#13 - If the play were successful, it would be adapted as a

[mankariousc]

Hello!

I am still a little bit confused about the wording of answer choice E. I am having a hard time specifically with "..does not preclude its satisfying a different sufficient condition for adaption as a movie or revival at the Decade Festival." Could you further explain what this is saying and its interaction with the stimulus' conclusion?

Also, just a general clarification on sufficient and necessary conditions. Do we make the same assumptions as we do in casual reasoning that just like there is one cause for one effect that there is only one sufficient condition for a necessary condition and vice versa?

Thanks!

[AthenaDalton]

Hi mankariousc,

In this prompt, if a play has been adapted into a movie or revived at the Decade Festival, we know it's a success. So "movie adaptation" or "Decade Festival revival" are both sufficient conditions which tell us that any play meeting one or both criteria was a success.

This relationship does not work in the opposite direction. We don't know if only successful plays get made into movies. There's nothing in the prompt that indicates that only successful plays are adapted into a movie or revived at the Decade Festival. It's possible that some crummy plays also get movie adaptations.

Just because success is one possible route to getting a movie adaptation or festival revival doesn't mean that it's the only way to achieve those things.

I hope this makes sense!

[ncolicci11]

Hi,

I was able to narrow down the answer choices to A and E. However, I find myself struggling with the language and structure of A and E. What should I do to make these answers seem more simple and clear? I was moving well through this problem until I got hung up on the language of these answers!

Thank you

[Jeremy Press]

Hi ncolicci,

The best approach to this question is to begin with an accurate identification of the flaw in the stimulus, then to use that identification to filter answer choices.

In the stimulus, the flaw is what we at PowerScore call a "Mistaken Negation." The first sentence/premise in the stimulus states a conditional relationship: Successful Adapted as Movie OR Revived at Decade Festival. The second sentence/premise tells us that the sufficient condition of the conditional relationship ("success") has not occurred. In conditional reasoning, the absence of a sufficient condition does not tell us with certainty whether any of the necessary conditions in the relationship will occur. So the author of the argument should not draw any further conclusions. But the author goes on to mistakenly conclude with certainty that neither of the necessary conditions will occur. Classic Mistaken Negation (absence of a sufficient condition is taken to indicate the absence of a necessary condition [or conditions]).

So now we need to find an answer choice that describes a Mistaken Negation accurately. One helpful hint on Flaw questions that exhibit Mistaken Negation or Mistaken Reversal flaws: look for an answer choice that uses "buzz words" drawn from the world of conditional reasoning. This alone will not be dispositive, but it can help you to narrow down your focus and make a strong educated guess if you're down to the right two answers (as you were). Notice how answer choice E begins from the (accurate) statement that the play does not "satisfy[] one sufficient condition" (because the play was not successful). This answer choice is both using a buzz word drawn from the world of conditional reasoning ("sufficient condition"), and it is accurately stating what the second premise in the stimulus did. That's a pretty good place to be. For a fuller discussion of why answer choice E accurately describes the flaw, check Athena's very good post above.

Answer choice A is a very difficult answer to understand, but the first thing I want you to notice is that answer choice A doesn't describe something that would be a conditional reasoning error. That's a good enough reason for me to eliminate it.

What answer choice A is actually saying is that the problem with the conclusion is that the author said neither one of the necessary conditions would occur, when the author instead should have concluded that we definitely won't see both of those necessary conditions occurring (although we might still see one of them occurring). But, as a matter of conditional reasoning, that's wrong too. The author cannot conclude anything with certainty about the occurrence of either one of the necessary conditions based on the absence of the sufficient condition. In fact, it's entirely possible that despite the play's lack of success, the play might still be BOTH adapted as a movie AND revived at the Decade Festival.

When you're confronted with an answer choice like A, think back to your prephrase (Mistaken Negation) and ask yourself, "Does what this answer is saying match with what I know about Mistaken Negation errors?" The Mistaken Negation error involves being too certain about your conclusion (that a necessary condition is absent). But answer choice A is telling me, not that the author was too certain about the conclusion, but rather that the author drew the wrong conclusion. Well, that's not a Mistaken Negation, so (even if I'm not totally clear on what answer choice A means) there's no way it can work.

I hope this helps!

Jeremy