Hello,
I am actually considering disputing this with LSAC but I thought it wouldn't hurt to run it by Manhattan first. I believe the issue is with the wording here. In the stem it says that the grapefruit juice affects how certain medicines are absorbed with the result that normal doses act like higher doses. The question never explicitly says why, but more importantly, the question never specifies whether or not that is because the degree of the chemical in the juice or simply the fact that the grapefruit has that chemical.
Assuming you narrow the answer choices to A and E because I think bcd are not the answer here. A and E both weaken the initial answer stem; however, I think if you interpreted the question as simply the fact that grapefruit has the chemical then answer choice E, the fact that doctors advised patients who took certain medicines to avoid grapefruit juice, would be the only one that even weakened the initial stem. Whereas, If you assume it is the degree of that chemical in the answer then A would make the most sense.
Thoughts?
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- bp0
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- christine.defenbaugh
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Atticus Finch
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
Interesting question, bp0!
First, you are absolutely correct in noting that they don't specify whether 1) the chemical has a variable effect based on amount ingested or 2) the chemical functions in a purely binary way - i.e., if you ingest any at all, a constant effect occurs, regardless of amount.
I could argue that the second reading defies what the LSAT would consider to be common sense about how chemicals tend to work in bodies. The fact that the conclusion refers to "prescribed amounts of grapefruit juice" bolsters the idea that the amount matters.
But I don't have to argue this!
Let's take a look at why not! First, let's break out the argument core:
Since we want to weaken the argument, we need something that suggests that this plan is NOT the "best medical approach" - in other words, what new information could show that this plan is a bad idea?
IF THE CHEMICAL IS A BINARY-TRIGGER WITH A CONSTANT EFFECT....
For argument's sake, let's say that the chemical is a binary-trigger with a constant effect. In this situation, (A) (the amount of the chemical varying from glass to glass) would have no effect on the argument. As long as people were getting some of the chemical, the constant effect would be triggered.
But (E) wouldn't have any effect on the argument either. What doctors were doing in yesteryear doesn't have any impact on what the best medical approach is now that we have more information about the chemical. This doesn't tell me that this new plan is a bad medical approach now, it just tells me that doctors used to do something different.
So, we have one answer that weakens in one situation and does nothing in the other - (A); and an answer that does nothing under both situations - (E). Since a weakener only has to make the argument a little bit less likely to work, (A) is still a perfectly valid weakener, even allowing for the unlikely possibility that the chemical functions as a binary-trigger with a constant effect.
IF THE CHEMICAL HAS A VARIABLE EFFECT BASED ON AMOUNT INGESTED
Just to clarify for future students, if the amount of the chemical ingested matters, and (A) is true, then even with a "prescribed amount of grapefruit juice" that the conclusion mentions, you wouldn't necessarily be ingested a standard amount of the chemical. Thus, it would be impossible to predict the effect, and thus impossible to accurately adjust the medicine dosages. That all sounds terrible! This would definitely make this new plan NOT "the best medical approach"!
Let's take a quick look at the incorrect answers here:
It's very rare for an LSAT question to be worded improperly, or flawed. It has happened, but it's exceedingly uncommon. It's AWESOME to question why answers are right/wrong/etc, so that you deepen your understanding instead of just mindlessly accepting the answer key. However, it's generally a good idea to accept that, at the end of the day, if you don't understand why a particular answer is correct, the error is far more likely to be in your own thought process than it is to be in the LSAT question itself. Your questioning should be with the goal of discovering that error.
It's very dangerous to conclude that questions that you don't yet understand must be themselves flawed. Thinking that way will undermine your ability to improve your logical connections and maximize your LSAT understanding.
Please let me know if this helps clear up a few things!
First, you are absolutely correct in noting that they don't specify whether 1) the chemical has a variable effect based on amount ingested or 2) the chemical functions in a purely binary way - i.e., if you ingest any at all, a constant effect occurs, regardless of amount.
I could argue that the second reading defies what the LSAT would consider to be common sense about how chemicals tend to work in bodies. The fact that the conclusion refers to "prescribed amounts of grapefruit juice" bolsters the idea that the amount matters.
