Q23 - Consumer advocate: TMD, a pesticide

[ohthatpatrick]

What does the Question Stem tell us?
Principle (Strengthen)

Break down the Stimulus:
Conclusion: Using TMD on peaches is not shown to be an acceptable practice.
Evidence: Using TMD on peaches would harm 20% of peach eaters.

Any prephrase?
Principle Strengthen answer choices are almost always conditional statements. We want a rule that is triggered by what we know in the Evidence and delivers us the language of the Conclusion. What do we know about using TMD in the Evidence that would allow us to say "using TMD on peaches has NOT been shown to be acceptable?" We know that is harms 20% of peach eaters. So we could pre-phrase a rule like, "If a practice harms 20% of people affected by it, that practice is not shown to be acceptable." There's a good chance some of the other counterpoint nuance (like that TMD is technically fine on average, for most) may get packaged into the correct answer. But really we just need a rule that's triggered by the 20% getting harmed and deliver us the idea of "not been shown to be acceptable practice".

Correct answer:
C

Answer choice analysis:
A) Lots of new stuff here. Doesn't seem like a bridge. This is helping us conclude "we should be cautious about assessing TMD's risk". That doesn't seem close enough to "TMD is not shown to be acceptable."

B) The trigger doesn't have anything to do with the 20% harmed, so move on. If we dug deeper, the 2nd half isn't as strong as the 2nd half of (C). And the left side of (B) isn't triggered. We actually know that most of the population is NOT likely to ingest a peach.

C) Yes! Contraposed: If a pesticide isn't used for its intended purpose OR it has NOT been shown to harm some portion of the population, then its use is unacceptable. That's pretty good? Since the rule has an OR trigger, we only need one of those ideas. Can we say that TMD has "NOT been shown to be harmless to all portions of the population"? In other words, can we say that TMD "might be harmful to at least some portion of the population? We don't have a great language match for that in the Evidence, but it's the best we get from these answer choices.

D) Contraposed: If avg doses are not low or if a pesticide HAS been shown to be harmful to children, then society has a special obligation to protect small children. Is that 2nd half close enough to "not shown to be an acceptable practice"? It's not as tight a fit as (C) was.

E) "Sometimes" is super weak (so it couldn't strengthen much). Also there's nothing in the argument about protection from one harm backfiring and turning into a greater harm. Pesticides are trying to protect crops from harm, not protect "the population".

Takeaway/Pattern: You can cut down on how much of a Principle-Strengthen answer choice you bother reading if you're clear on where the 2nd half your rule needs to take you (The Conclusion). Had we scanned for rules that allows to prove "something has NOT been shown to be an acceptable practice", we would essentially only have (C) to consider.

#officialexplanation

[irenewerwerwer]

Why C is correct and A flawed? I did not find elements corresponding to "intended purpose" in C in the stimulus.

Any thought?

[demetri.blaisdell]

This is a principle (support) question with a whole lot of reading. The argument is pretty straightforward, though. The gap in the argument relates to a term shift: "acceptable practice" shows up in the conclusion for the first time. You're thinking, "who says what is or isn't an acceptable practice?"

(C) gives us exactly what we're looking for: a definition of when something is an acceptable practice. The only way using a pesticide is an acceptable practice is (1) if it is used for its intended purpose and (2) has been proven not to harm anybody. The second part of the test is clearly not met; the author is concerned about the children. Therefore it's not an acceptable practice.

I don't necessarily agree with you about the first part of the test. There's not much question that the pesticide is being used for its intended purpose (pesticides are meant to be used in growing fruits/vegetables). But the key is that it doesn't matter whether that condition is met! The second condition wasn't so there's no way it's an acceptable practice.

(A) is a premise de-booster. It doesn't contain any definition of what is or isn't an acceptable practice. It says we should use "caution" in assessing the pesticide's current risks. Well that's wonderful, but is using the pesticide an acceptable practice or not?

I hope this helps clear up any confusion. Let me know if you have any questions.

Demetri

[Nina]

i have a hard time eliminating answer D. the second part after "unless", namely "and have not been shown to be harmful to children's health" would cause TMD not to meet the criteria, thus cannot be acceptable. is D wrong because it doesn't address "acceptable" explicitly?

thanks a lot!

[julia.korolkova]

I also had a hard time eliminating D but I think it is wrong because it talks about an obligation to protect small children but the passage is concerned with acceptable practice of TMD pesticide use. Answer C deals with acceptable use of the pesticide hence is the right answer.

[maryadkins]

I'd say (D) is wrong because it makes the argument solely about small children, whereas in the actual argument, they're just part of the reason pesticides are unacceptable. ("Others, including small children...") This argument is about pesticides being problematic for everyone, not just small children.

To answer your question, Nina, I wouldn't be bothered by the lack of the EXACT word "acceptable" in (D). Suppose (D) said that "we have an obligation to protect the population from harmful pesticides if [blah blah]..." That could potentially be correct (depending on what else it said"”the criteria would have to match, too).

As for the other answer choices that haven't yet been discussed in this chain:

(B) doesn't match our situation. The majority of the population isn't consuming it.

(E) measures to protect cause more serious harm? No.

[ttunden]

also for D, the sufficient conditions were never met.



Average doses are NOT low Special Obligation

or --------------------> 2 protect Children

Average doses shown to harm any portion of population


these sufficient conditions are not being met. So this is one of the reasons why answer choice D is wrong.

[yeh.briann]

I'd say (D) is wrong because it makes the argument solely about small children, whereas in the actual argument, they're just part of the reason pesticides are unacceptable. ("Others, including small children...") This argument is about pesticides being problematic for everyone, not just small children.

To answer your question, Nina, I wouldn't be bothered by the lack of the EXACT word "acceptable" in (D). Suppose (D) said that "we have an obligation to protect the population from harmful pesticides if [blah blah]..." That could potentially be correct (depending on what else it said"”the criteria would have to match, too).

As for the other answer choices that haven't yet been discussed in this chain:

(B) doesn't match our situation. The majority of the population isn't consuming it.

(E) measures to protect cause more serious harm? No.

Can someone explain more about why (E) is incorrect? I took the "measures taken to protect" to be the pesticide TMD, and the "harm to certain segments of the population" as the children who ear more than the national average of the peaches. But is the issue with this AC that it doesn't justify the argumentation, which is that the use of TMD is not an acceptable practice? Is the issue with (E) that it doesn't help us justify the conclusion that the practice of using TMD is not acceptable? Thanks!

[maryadkins]

Well, a pesticide isn't a measure taken to protect people. It's a measure taken to protect fruit. And also what you said about further reasons why (E) is wrong is correct.

[seychelles1718]

Can I eliminate B just because of "unlikely," without bothering to look at the second half ("when a majority...") of the answer choice?

[ohthatpatrick]

It's a good spidey-sense, but it's not a clear dealbreaker.

You may be thinking of this question task TOO similarly to that of Sufficient Assumption. With Sufficient Assumption, you would certainly be wise to think "unlikely to be acceptable" does NOT guarantee me "not acceptable".

But this is ultimately a Strengthen question, so from time to time you see answers that don't really "lock it in"; they just support more than any other choice.

So I would say seeing the "unlikely" is really a case of put a squiggle next to the answer for 'doubtful' and move on.

[KenM242]

We know that is harms 20% of peach eaters.

The stimulus does not say this. It says 80% of the entire population do not eat peaches, while others (20% of the POPULATION, not peach eaters) are eating peaches along with TMD.