' will be successful in preserving those trade goods all the way to the present day, some four hundred years later. the trade goods could have been preserved as much as possible - in accord with this statement - and still disappeared before the present.

by contrast, there is no such problem with choice b, because that choice states that the goods 'have been found' at the sites (present perfect = this is a pattern that continues into the present)

#2:

'the first european trade goods to reach the area' may not have reached this particular camp.

--

Ron, to accept B, we have to make another assumption that camp near Dumaw creek were similar to all other camps in the region. How can we assume this.

why would we have to assume that?

the only similarity we would have to assume is that, IF the dumaw camp had been around after 1630, the european traders would have gone there, just as they'd gone to all the other camps.
that is certainly not an unreasonable assumption, and is just as certainly better than the alternative assumption ("maybe the traders somehow skipped that camp, even though their goods were found at all the other camps").

[thanghnvn]

Ron, Manhantan experts, pls, help
1- the first.

In this question, the correct answer choice dose not ralate to any assumption. Here, the correct answer choice is another evidence which support the conclusion directly.

in many, if not most, other strengthening questions the correct answer choice is an assumption or new evidence which confirm an assumption.

is this correct? pls, confirm.

2- the second.

Normally, for many assumption based question such as weakening and strengthening, we can prethinking assumption and the possiblee weakener/strengthener. Doing so is very effective , I am sure.

But because for some problems, the correct answer choice is not based on assumption but a new evidence which directly support or weaken the conclusion, we should not rely too much on prephrased information/answer and remember that the correct answer choice dose not need to relate to the prephrased information.

I see this way of thinking is effective. Experts, please comment on this point.

[tim]

both of these are good ideas!

[cyprus]

Dear instructors,

I am having the toughest time understanding this CR. This is how I am approaching the problem:

Conclusion: the camp dates no longer than 1630.
Why? (Premise) european traders were active in the region from 1620 onwards and none of their
goods were found at this camp. So author thinks that for the camp to date beyond 1630, some goods from the said european traders must have been found there.

But option (B) says that the goods have been found in camps reliably dated to late 1620's. I cannot understand how this is in conjunction with the author's thought (well, from what I understood) above. Please could you explain how I'm wrong? Thanks.

Archaeologists in Michigan have excavated a Native American camp near Dumaw Creek. Radiocarbon dating of animal bones found at the site indicates that the camp dates from some time between 1605 and 1755. However, the camp probably dates to no later than 1630, since no European trade goods were found at the site, and European traders were active in the region from the 1620's onward.
Which of the following, if true, most strengthens the argument?

(A) Due to trade among Native Americans, some European trade goods would have reached the area before the European traders themselves did.
(B) At all camps in the region that have been reliably dated to the late 1620's, remains of European trade goods have been found.
(C) The first European trade goods to reach the area would have been considered especially valuable and preserved as much as possible from loss or destruction.
(D) The first European traders in the area followed soon after the first European explorers.
(E) The site is that of a temporary camp that would have been used seasonally for a few years and then abandoned.

The OA is B, but I find no ways to eliminate A, since they both indicate that Euro goods had existed in the area by 1920's. Please help clarify. Thanks a lot!!

you have a good point; choice a seems to buttress the argument a bit, by providing additional support for the idea that european good should be at the site.
however
per the directions, you're looking for the one answer choice that MOST strengthens the argument.
choice b strengthens the argument more than does choice a, because it fills in a badly needed assumption. in particular, the argument moves from a statement that no european goods were found at the site to an inference that those goods were simply never there in the first place. that's quite an inductive leap, as not everything that was ever present somewhere leaves a trace; therefore, any choice that fills in that hole will be the best choice to strengthen the argument.

this is precisely what choice b does: by providing evidence that such traces are, indeed, left behind when the trade goods in question have been present, it fills in the logical hole described above.

--

hope this helps. just remember the following:
filling in a missing assumption is considered better than reinforcing statements that have already been posited when it comes to strengthening an argument.
here's the deal, though:

[RonPurewal]

even if the researchers think that the camp is actually from 1620 or earlier, that is still "no later than 1630".

[sidnair225]

I rejected A not because it doesnt do as good a job as statement B. I rejected it because it doesn't address the conclusion directly. The author concludes something about the far end of the range. (i.e. "the camp dates no later than 1630"). Option A states that the goods could have got there well ahead of 1620s. That doesn't impact the conclusion, which talks about a MAX end-date for the camp.

In fact, I didn't think B was a great answer either - just the best of the rest available.

C. - just like Ron mentioned. What's the area? and what exactly does 'as much as possible' imply? Maybe they did the best that they could do and the goods still got destroyed. In such a scenario the argument is weakened. I agree that this answer is tricky though and it did get me thinking quite a bit. Then again, when you start looking for holes in an argument, they do begin to appear! (that's when close reading is helpful)

D. - irrelevant, don't care about the sequence of explorers vs. traders

E. - irrelevant

[RonPurewal]

Thanks, Sid. Do you have a question?

If you have a question, please clarify. Thanks.

[liu1993918]

choice a seems to buttress the argument a bit, by providing additional support for the idea that european good should be at the site.

Actually, I eliminate A, because I though A seems weaken the argument.
The author of the argument reasons that "no European trade goods were found at the site, and European traders were active in the region from the 1620's onward". The author assumes that only European traders can bring the goods to this site. A weakens this logic of reasoning by citing that Americans can bring the goods to here too.

Am I right?
If I am wrong, please correct me.

[RonPurewal]

ultimately A is irrelevant, because the only issue is "dates to 1630 or earlier" versus "dates to some time after 1630".

choice A would just move the date backward a bit, from the 1620's to some earlier time. this won't affect the issue, since any pre-1620 date, like the 1620's themselves, will fall into the "1630 or earlier" category.

[Crisc419]

i thought choice C only support the argument a little.
because it says: "The first European trade goods to reach the area would have been considered especially valuable and preserved as much as possible from loss or destruction. "

but in the stimulate, "European traders were active in the region from the 1620's onward".
choice C does not say anything about all other goods except the first trade goods, why all those goods have not been found?

In my opinion, to support the argument more, choice C should say "all European trade goods have been preserved from loss or destruction". BUT it just says the condition about the first trade goods, so still leaves us a big hole.

please comment on my reasoning, instructors, thanks very much.

Cris

[RonPurewal]

C isn't the correct answer.