But I don't have to argue this!
Let's take a look at why not! First, let's break out the argument core:- PREMISE: 1) Getting the wrong dose is dangerous
2) It's always best to take the lowest dose of a medicine
3) The grapefruit-chemical causes medicine to act like higher doses.
CONCLUSION: Best approach: take lower meds + certain amt grapefruit juice
Since we want to weaken the argument, we need something that suggests that this plan is NOT the "best medical approach" - in other words, what new information could show that this plan is a bad idea?
IF THE CHEMICAL IS A BINARY-TRIGGER WITH A CONSTANT EFFECT....
For argument's sake, let's say that the chemical is a binary-trigger with a constant effect. In this situation, (A) (the amount of the chemical varying from glass to glass) would have no effect on the argument. As long as people were getting some of the chemical, the constant effect would be triggered.
But (E) wouldn't have any effect on the argument either. What doctors were doing in yesteryear doesn't have any impact on what the best medical approach is now that we have more information about the chemical. This doesn't tell me that this new plan is a bad medical approach now, it just tells me that doctors used to do something different.
So, we have one answer that weakens in one situation and does nothing in the other - (A); and an answer that does nothing under both situations - (E). Since a weakener only has to make the argument a little bit less likely to work, (A) is still a perfectly valid weakener, even allowing for the unlikely possibility that the chemical functions as a binary-trigger with a constant effect.
IF THE CHEMICAL HAS A VARIABLE EFFECT BASED ON AMOUNT INGESTED
Just to clarify for future students, if the amount of the chemical ingested matters, and (A) is true, then even with a "prescribed amount of grapefruit juice" that the conclusion mentions, you wouldn't necessarily be ingested a standard amount of the chemical. Thus, it would be impossible to predict the effect, and thus impossible to accurately adjust the medicine dosages. That all sounds terrible! This would definitely make this new plan NOT "the best medical approach"!
Let's take a quick look at the incorrect answers here:
(B) Who cares about the cost? We need to know what's a good or bad medical plan!
(C) Who cares what happens when we remove the chemical? This medical plan is about using normal grapefruit juice.
(D) Who cares exactly how the chemical gets the job done - what matters is the impact on dosages and whether this is a good medical plan!
(E) Who cares what doctors were doing "long before" now? That doesn't tell me what a good plan is now!
It's very rare for an LSAT question to be worded improperly, or flawed. It has happened, but it's exceedingly uncommon. It's AWESOME to question why answers are right/wrong/etc, so that you deepen your understanding instead of just mindlessly accepting the answer key. However, it's generally a good idea to accept that, at the end of the day, if you don't understand why a particular answer is correct, the error is far more likely to be in your own thought process than it is to be in the LSAT question itself. Your questioning should be with the goal of discovering that error.
It's very dangerous to conclude that questions that you don't yet understand must be themselves flawed. Thinking that way will undermine your ability to improve your logical connections and maximize your LSAT understanding.
Please let me know if this helps clear up a few things!
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- bp0
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
First, you are absolutely correct in noting that they don't specify whether 1) the chemical has a variable effect based on amount ingested or 2) the chemical functions in a purely binary way - i.e., if you ingest any at all, a constant effect occurs, regardless of amount.
I would replace a constant effect occurs, regardless of amount with the effects of initial ingestion. For example, .0006 mg of venom from a Brazilian wandering spider kills a mouse. My guess is the mouse doesn’t want any of that venom anywhere near it. You could use a hyperbole and say what if there is a chemical that kills mice if they ingest .0000000000000000000000000000001 ml of it. If that is the case it won’t matter whether it is .0000000000000000000000000000001 or .01 or 1 or 4 ml. It’s dead either way.
I could argue that the second reading defies what the LSAT would consider to be common sense about how chemicals tend to work in bodies. The fact that the conclusion refers to "prescribed amounts of grapefruit juice" bolsters the idea that the amount matters.
