#19 - If the flowers Drew received today had been sent by

[alycatlsat]

Hi, can someone help me with the issue I'm having with A vs B?

I eliminated the answer choices down to A and B, but I'm having trouble seeing why A is less sound than B, even after reading the discussion above. My thought process is this:

- For A, most people (50%+) send roses. Therefore, even if the person knew Drew, he/she sent roses anyway, because it's what most people send. Drew's preference might not have trumped the norm to send roses. So even though Drew likes violets better, since 50%+ people send roses, the sender had no intention to satisfy Drew's preference.

- For B, some people (1+) don't send with the desire to please. Therefore, the person may have sent roses because he/she had no intention to satisfy Drew's preference.

In both cases, you have to make assumptions (for A, you would have to assume the person, if he did know Drew, knew his preference but decided that sending roses is more socially acceptable/normal. for B, you would have to assume the person who knew Drew did not want to make him happy).

Neither of these choices are better than the other in my brain, so I'm hoping someone can make it clear why B is more valid than A! Thank you!

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi Alycat

Let's start by looking at the reasoning.

Statement 1: Sender knows D---> Knows he likes violets more than roses
Contrapositive: Doesn't know violets more than roses---->Doesn't know D.

Statement 2: Sender doesn't know D---> send a card.
Contrapositive: No card--->Sender DOES know D

We know there is no card, which is related to the contrapositive of the second conditional. no card--->sender knows D

We also know that Drew received roses. But notice that receiving roses wasn't part of the first conditional. It's about knowing a preference. We want to weaken the conclusion that the florist made a mistake. So we are looking for an answer choice that says someone could know a preference, but still send something else.

Answer choice (B) does that---it says that people send flowers for reasons other than to please the recipient. That's something that, if true, would weaken the conclusion that the sender didn't know Drew. The sender could have known Drew, known his preferences, but sent different flowers because his goal was not to please.

Answer choice (A) on the other hand does not really address the issue. Even if most people send roses, that doesn't really explain why this sender would send roses to someone that didn't prefer them. Imagine if you were getting pizza with a friend, and they asked what you wanted. You said plain cheese. They show up with pepperoni and say "well, most people like pepperoni." That's sort of irrelevant to the question of what it made sense to get for YOU. Just like here, it doesn't matter what most people like. It's about what Drew likes, and what would overrule that preference.

Hope that helps!
Rachael

[alycatlsat]

Yes, this makes sense. Thank you so much!!!