A prominent investor who holds a large stake in the Burton Tool compan

Responding to a pm:



An investor has said that BTC is mismanaged. That their inventory is rising but they have not slowed production. (One would normally assume that if a company has too much inventory (unsold product), they will slow down production and wait for the product to move. Only then will they produce more. Otherwise storage issues etc. are likely to arise.)



This sentence means that an investor complaining about management will only be counterproductive. It will only worsen the situation. So it is generally bad. But in this case, it is not even justified.
Then the argument goes on to explain why it is not justified. Though increased inventory does often indicate less demand and more production but it is not so in Burton's case. Their inventory production is against orders received. So increased inventory is increased demand or slower delivery. So current product in inventory is already sold so they should keep producing.

B1 – claim by investor that the company is mismanaged , author is opposing this claim
B2 – This is the main conclusion , citing that investor claim is clearly not justified


Option C - matches for both boldface options

[quote="linker"]A prominent investor who holds a large stake in the Burton Tool company has recently claimed that the company is mismanaged, citing as evidence the company's failure to slow production in response to a recent rise in its inventory of finished products. It is doubtful whether an investor's sniping at management can ever be anything other than counterproductive, but in this case it is clearly not justified. It is true that an increased inventory of finished products often indicates that production is outstripping demand, but in Burton's case it indicates no such thing. Rather, the increase in inventory is entirely attributable to products that have already been assigned to orders received from customers.

In the argument given, the two boldfaced portions play which of the following roles?


(A) The first states the position that the argument as a whole opposes; the second provides evidence to undermine the support for the position being opposed.

(B) The first states the position that the argument as a whole opposes; the second is evidence that has been used to support the position being opposed.

(C) The first states the position that the argument as a whole opposes; the second states the conclusion of the argument as a whole.

(D) The first is evidence that has been used to support a position that the argument as a whole opposes; the second provides information to undermine the force of that evidence.

(E) The first is evidence that has been used to support a position that the argument as a whole opposes; the second states the conclusion of the argument as a whole.

Important to remember the main conclusion will always be stated by the author unless it is a dialogue format or stated by someone special. In this case the author sets up the first entire statement to counter it with his own opinion which is that "in this case it is clearly not justified". Thus, this is the main conclusion of the argument which is in an opposite direction to the first boldface statement. Also, the first boldface is not any evidence, but a claim by investor that is supported by evidence in next sentence. With this information we can eliminate wrong options and come to the option C.

KarishmaB GMATNinja

The second boldfaced section, "in this case [the investor's sniping at management] is clearly not justified", does not undermine the evidence cited above ("the company's failure to slow production in response to a recent rise in its inventory of finished products"). Stating that the investor's sniping was not justified does not, by itself, undermine the evidence. Rather, the second portion is the conclusion of the author's argument.

I was reading this explanation and had a doubt in this line: "Stating that the investor's sniping was not justified does not, by itself, undermine the evidence"
1)If something is not justified, it means that it weakens the argument. If investor's sniping was not justified, we can conclude that it is undermining the evidence (bcz evidence was given by investor only).

Let me know your thoughts.
Thanks

To undermine or weaken an argument, you have to provide facts, data. You cannot give your opinion and say that it undermines something.

e.g.
A: This is a beautiful painting.
B: It is not beautiful.

B does not undermine A's argument (opinion). To undermine A's argument, B needs to say something like - its composition is not balanced or too many primary colours are used together in a small space or the colours have become muddy etc.
B cannot give his own opinion to undermine A's opinion. Opinions are conclusions, not premises supporting or opposing conclusions.

Use simple method
Fact or Opinion In favour of Argument (+)/ In Oppose of Argument (-)
S1 : Opinion , -
S2: Opinion , +

A
B
C
D
E
DEB are eliminated as they say either S1 or S2 are evidence. Only C and A remains which now can be worked easily.