Akela wrote:
Among the many temptations of the digital age, manipulation of photographs has proved particularly troublesome for science. Recently, a journal of cellular biology began using a software tool to examine the digital images submitted along with articles for publication. It discovered that dozens of authors had submitted digital images that had been manipulated in ways that violated the journal's guidelines. Clearly, scientific fraud is a widespread problem among the authors submitting to that journal.
Which one of the following is an assumption required by the argument?
(A) The scientists who submitted manjpulated images were aware that the journal used software to examine digital images for evidence of manipulation.
(B) The journal requires that all articles submitted for publication include digital images.
(C) Scientific fraud is possible in the field of cellular biology only if the research is documented with digital images.
(D) Many of the scientists who submitted articles with manipulated images did so in order to misrepresent the information conveyed by those images.
(E) Scientific fraud is a widespread problem only among scientists who submit articles to journals of cellular biology.
LSAT
(A): This answer choice is incorrect because the conclusion does not require that the scientists who submitted manipulated images were aware that the journal was using the software described in the stimulus. To the contrary, evidence that the scientists knew the photographs would be analyzed may weaken the conclusion that they were attempting to commit scientific fraud.
(B): This answer choice explains why scientists submit digital images with their articles. However, it does not connect the violation of the journal’s guidelines with scientific fraud.
(C): Here, the answer choice is incorrect because it is unnecessarily restrictive. While the stimulus did discuss scientific fraud in cellular biology, we cannot say that the documentation with digital images is the only way to commit scientific fraud in the field of cellular biology.
(D): This is the correct answer choice. The premises only speak about digital image manipulations. The concluding sentence 'Clearly, scientific fraud is a widespread problem among the authors submitting to that journal.' suddenly brings up fraud into the equation. In order to conclude that fraud is committed, the assumption is that there an intention to misrepresent. This option states that exact assumption.
(E): As with (C), this answer is too restrictive. It does not have to be the case that widespread fraud is only a problem relating to articles submitted to journals of cellular biology.
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GMAT 1: 750 (Q50; V40; IR 8; AWA 5.5)
Debrief: https://gmatclub.com/forum/first-attempt-750-q50-v40-ir-8-awa-245721.html
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61% (02:08) correct 
