An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for

Question

An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for each note would sound different than the best Baldwin or Steinbach Grand Piano currently available.
To professional pianists, a piano that sounds different from the best Grand Pianos sounds less like a piano and therefore worse than the best-sounding existing pianos.Professional pianists are the only accepted judges of the quality of pianos.

Which of the following would be best supported by these statements?

A. Only amateur pianists should be asked to judge the sound of electric pianos.
B. Professional pianists assist in designing electric pianos.
C. The best sounding grand pianos have been around for over one hundred years.
D. It is currently impossible to create an electric piano that accepted judges will evaluate as being an improvement on existing grand pianos.
E. It is possible to create an electric piano that sounds better to everyone except a professional pianist.

Dawgie · Answer

A: No, Professional pianists are the only accepted judges of the quality of pianos.
B. No, doesn't say that anywhere. It says Professional pianists can judge quality of pianos.
C. No, doesn't specifically say how long Grand Pianos have been around.
D. I like this one, 1st sentence says electric piano sounds different than the best Grand Pianos. Then it says to professional pianists a piano that sounds different than the best Grand Pianos is worse than the best sounding existing pianos.
E. Confusing one for me, it doesn't really say anything in the stimulus about how others perceive electric pianos?

whiplash2411 · Answer

Let us first look at what the stimulus is telling us.

1. Electric pianos have better frequencies than the recognized Grand Pianos
2. Professional Pianists don't accept these as better because they sound different from the recognized Grand Pianos.
3. These people are the only accepted judges of piano quality.

What is the conclusion you can draw from this?

That professional pianists wouldn't accept electric pianos to being superior over Grand pianos. Now let's look at answer choices. Comments in red/green.

Hope this helps.

No, if the stimulus doesn't explicitly or specifically state anything about the preferences of other people, then we can rule out the possibility of it being the right answer under the argument of it being "out of scope". An answer in an inference type question must be  fully supported  by the stimulus. Hence the correct answer would have the tone of "certainty" as opposed to "possibility". Hope this clears up your doubt.

mainhoon · Answer

Whiplash,
I am confused.
D says it is IMPOSSIBLE to... Well the stimulus says that "an electric piano designed to..", and that the "professional pianists are the only ones to judge".. If professional pianists are the only ones to judge and clearly they don't like the sound of the so-designed pianos, and it is clear that the world is made up of people other than the professional pianists, why cannot we infer that there are other people to whom the pianos would sound better than they do to the professional pianists? To me D is strongly worded. E leaves a possibility open. What is really in-scope and what is really out of scope.

if the stimulus says A does not like B, is it not reasonable to infer that not(As) might like B?

whiplash2411 · Answer

Professional pianists are a group of people who can judge whether a piano is better than the existing grand pianos. The stimulus says that these people don't like the sound of the electric pianos. Hence it would be IMPOSSIBLE for these judges to ever admit that an electric piano is better than the existing Grand Pianos.

It is currently impossible to create an electric piano that  accepted judges will evaluate as being an improvement on existing grand pianos.

We are clear on the notion that accepted judges, i.e. the professional pianists will never accept an electric piano to be better than the existing pianos. This is exactly what option D says, that it is IMPOSSIBLE to create an electric piano that the accepted judges, i.e. professional pianists, would evaluate as being better than existing pianos.

This basically breaks down to saying that professional pianists will NEVER accept any electric piano to being better than a grand piano. This is what the conclusion from the stimulus says as well.

Because we don't care about the other people. Option D talks about accepted judges, and that refers only to the professional pianists. Not anyone else.

mainhoon · Answer

Well then "An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for each note would sound different than the best Baldwin or Steinbach Grand Piano currently available." reading this I assumed there are other electric pianos that can behave differently, meaning that this only refers to a class of electric pianos that are "designed to have a perfect frequency', clearly there are other electric pianos out there.. I note that the stimululs says that these professional pianists dislike the "pianos that sound different", it does not say "electric pianos".. So with this mind:

D - refers to electric pianos. What about the electric pianos that are not designed the way the stimulus mentions them.. perhaps they can be liked by professional pianists?
E- also refers to electric pianos. It is a possibility.

I would tend to agree with you had the stimulus flat out stated that the professional pianists disliked electric pianos, however it refers to "pianos that are different sounding".. Are all electric pianos different sounding? I can't make that conclusion from the stimulus...

whiplash2411 · Answer

The stimulus clearly states that electric pianos would sound different. And we can take this as a given.

The thing that struck me as odd about E was the fact that we are NOT given ANY information about how other people perceive these pianos. So we cannot assume the stimulus supports that when there is no information given to us at all.

mainhoon · Answer

Well I see your point.. I guess the thing is it is what GMAT thinks is right.. However, I still am not convinced that saying "A object designed to have X" means that all A's have X. If that were the case then it would just say "All As have X", the designed to is not required... And I noticed that the pianists were dealing with "different sounding" pianos, no reference to electric pianos anymore..