I find this response very interesting. In my opinion, if Lsac isn’t specifying the above and it breaks the question and their rebuttal is oh you should have assumed that, I find that incredibly problematic for obvious reasons. A doctor could prescribe the same amount of x medicine to every patient. Again you are assuming the prescribed amounts differ.
But I don't have to argue this! Let's take a look at why not! First, let's break out the argument core:
PREMISE: 1) Getting the wrong dose is dangerous
2) It's always best to take the lowest dose of a medicine
3) The grapefruit-chemical causes medicine to act like higher doses.
CONCLUSION: Best approach: take lower meds + certain amt grapefruit juice
Since we want to weaken the argument, we need something that suggests that this plan is NOT the "best medical approach" - in other words, what new information could show that this plan is a bad idea?
E does. If Doctors previously were telling patients to avoid Grapefruit juice completely and new doctors changed that, that would seriously weaken that the best medical approach would be to take the medications along with the grapefruit juice.
IF THE CHEMICAL IS A BINARY-TRIGGER WITH A CONSTANT EFFECT....
For argument's sake, let's say that the chemical is a binary-trigger with a constant effect. In this situation, (A) (the amount of the chemical varying from glass to glass) would have no effect on the argument. As long as people were getting some of the chemical, the constant effect would be triggered.
Agreed. It wouldn’t weaken the argument at all.
But (E) wouldn't have any effect on the argument either. What doctors were doing in yesteryear doesn't have any impact on what the best medical approach is now that we have more information about the chemical. This doesn't tell me that this new plan is a bad medical approach now, it just tells me that doctors used to do something different.
I disagree. If E is true, couldn’t it be suggesting that perhaps previously there was a reason doctors were adivisng patients against grapefruit juice? This would leave the door open for the fact that perhaps you shouldn’t take any! To use a hyperbole to elucidate my point, since I love hyperboles obviously, what if the grapefruit juice combined with cough medicine was killing people. What if the cough medicine back in the day had sugar in it and it was really the sugar+ grapefruit Juice combo that was killing people. Obviously this is an utterly ridiculous what if situation but I think it prove that E insinuates that there might be a reason that doctors were advising patience to avoid grapefruit juice.
Either way in this situation E is the only one that REMOTELY weakens the answer.
So, we have one answer that weakens in one situation and does nothing in the other - (A); and an answer that does nothing under both situations - (E). Since a weakener only has to make the argument a little bit less likely to work, (A) is still a perfectly valid weakener, even allowing for the unlikely possibility that the chemical functions as a binary-trigger with a constant effect.
Again replace constant effect with initial effect.
IF THE CHEMICAL HAS A VARIABLE EFFECT BASED ON AMOUNT INGESTED
Just to clarify for future students, if the amount of the chemical ingested matters, and (A) is true, then even with a "prescribed amount of grapefruit juice" that the conclusion mentions, you wouldn't necessarily be ingested a standard amount of the chemical. Thus, it would be impossible to predict the effect, and thus impossible to accurately adjust the medicine dosages. That all sounds terrible! This would definitely make this new plan NOT "the best medical approach"!
Let's take a quick look at the incorrect answers here:
(B) Who cares about the cost? We need to know what's a good or badmedical plan! Agree.
(C) Who cares what happens when we remove the chemical? This medical plan is about using normal grapefruit juice. Agree.
(D) Who cares exactly how the chemical gets the job done - what matters is the impact on dosages and whether this is a good medical plan! Agree.
(E) Who cares what doctors were doing "long before" now? That doesn't tell me what a good plan is now! Disagree.
What if Doctor's changed their behavior that wasn't in your best interest due to some other incentive? One doesn't have to look too far in the real world to see this happens quite often. Either way the only thing you care about is what plan is the correct plan. The time period the doctor is alive in isn't nearly as important as going to the Doctor with the correct plan!
It's very rare for an LSAT question to be worded improperly, or flawed. It has happened, but it's exceedingly uncommon. It's AWESOME to question why answers are right/wrong/etc, so that you deepen your understanding instead of just mindlessly accepting the answer key. However, it's generally a good idea to accept that, at the end of the day, if you don't understand why a particular answer is correct, the error is far more likely to be in your own thought process than it is to be in the LSAT question itself. Your questioning should be with the goal of discovering that error.
