Q10 - Recently, photons and neutrinos emitted

[camerojg]

I had this question narrowed down to A and B, but unfortunately ended up choosing A. I'd appreciate anyone who can provide a definitive reason for why A is wrong and why B is correct.

Furthermore, I had trouble formulating this question's argument core. It almost seems like the first sentence serves as the premise for two conclusions (the final two sentences), either of which could be the main claim. If I had to guess, however, I would say the core looks something like this:


Premise: "Recently, photons and neutrinos emitted...the same time."

Intermediate Conclusion: "The simultaneous arrival...traveled was curved."

Main Conclusion: "This finding supports...space around it."

[maryadkins]

Nice job ID'ing the core!

So here's the problem. You got the core down. You narrowed it down to (A) and (B). Now what? Compare the answer choices to each other, right? NO. Compare them to your core. You said the conclusion is:

-gravity is a property of space itself b/c a body curves the space around it

This is what we need to link to the evidence that P and N arrived at the same time. (B) tells us that if the conclusion were not true, then P and N would have arrived at different times. In other words:

Conclusion not true --> Premise not true

The contrapositive of that is:

Our premise is true (they arrive at different times) --> Our conclusion is true (gravity is a property of space)

Super strengthener!

(A) is wrong because we're not concerned with what Einstein generally predicted, but whether what happened supports his specific claim that gravity is a property of space.
(C) is the opposite of what we want. They were detectable, and it is correct.
(D) is out of scope. Only kinds--who cares?
(E) is irrelevant.

[wj097]

Nice job ID'ing the core!

So here's the problem. You got the core down. You narrowed it down to (A) and (B). Now what? Compare the answer choices to each other, right? NO. Compare them to your core. You said the conclusion is:

-gravity is a property of space itself b/c a body curves the space around it

This is what we need to link to the evidence that P and N arrived at the same time. (B) tells us that if the conclusion were not true, then P and N would have arrived at different times. In other words:

Conclusion not true --> Premise not true

The contrapositive of that is:

Our premise is true (they arrive at different times) --> Our conclusion is true (gravity is a property of space)

Super strengthener!

(A) is wrong because we're not concerned with what Einstein generally predicted, but whether what happened supports his specific claim that gravity is a property of space.
(C) is the opposite of what we want. They were detectable, and it is correct.
(D) is out of scope. Only kinds--who cares?
(E) is irrelevant.

For (C), when you mean "They were detectable, and it is correct" your referring as "if detectable then correct", not the other way around, right? So in case of (C) "P and N emitted undetectable, if Einstein's claim wrong".

[Crogati]

To answer your question about (C). You almost got it, you just reversed the logic within the answer choice.

This answer is wrong because it boils down to:

"If correct then undetectable"
(Correct-->Undect)

And the stimulus states P+N were detectable. Or if you want to think about it as a double negative, they are NOT undetectable. So now you have a negated consequent (~Undetectable), what could logically follow? The negated trigger (~Correct). This is the contrapositive.

~Undect --> ~Correct


Ah hah! This would weaken the conclusion. We want to prove that Einstein's theory about gravity as a property of space IS correct.

[redskateboard]

I see that the structure of B makes it a good form to strengthen the conclusion, but I didn't pick it because B says "[P and N] emitted simultaneously by a distant event will reach Earth at different times." How do we know whether they were emitted simultaneously? The stimulus doesn't say so.

[andrewgong01]

I was doing this problem on the online LR drill set and I don't understand how the solutions said the last sentence is the intermediate conclusion because I didn't see the argument structually as that being the intermediate conclusion. I thought the argument was more so :

Reached Same Time
+................................... --------> Gravity is property of space
Same time cause travel was curve



However, this still allowed me to answer it was "B" since the gap is still the same where my phrephase was "Same Arrival = Gravity property of space" because we know that gravity as a property of space is due to the curve space around it and we have already established the curve part so the only gap was same time = gravity. In other words I saw it as two complementing premises instead of one being the intermediate conclusion

[RanW386]

I see that the structure of B makes it a good form to strengthen the conclusion, but I didn't pick it because B says "[P and N] emitted simultaneously by a distant event will reach Earth at different times." How do we know whether they were emitted simultaneously? The stimulus doesn't say so.

I narrowed it down to A and B and have the same problem there. However, when I look back to A, even if Einstein predicted such thing, he could predict it on the basis of other theories, having no connection to the gravity. B mentions the theory, so B is better. "emitted simultaneously" may come from "emitted by an explosion", and explosion is fast.