Q23 - Shrimp farming results in damage

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
ID the Disagreement

Stimulus Breakdown:
A: SF damages the environment. Investors make quick profits and then abandon the farms.
J: Most owners of shrimp farms put a lot of effort into setting them up, so most owners stick around for years.

Answer Anticipation:
Does J argue that "shrimp farming DOESN'T result in damage to the environment"? Not explicitly.
Does J argue that "investors do NOT make quick profits and then abandon the farms". Yes.

She admits that farms are sometimes quickly abandoned (when 'unsustainable'), but says that typically it takes a while to build a farm and a while to make enough money for it to be worth it, so it's rare (or nonexistent) to make a quick buck and then abandon the farm.

So does J have a position on environmental damage? We could probably say that she thinks shrimp farming isn't environmentally damaging FOR THE REASON ALEX CITED.

Correct Answer:
B

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) "Eventually" makes this something out of scope. The disagreement is over whether most owners QUICKLY abandon the farms.

(B) Yes, this could work. Alex implies that YES, investors often make a quick profit and move on. Jolene, meanwhile, suggests that it takes a while to make your money back so NO, shrimp famring doesn't usually yield a quick profit (usually, you have to stay productive for years)

(C) We don't know Jolene's position on environmental damage, OTHER THAN that she wouldn't think that quick abandonment of famrs would be a substantial problem.

(D) They would probably agree to this. Jolene is saying farms aren't usually abandoned, not that abandonment is harmless.

(E) Neither party labels the farmers themselves as "irresponsible".

Takeaway/Pattern: Once you've read both parties' statements, re-read the first person's claims and ask yourself if person 2 is arguing the opposite, for each of those claims. Here, it would protect us against the intended trap answers about "environmental damage". The language of whether shrimp farming is "often quick/easy" in (B) is not perfectly inferrable from both parties, but this answer still has better support than any other choice.

#officialexplanation

[schwingrocker]

Why is the answer B instead of C?

[sumukh09]

Jolene doesn't explicitly disagree with Alex's contention that shrimp farming results in some environmental damage, she never mentions anything about this so we can't say that she disagrees. For B) however, we can make the assertion that she thinks most farmers do not abandon their farms to yield a "quick profit." We know this because of Jolene's last statement; if most owners try to make sure their farms are productive for many years, then they wouldn't be able to realize a quick profit by abandoning their farms since they try and recuperate the costs associated with building the farms by remaining in production for "many years."

[scott.callin66]

I really think this was a poorly worded questions. Jolene simply says that "properly built" shrimp farms have certain characteristics. I think it's implied by Alex that those quicky shrimp farms aren't properly built. I guess questions like these are supposed to be the difference-makers but deception in wording doesn't seem like a great way to do it.

[s.atrmachin3]

Can anyone shed light on why (A) is incorrect here?

[rinagoldfield]

Great discussion.

There’s only one thing both Alex and Jolene talk about: whether shrimp farming is fast or not. Alex sees quick profits, while Jolene sees "a long time" spent constructing proper shrimp farms and "many years" of productivity.

(B) gets at this point of disagreement.

(A) is tempting... but look at the time scale. Alex and Jolene might agree that most farmers EVENTUALLY abandon their farms.

(C), (D), and (E) are all half-scope. Jolene doesn’t mention the environment. So we don’t know what she thinks about shrimp farms' environmental impact, or whether she disagrees with Alex on these points.

Hope that helps.

[rtrombley]

Can anyone shed light on why (A) is incorrect here?

One reason why A is incorrect is because of the pronoun shift.

From Alex, we know that investors "make quick profits.... and then abandon the farms."

However, Alex made no statement about whether most owners of farms eventually abandon their farms.

In addition, Jolene's view, with respect this query, is not contained within the stimulus.

[can_I_ever_reach_a_170?]

Hi!
I’m posting a question because I’m still confused by the correct answer choice B’s wording.

I understand Alex agrees, but I think Jolene could also agree with answer choice B’s wording.

To me, “often” is closer to “some.” So I think Jolene can agree with the statement that shrimp farming sometimes yields a quick, easy profit. But no for most owners of property built shrimp farms.

Should I think “often” is stronger than “some” but less strong than “most?

Thank you!

[ohthatpatrick]

Before I go further, remember you're looking for THE BEST answer, not A PERFECT answer.

There will be times where we stretch a little bit to defend an answer, but it's still the most supportable answer.

In terms of the quantity terms
Most > Often > Some

They're all compatible with each other, but most has the highest burden of proof (more than half of all cases).

Often / commonly / frequently = ??? It's hard to say a precise minimum, here but it definitely has to be more than a handful of times.

Some = at least one case

So I wouldn't say we're allowed to say that often is closer to 'some' than to 'most', but I think you just meant "often is allowed to be less than most".

Anyhoo, Jolene's claim is categorical:
"Properly built shrimp farms take a long time to construct and are costly to operate".

There's no hedging of the wording there, so it seems like she's saying 100% of properly built shrimp farms take a long time to construct and are costly to operate.

Maybe improperly built shrimp farms are capable of yielding a quick/easy profit, and maybe they do so "often", but nothing Jolene says indicates anything of that sort.

Hope this helps.

[JackQ201]

I'm having trouble seeing that answer choice B is the right answer. How do we know that Alex believes that shrimp farming "often" yields a quick, easy profit? I don't see any sort of percentage or numerical value in his statement that would imply that shrimp farming "often" yields a profit. In my mind, the word often would imply greater than 50%, or is my assumption wrong?

In addition, answer choice B states that shrimp farming often yields a quick, "easy" profit. Once again, how can we conclude that Alex and Jolene disagree over this statement if this aspect of "easiness" isn't mentioned in any of their statements?

Am I perhaps reading into these words too much? Any help would be appreciated, thank you!