Q14

[jasonleb1]

Why is the answer E instead of A? I was between the two but I couldn't find any text support for the idea of unbiased judges being recused in the passage, it only ever talked about biased judges not getting recused. A on the other hand pretty much states the main idea of the passage, that the current system isn't adequately protected against judicial bias.

[ohthatpatrick]

Yikes. I'm with you. I can see that (E) has support, but (A) is pretty awful to get rid of.

Because the question stem is of the "most likely agree / inferred / implies / suggests" family, I would read answers with a skeptical eye towards
EXTREME CLAIMS
COMPARATIVE CLAIMS
OUT OF SCOPE IDEAS

(A) The author would definitely say "the standards in place" should be changed. But can we say the author currently thinks that "the legal system is not adequately protected against judicial bias"?

The author actually thinks, in part, that the standards in place should be changed because the current system OVERPROTECTS against bias.

The author is pointing out that judges are often forced to recuse themselves because there would be some 'appearance' of bias (but not ACTUAL bias).

In the final sentence, the author implies that sometimes a judge who would seem "too close to the case" could have reached the same conclusion for the reasons stated by the "unbiased" judge.

(B) "meddlesome and ineffective" are loaded, unsupported claims.

(C) "rarely" is loaded

(D) "rarely is loaded

(E) "sometimes" and "some" are very safe.

The last three answers all deal with the same issues:
are BIASED judges sometimes/often allowed to still judge?
are UNBIASED judges sometimes/often removed from the case?

Lines 22-24 indicate that the first issue MAY arise.

Nothing concretely indicates that the 2nd issue may arise, but there is a lot of hinting at that. Because of this, the safer wording of (E) is the best match.

Support for (E), that UNBIASED judges are sometimes removed from the case:
line 12 - vague guidance at best, dependent on whether impartiality 'might reasonably be questioned'.

line 16 - mistake to focus on APPEARANCE of justice rather than ELIMINATION of bias.

line19 - Is a judge cognitively incapable of a just verdict, even if she has too-close personal involvement?

Both claims in (E) are technically unproven in the passage ... they are both referred to as possible holes / flaws with the current disqualification and recusal laws.

Since the author is concerned about those holes, it seems reasonable to say she would agree with (E), that there MAY be SOME cases when these holes give us bad outcomes.

The correct answer is (E).

[jm.kahn]

Isn't A wrong mainly because there is no support for "fail to assure the general public"? The author would have agreed with a choice that said "The standards in place do not adequately protect the legal system against judicial bias".
But choice A is different. It talks about whether the general public feels assured or not about current standards.

But A is hard to get rid of if there were no E. How much of a gap between the support and credited choice can exist in "author most likely to consider..." questions?

[ohthatpatrick]

That's a nice tweak.

If you read (A) more as "does the general public PERCEIVE the current standards as adequately protecting against judicial bias", then it's easier to get rid of. The author thinks the current system is all about managing PERCEPTION of bias.

I think you COULD also read (A) as, "I, the author, do not believe that current standards assure the public of adequate protection against bias".

But since the question stem is about how the author would judge the EFFECTS of the current approach, I think your reading (the first one I just wrote) is probably more apt.

To your other question, on older tests, the standard of proof was very high and concrete, even for fuzzier wording like "implies / suggests / most likely to agree".

But modern RC has thrown us some correct answers that are not fully provable from the text, but they are MORE supportable than anything else.

So don't be surprised if it at least twice per RC section (not per passage), you're thinking, "Well ... I guess I'll pick THIS stinkball, because it's more supportable than anything else."

[abrenza123]

I initially chose A because I really thought that lines 22-24 focusing on appearances may cause actual bias to not be apparent could mean that even if the judge SEEMS unbiased, they still COULD be biased - if that is the case, then wouldn't it be reasonable to infer that an effect of the current system (focusing on appearance) DOESN'T adequately protect against judicial bias??

After reviewing the question, I did have the thought that "assure the general public" could indicate how the public perceives the current standards protection against bias, BUT I googled assure to see all of the possible definitions and one of them does state that "make certain to happen," so lines 22-24 WOULD be saying that current standards fail to make certain that public has adequate protection against judicial bias.

for E, I would have been more comfortable with judges COULD be removed from cases who aren't biased rather than judges ARE sometimes removed..

I'm a little confused about overprotect inference in the passage - do you mean that on one hand, the judge could fail to be removed cause of no apparent bias but actual bias is unprotected, but on the other hand, judges could appear biased because of seemingly improper considerations that shouldn't necessarily be removed because they would still be able to demonstrate legally adequate/sound reasoning that shows they are still cognitively capable??

For the final sentence, I thought when they were referring to "hidden reasons' that means that considerations that are NOT apparent, meaning bias (or lack thereof) that wouldn't qualify as "apparent bias" but could still go undetected, even if reasoning is sound.

[ohthatpatrick]

Yes, one definition of "assure" is like "ensure".

That last touchdown the other team scored assures/ensures our defeat.

But in context of this answer, it's talking about "assuring someone" (kinda like "reassuring someone"). The structure of "assure [someone] that [x]" means "to convince someone that X is true".

Would the author say that
(A) the current standards fail to convince the general public that we're adequately protected against bias

That's a pretty strong claim. To support that, we'd need to know that the general public, i.e. "MOST people", believe there is too much bias in the legal system. It's hard to find support for that in the passage.

If you removed "the general public" from (A), then you would have the meaning you're fighting for: "the standards fail to guarantee that the legal system is adequately protected".

In terms of supporting (E), it's not pulling from the last sentence. The last sentence is about the system the author is proposing, whereas Q14 is about "the current system".

Q14 is presumably going to come from paragraphs 1 and 2, where the author discusses the current system.

All the support for (E) comes from lines 16-24. Those two sentences address situations in which bias is apparent, but in reality the judge would be cognitively capable of making a proper and just decision .... and situations in which bias is not apparent, but in actuality it exists.

It's not a perfect language match, but that's not the standard of right/wrong for questions like
"most likely to agree"
"suggests"
"most supported"

It just has to be the most supportable answer, and the language of (E) is very soft so it's a pretty supportable inference.

We certainly don't think the author believes (E) is false. If the author thought (E) were false, he would be thinking:
"Judges are never removed from cases even though they're not actually biased;
judicial bias never goes undetected"