I get that trust me; I agree that it is very rare that there are questions wrong on the LSAT. However, that does not mean that LSAC get’s a free pass and shouldn’t have to defend itself when test takers believe that a question is debatable. In fact, I would think that LSAC would encourage this type of behavior given the exam is to get into Law School.
It's very dangerous to conclude that questions that you don't yet understand must be themselves flawed. Thinking that way will undermine your ability to improve your logical connections and maximize your LSAT understanding.
It isn’t that I don’t understand the question therefore it must be flawed. It is I reviewed the question, I thought I would see if someone at Manhattan could refute me, I would have a friendly debate about the question, and I would come to a conclusion on whether I need to dispute the question.
I scored a 166 on this specific test. Half of the questions I missed were in RC so I am consistently going -1 to -4 on LR. I do make mistakes and my other two questions in this section I missed on the actual test were my mistakes. However, I still believe this question is refutable.
Please let me know if this helps clear up a few things!
It helps a lot but I still look forward to your response. Thank you for your time Christine.
I would replace a constant effect occurs, regardless of amount with the effects of initial ingestion. For example, .0006 mg of venom from a Brazilian wandering spider kills a mouse. My guess is the mouse doesn’t want any of that venom anywhere near it. You could use a hyperbole and say what if there is a chemical that kills mice if they ingest .0000000000000000000000000000001 ml of it. If that is the case it won’t matter whether it is .0000000000000000000000000000001 or .01 or 1 or 4 ml. It’s dead either way.
I could argue that the second reading defies what the LSAT would consider to be common sense about how chemicals tend to work in bodies. The fact that the conclusion refers to "prescribed amounts of grapefruit juice" bolsters the idea that the amount matters.
I find this response very interesting. In my opinion, if Lsac isn’t specifying the above and it breaks the question and their rebuttal is oh you should have assumed that, I find that incredibly problematic for obvious reasons. A doctor could prescribe the same amount of x medicine to every patient. Again you are assuming the prescribed amounts differ.
But I don't have to argue this! Let's take a look at why not! First, let's break out the argument core:
PREMISE: 1) Getting the wrong dose is dangerous
2) It's always best to take the lowest dose of a medicine
3) The grapefruit-chemical causes medicine to act like higher doses.
CONCLUSION: Best approach: take lower meds + certain amt grapefruit juice
Since we want to weaken the argument, we need something that suggests that this plan is NOT the "best medical approach" - in other words, what new information could show that this plan is a bad idea?
E does. If Doctors previously were telling patients to avoid Grapefruit juice completely and new doctors changed that, that would seriously weaken that the best medical approach would be to take the medications along with the grapefruit juice.
IF THE CHEMICAL IS A BINARY-TRIGGER WITH A CONSTANT EFFECT....
For argument's sake, let's say that the chemical is a binary-trigger with a constant effect. In this situation, (A) (the amount of the chemical varying from glass to glass) would have no effect on the argument. As long as people were getting some of the chemical, the constant effect would be triggered.
Agreed. It wouldn’t weaken the argument at all.
But (E) wouldn't have any effect on the argument either. What doctors were doing in yesteryear doesn't have any impact on what the best medical approach is now that we have more information about the chemical. This doesn't tell me that this new plan is a bad medical approach now, it just tells me that doctors used to do something different.
I disagree. If E is true, couldn’t it be suggesting that perhaps previously there was a reason doctors were adivisng patients against grapefruit juice? This would leave the door open for the fact that perhaps you shouldn’t take any! To use a hyperbole to elucidate my point, since I love hyperboles obviously, what if the grapefruit juice combined with cough medicine was killing people. What if the cough medicine back in the day had sugar in it and it was really the sugar+ grapefruit Juice combo that was killing people. Obviously this is an utterly ridiculous what if situation but I think it prove that E insinuates that there might be a reason that doctors were advising patience to avoid grapefruit juice.
Either way in this situation E is the only one that REMOTELY weakens the answer.
