Q24 - Telephone companies are promoting

[willaminic]

Ok, i chose C over D which i can see why is correct.

But i just wondering why C is incorrect? The conclusion is that the voice mail will make answering machine obsolete, so C could weaken it given the chance that the service is always concealable....

[geverett]

Hey I'm not quite sure what you mean by "concealable". If you could clarify for me just a bit that would be awesome.

Here's what I was thinking when I did this question:

Conclusion: Answering machines will soon be obsolete.

Evidence: A new service called "voice mail" provides a similar service that is much more convenient, flexible, and less expensive.

Question: Weaken this argument

Prephrase: Okay this sounds like a reasonable argument, but I need to weaken it and in order to do that I want to show that just because voice mail has all these benefits over answering machines that perhaps there is a benefit to answering machines over voice mail that the author has not considered in constructing his argument.

(A) This would strengthen the argument as it gives another benefit of voice mail over answering machines. Get rid of it.
(B) We need to weaken the claim that voice mail's benefits will cause answering machines to become obsolete. A discussion of the sales history of answering machines does not address this at all. Irrelevant. Get rid of it.
(C) Just because they can cancel the service at anytime does not necessarily mean they will. This answer choice is too ambiguous to know how it will affect our argument core. One could even imagine a scenario where this could actually strengthen the argument, because if there was a "no strings attached cancel at any time" policy to entice customers to try voice mail it could bring many customers over from answering machines to voice mail. The details of the consumer agreement that customers make when signing up for voice mail does not weaken our argument core which is about the benefits of voice mail causing answering machines to become obsolete. Get rid of it.
(D) This is exactly what we want. It describes a benefit of answering machines over voice mail that the author has not considered. Winner.
(E) This would be a potential strengthen answer choice since it shows another limitation of answering machines. However, we still need a comparison of voice mail vs. answering machines and this does not get into the comparative nature of the stimulus. Get rid of it.

Please let me know if you need any of the points clarified.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Nice explanation geverett!