#16 - The seventeenth-century physicist Sir Isaac Newton is

[rachel_fs03]

Hi! I chose B, but only because I eliminated the other answers. B doesn't feel right to me as enough to justify the conclusion. This is because the conclusion references chemistry while B references science.

Without the word "all" to indicate that every field of science, including chemistry, would have its advances hastened, how can this answer choice justify that advances in chemistry specifically will be hastened? I interpreted this as an error of division because advances in science as a whole do not equate to advances in chemistry. Additionally, even if B had included the word "all", how would this prove the part of the conclusion about the 18th century? Even if all scientific advances were hastened, would this necessarily have made the field of chemistry overall more advanced in the 18th century? Wouldn't this be assuming the timing of exactly how hastened the advances are?

I feel like I'm overthinking this, but I've trained myself to be scrupulous for justify questions to make sure they prove the conclusion 100%. This answer felt like it proved the conclusion 90%.

Thanks in advance!

[Dana D]

Hey Rachel,

When the test says something like answer choice (B) "advances in science are hastened", you can understand it to mean broadly all fields of science, of which chemistry is a part. This is conditional logic: when reports of experiments are available for review advances in science are hastened. Therefore, if reports of 17th century experiments had been available in the 18th century, advances in science (including chemistry) would have been hastened and more advanced than it was. Any hastening in advances at all would put the advancement ahead of what it actually is.

Hope that helps!