Police Chief of Megalopolis: Five years ago, the city's police department introduced innovative policing strategies. Since then, the crime rate in Megalopolis has declined significantly. Our new strategies should be credited with bringing about the decline. It has been objected that
there have been significant declines during the past five years in crime rates throughout the nation and that therefore Megalopolis' crime rate would probably have declined even without the new policing strategies. Once we had introduced the new strategies, however,
they were soon adopted by police departments in cities throughout the nation, and it was only then that crime rates in those cities began to decline.
In the police chief's argument, the two
boldface portions play which of the following roles?
A. The first presents a phenomenon whose interpretation is at issue in the argument; the second presents a claim that the police chief denies.
B. The first presents a phenomenon whose interpretation is at issue in the argument; the second presents evidence that has been used to undermine the police chief's interpretation of that phenomenon.
C. The first presents evidence, the accuracy of which the police chief questions; the second supplies a reason for the police chief to question the accuracy of that evidence.
D. The first presents evidence that has been used to support the hypothesis that has been proposed as an alternative to the police chief's hypothesis; the second provides evidence to weaken that support.
E. The first and the second each provide evidence that has been offered to support an objection to the police chief's view.
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