- Wed Jan 20, 2010 12:00 am
#73844
Complete Question Explanation
The correct answer choice is (C).
Parallel reasoning questions require you to understand the stimulus well enough to analogize it to other contexts. For this question, we need to understand "the relationship between strengthening current copyright laws and relying on passwords to restrict access to a Web document." Well, the author thinks that imposing protections on users is an inferior solution to the compromise solution of allowing users to choose to protect themselves with passwords. One of the basic themes here is "mandatory vs. optional." Another is "imposed from above vs. allowing user agency." I will use these ideas to sort the answer choices.
Answer choice (A): This answer choice is about including everyone versus excluding most. Since the relationship in the prephrase wasn't really about inclusion and exclusion, let's see if there's a better answer choice.
Answer choice (B): Outlawing use and outlawing sale doesn't relate very well. It's difficult to see how "outlawing use" corresponds to "allowing users to choose to protect themselves."
Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice. Oooooh, this one looks good! Prohibitions are mandatory and imposed, while "relying on participants to employ proper safety gear" sounds more optional and allows user agency by relying on them to take action to protect themselves. Here, the passwords that users choose to employ are like the safety gear that athletes can wear. Notice that the idea of protection is in both the stimulus and the answer choice. (Contrast this with answer choice (E), which involves a "protection" theme but does not analyze the right relationship: the relationship between the two solutions discussed in the passage.
Answer choice (D): Passing and enforcing a law is all mandatory, not what we're looking for.
Answer choice (E): This is a distractor answer choice and a bit of a shell game! It tries to trick us by using an analogy, where a badge is like a password and a building is like a webpage, but, importantly, that's not the relationship that the question stem asked us to analogize!
The correct answer choice is (C).
Parallel reasoning questions require you to understand the stimulus well enough to analogize it to other contexts. For this question, we need to understand "the relationship between strengthening current copyright laws and relying on passwords to restrict access to a Web document." Well, the author thinks that imposing protections on users is an inferior solution to the compromise solution of allowing users to choose to protect themselves with passwords. One of the basic themes here is "mandatory vs. optional." Another is "imposed from above vs. allowing user agency." I will use these ideas to sort the answer choices.
Answer choice (A): This answer choice is about including everyone versus excluding most. Since the relationship in the prephrase wasn't really about inclusion and exclusion, let's see if there's a better answer choice.
Answer choice (B): Outlawing use and outlawing sale doesn't relate very well. It's difficult to see how "outlawing use" corresponds to "allowing users to choose to protect themselves."
Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice. Oooooh, this one looks good! Prohibitions are mandatory and imposed, while "relying on participants to employ proper safety gear" sounds more optional and allows user agency by relying on them to take action to protect themselves. Here, the passwords that users choose to employ are like the safety gear that athletes can wear. Notice that the idea of protection is in both the stimulus and the answer choice. (Contrast this with answer choice (E), which involves a "protection" theme but does not analyze the right relationship: the relationship between the two solutions discussed in the passage.
Answer choice (D): Passing and enforcing a law is all mandatory, not what we're looking for.
Answer choice (E): This is a distractor answer choice and a bit of a shell game! It tries to trick us by using an analogy, where a badge is like a password and a building is like a webpage, but, importantly, that's not the relationship that the question stem asked us to analogize!