Q20 - According to a theory embraced by

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Sufficient Assumption

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: These musicians' music fails to conform to their theory.
Evidence:
THEIR MUSIC: they preface their performances by explaining their intentions.
THEIR THEORY: music is simply a series of sounds, bereft of meaning.

Answer Anticipation:
How do we establish that their music is a mismatch for their theory?

In mechanical "IF, THEN" form, we could prephrase "If you explain your intentions to an audience before a performance, then you're not conforming to the idea that music is simply a series of sounds, bereft of meaning".

In more conversational terms, this author is saying "If you're telling the audience your INTENTIONS, then aren't you saying there IS meaning to your performance?'

Correct Answer:
E

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) We need to join "explain intentions to audience beforehand" = "doesn't conform to series of sounds, bereft of meaning". This doesn't do that.

(B) We need to join "explain intentions to audience beforehand" = "doesn't conform to series of sounds, bereft of meaning". This doesn't do that.

(C) We need to join "explain intentions to audience beforehand" = "doesn't conform to series of sounds, bereft of meaning". This doesn't do that.

(D) We need to join "explain intentions to audience beforehand" = "doesn't conform to series of sounds, bereft of meaning". This doesn't do that.

(E) YES. This proves that their music doesn't match their theory.

Takeaway/Pattern: Sufficient Assumption should be solved up front (almost always). We don't need to consider the relative merits of different answer choices. An answer either IS our missing puzzle piece or it isn't. Correct answers are almost always limited to words/ideas we already used in the argument. New stuff is almost always wrong.
A: "think symbolically?"
B: "POSSIBLE to create meaningless music?"
C: "music is DISTINGUISHABLE from a random series of sounds?"
D: "popular conceptions?"

There are other problems with those answers too, but you need only read to that first foreign idea to know these are worthless.

#officialexplanation