Q20

[YuriJ257]

Hello, can anyone please help me out with this question? I don't understand why B is correct and why A is incorrect. Also, I don't understand how the AC's are supposed to strengthen/weaken Passage B. Thanks in advance! :

[ThaoN810]

I think of this as a Strengthening question. Much like in LR. The argument of passage B can be summarized thus: Social norms function in a manner similar to law-based intellectual property systems, and they work quite well. That, anything that emphasizes the parallels between social norms and law-based intellectual property systems, or adds that the social norms system is successfully implemented, would strengthens.

(A) mentions a weakness in the social norms system, eliminate.
(B) CORRECT. This fact shows that the social norms accomplishes the purpose of intellectual property protection.
(C) makes the social norms system seem obsolete, eliminate.
(D) again mentions a weakness in the social norms system, eliminate.
(E) again mentions a weakness in the social norms system, eliminate.

[ohthatpatrick]

If an RC question stem asks us to Strengthen or Weaken an argument, we need to think about that passage the way we would think about an argument in LR:

What's the Conclusion? What's the Evidence?

The conclusion should essentially be the main point. It seems like the main point of psg B was something to the effect of line 46-49, "instead of having actual intellectual property legal rights, chefs use three implicit social norms that function in a similar manner."

The evidence? The second paragraph.

So a correct answer that strengthens would probably make it seem like one (or more) of the three implicit norms is a successful / fair analogue for an intellectual property law.

(A) This doesn't sound like a very strong idea. It adds some more detail to the 1st norm, but I'm not sure how it makes me feel any better that these norms function the way IP law would.

(B) This has strong wording, and it corroborates the idea that the system of social norms is a proxy for IP laws. If you broke an IP law, there would be legal punishment. This lets us know that if you break a social norm, there will be punitive consequences.

(C) This is irrelevant, since the author's main point is about the recipes themselves, which are intellectual property but do not have adequate legal protection as such. This is a fact about plagiarizing a published book, which IS covered under copyright law.

(D) This weakens. It's the opposite of (B), saying that norms are UNLIKE laws in that norms don't lead to effective deterrent punishments.

(E) This minimally undermines the system of norms (or a system of laws, if they existed), by making it sound untenable to apply either the first norm or any law that resembled the first norm.

Hope this helps.

[JenniferK632]

Thanks for the explanation! Would you recommend prephrasing for these kinds of inference/synthesis questions? I didn't, and got distracted by trying to find the weakest answer choice I could support from the passage.

[dmitry]

Yes, you absolutely want to prephrase whenever possible. On synthesis or application questions like this, it can be tough to identify the right answer without prephrasing, since we may have an unclear idea of the task that leaves us vulnerable to trap answers.