#16 - The caffeine in coffee stimulates the production of

[bli2016]

I remember in the Powerscore course we approached the evaluation questions by answering in the two extremes and seeing if one extreme makes the argument valid and the other extreme makes the argument invalid. However, I still have a lot of difficulties with evaluation questions, and specifically for this question, I was stuck between A, B, and D. I wanted to list out my reasoning for each answer choice to see if I'm understanding the technique for evaluation questions.

A) Answering "yes" means that the effect of having more NMP in dark roast coffee could potentially be negated so darker roasts could actually irritate your stomach as much as lighter roasts do. Answering "no" would make the conclusion valid because the same amount/less caffeine in darker roasts would still give it the advantage of having more NMP to suppress acid production (and acid production would be the same or less after drinking darker roasts).

B) I had a lot of trouble with this one because I thought that answering "yes" to this question may potentially make the conclusion invalid because if a reduction in acid production in the stomach does have an adverse effect on stomach function, then darker roasts having more NMP might still lead to irritation in the stomach. On the other hand, if a reduction in acid production in the stomach does not have an adverse effect on stomach function, then the conclusion could be valid. However, upon reviewing this answer choice, I realize that stomach function may not be relevant to stomach irritation and lighter roasts can also contain NMP, so the question does not help differentiate between darker and lighter roasts.

D) I initially thought that answering "yes" to this question might negate the advantage that darker roasts have because more coffee = more caffeine, but upon review, I realized that the stimulus was comparing relative amounts of NMP in each roast, so more coffee would mean more caffeine, but also more NMP being produced. So, answering yes or no to this question has no effect on the conclusion.

Am I getting the reasoning right? Also, if someone could point me to which lesson Evaluation questions on in (for the full length course) that would save me a whole bunch of time flipping through all the books! Thanks in advance!!

[Jonathan Evans]

Hi, Bli,

Thanks for sharing your reasoning. Very helpful! At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the secret sauce for this one will again involve a strong prephrase, but before we get to that let's talk about some of the characteristics of this question and Evaluate questions in general.

This argument proceeds as follows:

• P1 Caffeine in coffee causes irritating stomach acid.
• P2 Darker roasts have more NMP than have lighter roasts.
• P3 NMP suppresses production of irritating stomach acid.
• Conclusion: Drinking darker roasts irritates stomach less than drinking lighter roasts.

The first important feature to note about Evaluate questions is that the scenarios presented will generally be similar to those of Strengthen and Weaken questions. In other words, the stimuli will tend to include a set of circumstances offered as evidence for a claim, and the evidence offered might be generally stronger or generally weaker; however, there will usually be multiple fallacies or possible vectors of attack/critique of the argument's validity. Nonetheless, there will usually be one particularly salient flaw or issue with the argument that will present the most likely avenue either to help the argument (for Strengthen), hurt the argument (for Weaken), or present a test whereby to judge the merits of the conclusion (for Evaluate).

The question stems for Strengthen, Weaken, and Evaluate questions generally underscore the importance of this most-significant-flaw in their use of the qualifying word "most." For instance, this question asks:

• The answer to which one of the following questions most helps in evaluating the argument? (Emphasis mine)

In other words, the question stem acknowledges that there could be multiple possible ways to evaluate this argument. The answers to perhaps a couple of the questions in the answer choices could conceivably have an effect on the likelihood of the conclusion. For this question, you have noted different ways that a couple answer choices here could possibly work!

Now, let's return to the issue of prephrasing. To avoid getting mired in different answer choices, comparing them to each other, making a case for one but feeling reluctant to eliminate another, it is essential to approach the answers with a gimlet eye and look first for what's wrong rather than what's right. How can you judge whether an answer is better or worse? By comparing it to your analysis/prephrase.

In other words, you do the work. Have faith in your analysis. I often tell students the following:

• Stimulus: This is my friend.
• Question stem: This is my friend.
• Answer choices: These dudes suck. They are my enemies. One of them will be correct but will often be presented in such a way as to make it unappealing or its merits opaque. Four of them will be incorrect but presented in such a way that students could conceivably want to select them.

Therefore, where do you want to spend the lion's share of your time and effort? On the constructive material that helps you formulate an analysis and prediction/prephrase. Then, proceed through the answer choices with an eye for what's wrong rather than what could be right.

For this question, note that the biggest, overriding issue is the amount of NMP relative to the amount of caffeine in these different roasts. In your analysis, you could note that if we had a higher ratio of NMP to caffeine, then by the other premises we would know that this coffee would likely be less irritating. Had we a lower ratio of NMP to caffeine, then this coffee would likely be more irritating. This is the Variance Test™ in a nutshell here, right in your prephrase.

You've got a strong match right in answer choice (A), as you note, but you also could possibly make a case for a couple of the other ones, notably (B) and (D). (B) is not without its issues. For one, we're talking about irritation here and not "function" per se, but the overriding issue here is the ratio of NMP to caffeine, not the effect of acid on stomach function. (D) also has some issues. Whether "some" people do this or "some" people do that, we're not going to make a lot of headway with the conclusion here, but again the overriding issue is that the issue in this answer is of secondary or tertiary importance to this argument. The key concept in the question stem is what would "most help" in evaluating the argument.(A) gives us a clear shot at the conclusion, one way or another. The other options presented, while not without some merit, don't offer as much help and require additional assumptions (e.g. "function" to "irritation") to make them work.