I think in the Verbal section the best you can do is in SC, then RC and then in CR. CRs can be debatable unlike SC... Good discussion though

I think in the Verbal section the best you can do is in SC, then RC and then in CR. CRs can be debatable unlike SC... Good discussion though

whiplash2411 · Answer

Haha, that is true. There is no concrete example because it's all a matter of perspective sometime. You just gotta learn to think like the GMAT.

suyashjhawar · Answer

Whiplash really well explained.Even i felt for the trap.Really liked this CR.Once again for the wonderful healthy discussions....Gmat Club Rocks!

sudhanshushankerjha · Answer

D is the only ans..
E is incorrect..as we dnt know abt everyone..may b everyone agree with professional pianist...

Axwe7 · Answer

MartyMurray

Would you be able to verify my logic here?

I've narrowed my options down to D) or E), however, I'm not satisfied with either option. On one hand, D) sounds quite good, but mentions that it's "impossible" for an electric piano to be an improvement to "existing grand pianos", but not "the best grand pianos" as the passage states. That difference is crucial. Not all grand pianos are the "best" grand pianos.

I've also had trouble choosing E), since, like others have mentioned in the passage, we're unsure about the preferences of other listeners.

Between these two, the OA is D), but I believe that's not correct. Would you be able to help me out please?

guddo · Answer

An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for each note would sound different than the best Baldwin or Steinbach Grand Piano currently available. To professional pianists, a piano that sounds different from the best Grand Pianos sounds less like a piano and therefore worse than the best-sounding existing pianos. Professional pianists are the only accepted judges of the quality of pianos.
 
 Which of the following would be best supported by these statements?

The passage says that an electric piano with perfect frequency would sound different from the best grand pianos. Professional pianists judge any piano that sounds different from the best grand pianos as worse. Since professional pianists are the only accepted judges,  such an electric piano would not be   judged an improvement  over the best existing grand pianos.

(A) Only amateur pianists should be asked to judge the sound of electric pianos.

This is not supported. The passage says professional pianists are the only accepted judges, not that amateurs should judge electric pianos.

(B) Professional pianists assist in designing electric pianos.

This is unsupported. The passage says professional pianists judge piano quality, but says nothing about their role in design.

(C) The best sounding grand pianos have been around for over one hundred years.

This is unsupported. The passage gives no information about how long the best grand pianos have existed.

(D) It is currently impossible to create an electric piano that accepted judges will evaluate as being an improvement on existing grand pianos.

This is correct.  If the electric piano sounds different, professional pianists will judge it as worse. If it does not sound different, it would at best sound the same, not better. So accepted judges would not evaluate it as an  improvement  over the best existing grand pianos.

(E) It is possible to create an electric piano that sounds better to everyone except a professional pianist.

This is unsupported. The passage tells us only how professional pianists judge such pianos, not how everyone else would judge them.

Answer: (D)

MartyMurray · Answer

Here's (D):

D. It is currently impossible to create an electric piano that accepted judges will evaluate as being an improvement on existing grand pianos.

(D) could be read as conveying that it's impossible to create an electric piano that's better than any grand piano currently in existence. Read that way, (D) basically works.

That said, (D) is merely the best choice and not an ideal answer because the passage says that an electric piano specifically "designed to have perfect frequency for each note" would sound different from one of the best grand pianos, but it doesn't say that it's "impossible" to create an electric piano that sounds better than any grand piano.

So, this question isn't tightly constructed.

egmat · Answer

Hi Axwe7,

You've spotted a real wording shift between the passage ("the best grand pianos") and choice  D  ("existing grand pianos"), and your instinct to read carefully is exactly right. The good news is that this particular shift doesn't hurt D - it actually locks it in.

Here's the key word in D:  "improvement."  To count as an  improvement on existing grand pianos , the electric piano wouldn't just need to beat some random grand piano - it would have to surpass the  best  one currently available. "Improvement on the existing field" automatically sets the bar at the top of that field.

Now line that up with what the pianists do:

- The electric piano  sounds different  from the best grand pianos (premise  1 ).
- To pros, anything that sounds different is  worse than the best-sounding existing pianos  (premise  2 ).
- Pros are the  only accepted judges  (premise  3 ).

So the accepted judges would rate it  below  the best existing piano - meaning it can't be judged an improvement on the existing grand pianos at all. The "best vs. existing" gap you worried about disappears because  the bar for "improvement" is the best , and that's precisely the piano the judges measure against.

A quick way to feel it:

"My new phone is an improvement on the phones currently on the market."

That claim only holds if it beats the  best  phone out there - not just the worst one. Same logic in D: improving on existing grand pianos = beating the top of that line.

And notice E never gets off the ground - the passage gives us  zero  information about how non-professionals hear these pianos, so "sounds better to everyone except a professional" is unsupported. D is the one fully backed by the  three  statements.

Answer: D

An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for

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An electric piano designed to have perfect frequency for

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