So, we have one answer that weakens in one situation and does nothing in the other - (A); and an answer that does nothing under both situations - (E). Since a weakener only has to make the argument a little bit less likely to work, (A) is still a perfectly valid weakener, even allowing for the unlikely possibility that the chemical functions as a binary-trigger with a constant effect.
Again replace constant effect with initial effect.
IF THE CHEMICAL HAS A VARIABLE EFFECT BASED ON AMOUNT INGESTED
Just to clarify for future students, if the amount of the chemical ingested matters, and (A) is true, then even with a "prescribed amount of grapefruit juice" that the conclusion mentions, you wouldn't necessarily be ingested a standard amount of the chemical. Thus, it would be impossible to predict the effect, and thus impossible to accurately adjust the medicine dosages. That all sounds terrible! This would definitely make this new plan NOT "the best medical approach"!
Let's take a quick look at the incorrect answers here:
(B) Who cares about the cost? We need to know what's a good or badmedical plan! Agree.
(C) Who cares what happens when we remove the chemical? This medical plan is about using normal grapefruit juice. Agree.
(D) Who cares exactly how the chemical gets the job done - what matters is the impact on dosages and whether this is a good medical plan! Agree.
(E) Who cares what doctors were doing "long before" now? That doesn't tell me what a good plan is now! Disagree.
What if Doctor's changed their behavior that wasn't in your best interest due to some other incentive? One doesn't have to look too far in the real world to see this happens quite often. Either way the only thing you care about is what plan is the correct plan. The time period the doctor is alive in isn't nearly as important as going to the Doctor with the correct plan!
It's very rare for an LSAT question to be worded improperly, or flawed. It has happened, but it's exceedingly uncommon. It's AWESOME to question why answers are right/wrong/etc, so that you deepen your understanding instead of just mindlessly accepting the answer key. However, it's generally a good idea to accept that, at the end of the day, if you don't understand why a particular answer is correct, the error is far more likely to be in your own thought process than it is to be in the LSAT question itself. Your questioning should be with the goal of discovering that error.
I get that trust me; I agree that it is very rare that there are questions wrong on the LSAT. However, that does not mean that LSAC get’s a free pass and shouldn’t have to defend itself when test takers believe that a question is debatable. In fact, I would think that LSAC would encourage this type of behavior given the exam is to get into Law School.
It's very dangerous to conclude that questions that you don't yet understand must be themselves flawed. Thinking that way will undermine your ability to improve your logical connections and maximize your LSAT understanding.
It isn’t that I don’t understand the question therefore it must be flawed. It is I reviewed the question, I thought I would see if someone at Manhattan could refute me, I would have a friendly debate about the question, and I would come to a conclusion on whether I need to dispute the question.
I scored a 166 on this specific test. Half of the questions I missed were in RC so I am consistently going -1 to -4 on LR. I do make mistakes and my other two questions in this section I missed on the actual test were my mistakes. However, I still believe this question is refutable.
Please let me know if this helps clear up a few things!
It helps a lot but I still look forward to your response. Thank you for your time Christine.
Last edited by bp0 on Tue Mar 31, 2015 11:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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- tommywallach
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Atticus Finch
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
Hey Bp,
Just wanted to let you know, on the forums, we answer orange folks (students who haven't taken a class or bought a book) when they ask a new question, but we don't do follow-ups, so Christine won't be returning here. That said, be aware that your reasoning on (E) remains incorrect. You keep jumping to assumptions about WHY stuff happened in the past, but all we know is that something DID happen in the past. That fact alone is irrelevant. You can't make up your own explanations for why, then call it a weakener/strengthener.
Hope that helps a bit!
-t
Just wanted to let you know, on the forums, we answer orange folks (students who haven't taken a class or bought a book) when they ask a new question, but we don't do follow-ups, so Christine won't be returning here. That said, be aware that your reasoning on (E) remains incorrect. You keep jumping to assumptions about WHY stuff happened in the past, but all we know is that something DID happen in the past. That fact alone is irrelevant. You can't make up your own explanations for why, then call it a weakener/strengthener.