Thus, proceed confidently with your analysis. Rely on your prephrase. Don't get stuck in the muck making a case for various answer choices. When in doubt, return to the stimulus, return to the question stem, and return to your analysis/revise your prephrase to attack these questions from a position of strength.

I hope this helps!

[bli2016]

Thank you, Jonathan! Your response was extremely helpful.

[bk1111]

Hi Jonathan - thank you for the detailed analysis. I understand why A is the superior answer, but I ended up choosing D. Is the only reason to eliminate D that it is not the "better" answer? My thought process was: If I answer YES, drinkers do increase their coffee consumption, then it would lead to more caffeine and thus increased production of acid, possibly weakening the conclusion that dark roast with irritate the stomach less. Contrastingly, if answered NO, then the caffeine to NMP ratio might allow for the conclusion to follow. Is this analysis wrong? Upon reviewing, I see how my analysis for D is similar to the analysis you used for answer choice A.

[Adam Tyson]

The problem with that analysis, bk1111, is that the stimulus is not about the amount of coffee you drink, but only about the effect that coffee has. The argument is that darker roasts irritate less than lighter roasts. The amount a person consumes might impact how irritated they get, but it has no impact on the degree to which any given amount of coffee causes irritation.

In addition, D is further weakened by the "some" - so what if some people drink more? Maybe others drink less?

Let's say the answer to D is yes - some people who switch increase their consumption. Does this mean that darker coffee doesn't irritate less? Not at all - the coffee is what it is, either more or less irritating. The AMOUNT of coffee is a whole other question!

And if it's no, nobody increases their consumption? Still no impact on the question of whether dark roasts irritate more. That tells me nothing about the relative irritation of light and dark roasts. Even if the "yes" answer had an impact (which it does not), the lack of an impact of the "no" answer means this cannot be the correct answer to this Evaluate the Argument question. The goal is to find the one which will strengthen the argument when you provide one of the two opposite answers and will weaken when you provide the other. If either answer has no impact, that is the wrong question to ask.

Now, if the argument concluded "if you drink dark roasts you will suffer less irritation", then answer D would start to look pretty good, because it would be about total amount of irritation for the coffee drinker, rather than relative irritation between two types of coffee. See the difference?

I hope that helps!

[Michaeltinti22]

I'm having a difficult time understanding why the logic for B is wrong. When I read the question, the thing I focused in during my prephrase was the distinction between the "irritating acid" specifically stimulated by caffeine, and the more general "acid" suppressed by NMPs. Those aren't the same thing. Sure, NMPs reduce the production of that no-good acid, but what if it reduces acid that's beneficial to your stomach? And what if the lack of that acid irritates you even more? So when I got to the answers, I chose B. I'll totally admit that "function" is not the word I would want to see, but my reasoning was that an adverse effect on stomach function could reasonably result in digestive problems/stomach pain.

The reason why I didn't choose A (other than the fact that I just didn't focus nearly as much on the ratio aspect in my prephrase) was that the ratio mentioned in A was not clear enough. Even if you answer "Yes" to A, the NMPs could still negate the effects of the caffeine. The only way this isn't true is if there's more caffeine in dark roasts than the NMPs can handle, but that doesn't necessarily come from answering "Yes" to A.

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi Michael,

The trouble with answer choice (B) lies in the conclusion of the argument. When we look at the stimulus, we see that the conclusion is focused only on stomach irritation. This stimulus doesn't address general stomach function just as it doesn't address headaches or other body discomfort. To evaluate the argument, we need an answer choice that helps us evaluate the impact on stomach irritation.

Let's turn to answer choice (A). I think you isolated the correct opposite answers (yes and no) for the evaluate test. Our stimulus says that the caffeine in coffee stimulates acid production. NMP suppresses acid production, and you get more NMP by roasting the beans longer. But what if longer roasting ALSO caused more acid production? If it did, that would hurt the conclusion that darker roasts cause less stomach irritation as the benefit from longer roasting would be offset by higher caffeine production. If it did not, that would strengthen the argument because it would eliminate a possible downside of the longer roasting.

Hope that helps!

[snehadurgapal]

Hi,

Thanks in advance for your insight! I chose B and do understand why it's wrong (argument pertains to stomach irritation not stomach function, for starters). I struggled with this question and still don't see how A is totally defensible. The stimulus only says that caffeine in coffee causes irritating stomach acids. It doesn't say that the amount of irritating acid developed depends on the amount of coffee. In other words, it doesn't say that caffeine to irritating acids is a dose-dependent increase.

On other questions, I've been wrong when I assumed that an increase in one factor contributes to an increase in another factor. How can we determine that increasing the amount of caffeine would actually in fact increase the amount of irritating stomach acids? This seems a lot to me like bringing in outside assumptions.... which we are always advised to not do.

Thank you!

[Poonam Agrawal]

Hi Sneha!

That's a good question - kudos to you on reading the stimulus so closely! You don't necessarily need to make the assumption that increasing the amount of caffeine increases the amount of stomach irritating acid. The stimulus says that caffeine stimulates production of the acids and NMP suppresses production of the acid. So, as the body processes more and more caffeine, it continues to stimulate production of the acid. In evaluating the argument, we mostly just want to know whether or not the NMP (dark roast) coffee will introduce more caffeine into the body, thereby offsetting any acid suppression benefits offered by the NMP. Hope that helps!

[PavelN]

I'm still struggling with understanding why A is the answer. Does it make sense to consider the answer as an additional premise? Like if we new the answer to the question stated in the answer choice it would help strengthen or weaken the conclusion?