voodoochild
A football team's fans expect the team to make the playoffs. If the team makes the playoffs then their fans expect it to win the Super Bowl. A team that is happy just to make the playoffs will upset its fans. The New York Giants' primary goal is to meet their fans' expectations.
Which of the following must be true based on the statements above?
A) Other teams will not upset their fans only if they win the Super Bowl.
B) A team that doesn't think its fans want it to make the playoffs will certainly not make the playoffs.
C) The Giants' primary goal is possible only if they win the Super Bowl.
D) If a team is happy just to make the playoffs one year, it won't make the playoffs next year.
E) The Giants' fans are not currently upset.
Why is A incorrect? I agree with OA. The premise says A team that is happy just to make the playoffs will upset its fans. Hence, ~Superbowl ---> upset. This is same as A). Isn't it?
VoodooSo, we agree that (C), the OA, is the best answer. That's good.
Let's take what we know about other teams.
a) through #1 & #2, it appears fans of any team expect that team to win the Super Bowl
b) we know the Giant's primary goal, but we don't necessarily know the goal of any other team.
Technically, therefore, we absolutely do know:
if any team does not win the Super Bowl, it is not meeting fan's expectations.
Now, compare that to the text of (A):
A)
Other teams will not upset their fans only if they win the Super Bowl.BTW, I think this is a little over-achieving on Veritas' part --- I don't think I have ever seen the logical phrase "only if" in official material. We can rephrase answer (A) as
(A1) If other team's fans are not upset, then that team has won the Super Bowl
(A2) If a team does not win the Super Bowl, then its fans are upset.
I point out, (A2) is not identical to the green sentence above. Their equation depends on the assumption:
if a person's expectations are not met, then that person is upset. Granted, that is often the case, although I would argue, that's an emotionally unhealthy state of affairs. We have consider a few caveats.
First of all, how strong are those expectations? Yes, we are told, "
A football team's fans expect the team to make the playoffs," but if the team gets off to a 3-8 start to its season, probably the sense of "
we are not going to make the playoffs" will be a slow sinking feeling that accrues over the season, not a sudden shock: when expectations slowly but steadily become unrealistic to the point at which one feels compelled to abandon them because of their sheer logical absurdity, that is far less an occasion for upset than when strong expectations are dashed in an instant --- say, in the final 10 minutes of a crucial football game.
Next, think about the quality of expectations one has of other people, say, a friend or a family member. There are some expectations that are "non-negotiable" --- the person better do X, or I will be hopping mad at that person. Example: husband remembers first wedding anniversary. There are others that are more idealized: it would really allow me to settle some doubts and hold a higher opinion this person, or it would surprise me and force me to raise my opinion, if this person does X. Example: husband has forgotten the first 16 wedding anniversaries in a row, but it sure would be nice if he remembered the 17th. In the latter case, when the husband forgets yet another time, the wife may be disappointed, may feel a certain amount of resignation, but certainly she is not going to be as lividly upset as she was in the first case. Once there's a fixed pattern of disappointment, each new instant can't be nearly as upsetting as the the first time, when the wife still had every reason to expect the very best. It's not that the wife of 16+ years has zero expectations, but previous disappointment produces a muted or attenuated expectation, a hope-against-hope, one quite different in quality from the fresh vital bright-eyed expectations of newly weds. Those are two extreme examples, but clearly, different expectations vary by degrees of the emotional tone and seriousness and realism, and that will make a difference in the emotional experience when they are not met. ---- Now, the question arises: what are the expectations for a football team more like which scenario? Well, a team that has been successful last year, that has acquired even more talented new players --- one could imagine high expectations, even of a non-negotiable sort. BUT, a team that was in last place for the last four years, and has made no substantial improvements between last year and this year --- yes, fans will always harbor idealized playoff and super bowl hopes at the outset, hopes-against-hope, but those hopes can't possibly be as strong, as realistic, or as emotionally charged as those for a team brimming with talented & potential. Again, the quality of expectation has something to do with how "upset" one will be.
Finally, among the large pool of fans for any team, arguably there must be a few who, like me, have some Buddhist proclivities, and to that extent, recognize how profoundly unbalancing it is to invest large amounts of emotional energy into expectations of any kind. Such fan admitted are rare, but I would argue, there will be some small number of fans who have worked consistently with emotional disattachment from expectations, such that when expectations are not met, even when expectations are suddenly and permanently obliterated, this does not cause substantial emotional unbalance in those people --- they do not allow themselves to become "upset." Thus, we cannot say that "all" the fans are upset, even when strong expectations are dashed.
In my mind, these considerations make (A) shaky, whereas (C) is not shaky at all.
Does that make sense?
Mike