Hope that helps a bit!
-t
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- bp0
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
Fair enough, I understand. I have purchased the books, so when I get home perhaps I will just register if I still have questions.
In regards to the question, E is stating that doctors were specifically advising their patients against doing this. Without making any assumptions as to why, that would still lead the reader to a strong indication that it must have been banned for a reason, right?
If you went to the doctor tomorrow and were prescribed medicine, for let's say the flu, and the doctor goes oh yeah, previously you couldn't brush your teeth while taking this medicine but as of yesterday, after being banned for the past 300 years, you can go ahead and brush your teeth with it. You are telling me you would just say ok sounds great! You wouldn't start to ask questions as to why it was banned?
Also you ignored the more important part of what I said- that because of the ambiguity in the question under my interpretation; which, Christine agreed with, A would not weaken the statement at all! So all you are left with is E as clearly bcd don't work here, even if E just slightly weakens it because of the above, it would be the only answer that even remotely works here.
At the end of the day I think that the ambiguity of the question is the main issue here.
In regards to the question, E is stating that doctors were specifically advising their patients against doing this. Without making any assumptions as to why, that would still lead the reader to a strong indication that it must have been banned for a reason, right?
If you went to the doctor tomorrow and were prescribed medicine, for let's say the flu, and the doctor goes oh yeah, previously you couldn't brush your teeth while taking this medicine but as of yesterday, after being banned for the past 300 years, you can go ahead and brush your teeth with it. You are telling me you would just say ok sounds great! You wouldn't start to ask questions as to why it was banned?
Also you ignored the more important part of what I said- that because of the ambiguity in the question under my interpretation; which, Christine agreed with, A would not weaken the statement at all! So all you are left with is E as clearly bcd don't work here, even if E just slightly weakens it because of the above, it would be the only answer that even remotely works here.
At the end of the day I think that the ambiguity of the question is the main issue here.
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- judaydaday
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Jackie Chiles
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
bp0 Wrote:Fair enough, I understand. I have purchased the books, so when I get home perhaps I will just register if I still have questions.
In regards to the question, E is stating that doctors were specifically advising their patients against doing this. Without making any assumptions as to why, that would still lead the reader to a strong indication that it must have been banned for a reason, right?
If you went to the doctor tomorrow and were prescribed medicine, for let's say the flu, and the doctor goes oh yeah, previously you couldn't brush your teeth while taking this medicine but as of yesterday, after being banned for the past 300 years, you can go ahead and brush your teeth with it. You are telling me you would just say ok sounds great! You wouldn't start to ask questions as to why it was banned?
Also you ignored the more important part of what I said- that because of the ambiguity in the question under my interpretation; which, Christine agreed with, A would not weaken the statement at all! So all you are left with is E as clearly bcd don't work here, even if E just slightly weakens it because of the above, it would be the only answer that even remotely works here.
At the end of the day I think that the ambiguity of the question is the main issue here.
I think that you are not focusing on the core of the argument here. To weaken an argument, at least on the LSAT, you need to weaken the support relationship between the premise and conclusion.
The premises are:
1. Chemical discovered in grapefruit affects how medicines are absorbed.
2. It is desirable to take the lowest effective dose
Conclusion: the best medical approach would be to take lower doses + prescribed amounts of grapefruit
In order to weaken a support relationship, you can't just ignore the premises given. On the LSAT, an argument is considered to be "good" when you can concede the truth of the premises the other person gives AND still provide reasons as to why their conclusion is unsupported/undermined by the reasons they provided...in other words, it's like saying "even if your premises are true, it doesn't support your conclusion because of x y z..."
So the correct answer must be relevant to the premise in some way.
In this sense, you can notice how (E) does not relate to the support relationship at all. On the other hand, you can see how even if the premise1 and premise 2 are true, this answer choice can still weaken the conclusion.
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- ganbayou
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Atticus Finch
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
I also chose E thinking maybe if it was identified dangerous long time ago, it is not the best approach and this weaken the argument...how can they say its the best if its identified dangerous before?
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- vstoever
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Vinny Gambini
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
I really don't understand why the answer can't be C.
If scientists can remove the chemical from grapefruit juice, wouldn't the best medical approach be to take normal doses with grapefruit juice without the chemical? Why is the chemical needed?
If scientists can remove the chemical from grapefruit juice, wouldn't the best medical approach be to take normal doses with grapefruit juice without the chemical? Why is the chemical needed?
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- andrewgong01
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Atticus Finch
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
vstoever Wrote:I really don't understand why the answer can't be C.
If scientists can remove the chemical from grapefruit juice, wouldn't the best medical approach be to take normal doses with grapefruit juice without the chemical? Why is the chemical needed?
I agree with your line of reasoning. However, I think "A" is just much stronger in terms of weakening since it directly strikes a blow and says your prescription is not viable at all. On the other hand, I disagree with some previous posters that "C" is irrelevant because "C" is giving, in some senses, an alternative proposal ( which usually works in strengthen/weaken where we look at the alternative explanations). However, where "C" "fails" I think is that although it gives us an alternative it does not really strike as strong of a blow as answer choice "A" because we do not know if removing chemicals all together is the best. Maybe there are other side effects to removing chemicals in grapefruit juices. Maybe the time +cost of doing it far outweighs the current harm of chemicals. The argument's conclusion is actaulyl saying the best approach is taking lower doses AND the status quo grapefruit juice whereas Choice C is simply saying change the grapefruit juice but are there implications for the dosage? Moreover, if you look at "A", "A" strikes a blow at both elements of the treatment because it simply says this proposal is not practical.
I personally thought this question was testing us on the EXTREME conclusion (Best) because extreme conclusions tend to have answer choices that focus on the EXTREME where pointiung out just something counter to it does the job and I think "C" does it really attractively but "A" is just too strong in that A bascailyl tells us upfront your plan is impossible. The negation of A also seems to be a NA in the argument which bridges the gap by making the plan seem more viable.
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Elle Woods
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Re: Q6 - While grapfuit juice is a healthy drink,
I have a different thought on why E is wrong.
In the premise, it is said that grape fruit juice seems to affect the absorbtion of "certain" medicine.
I suppose we can take that to mean "some" medicine.
In AC E, it is said that doctor suggest patient who took "certain" medicine not to drink grape fruits juice.
We have no idea whether these 2 scenarios are talking about the same kind of medicine.
For example, in the premise, we find Medicine ABC acts like higher dose when taken with grape fruit juice.
In AC E, the doctor suggest patient who took Medicine XYZ to avoid grape fruit juice.
And maybe the doctor's suggestion is based on the fact that XYZ will have toxic effects on human body when taken with grape fruits, nothing relevant with the "dose effect" mentioned in the stimulus.
Who knows.
So we cannot assume the XYZ equals ABC.
And it is possible that the same doctor in AC E will even agree with the argument and at the same time suggest patient to drink prescribed amounts of grape fruit juice to get the effect with lowest dose of medicine ABC.
In this way, we cannot assume the doctor's point weakens the argument in question.
In the premise, it is said that grape fruit juice seems to affect the absorbtion of "certain" medicine.
I suppose we can take that to mean "some" medicine.
In AC E, it is said that doctor suggest patient who took "certain" medicine not to drink grape fruits juice.
We have no idea whether these 2 scenarios are talking about the same kind of medicine.
For example, in the premise, we find Medicine ABC acts like higher dose when taken with grape fruit juice.
In AC E, the doctor suggest patient who took Medicine XYZ to avoid grape fruit juice.
And maybe the doctor's suggestion is based on the fact that XYZ will have toxic effects on human body when taken with grape fruits, nothing relevant with the "dose effect" mentioned in the stimulus.
Who knows.
So we cannot assume the XYZ equals ABC.
And it is possible that the same doctor in AC E will even agree with the argument and at the same time suggest patient to drink prescribed amounts of grape fruit juice to get the effect with lowest dose of medicine ABC.
In this way, we cannot assume the doctor's point weakens the argument in question.
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