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All correct in 12 mins, including 4 mins and 30 seconds to read.

Para 1- Dowsing- what it is and how it works?
Para 2- what skeptics say?
Para 3- what proponents say?
Para 4- study corroborates 2 claims; dowsers consistently made significantly more accurate predictions than geologists and hydrologists

1. Which one of the following most accurately describes the primary purpose of the second paragraph?
(C) to present arguments against which the third paragraph presents counterarguments- Correct

2. According to the passage, dowsing's skeptics acknowledge which one of the following?
(A) A few dowsers have shown considerable and consistent success.

Further, skeptics say, numerous studies show that while a few dowsers have demonstrated considerable and consistent success, the success rate for dowsers generally is notably inconsistent.

3. The reasoning in which one of the following is most analogous to an argument explicitly attributed to dowsing's skeptics in the passage?
(D) Some people claim to be able to sense where the area's good fishing spots are, but the lakes in the area are so loaded with fish it would be difficult not to pick a good spot.

Finally, skeptics note, dowsing to locate groundwater is largely confined to areas where groundwater is expected to be ubiquitous, making it statistically unlikely that a dowsed well will be completely dry.

4. The author of the passage would be most likely to agree with which one of the following statements about the results of the groundwater-locating study discussed in the final paragraph?
(B) The results leave open the possibility that dowsers can sense minute changes in Earth's electromagnetic field.-- Correct; this makes sense because in the study 'dowsers consistently made significantly more accurate predictions than geologists and hydrologists'

5. The passage provides information most helpful in answering which one of the following questions?
(D) Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water?

The dowsers consistently made significantly more accurate predictions regarding drill sites, and on request even located a dry fracture zone, suggesting that dowsers can detect variations in subsurface conditions.

6. The passage provides the most support for inferring which one of the following statements?
(B) There are no reliable studies indicating that dowsers are consistently able to locate subsurface resources other than groundwater.-- no evidence to support this
(E) The groundwater-locating study described in the final paragraph was not a typical dowsing study.

I eliminated other options but took some time to find the following-

They also note that numerous dowsing studies have been influenced by a lack of care in selecting the study population; dowsers are largely self-proclaimed and self-certified, and verifiably successful dowsers are not well represented in the typical study.

The last two claims were corroborated during a recent and extensive study that utilized teams of the most successful dowsers, geologists, and hydrologists to locate reliable water supplies in various arid countries.
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Hi Experts,

I have a question on Q5.
Why (D) is correct?

I understand that the first sentence of the passage states that
"Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain."
However, it is just a definition of dowsing, so can we be sure that it is ever utilized to try by someone?

Also why B is incorrect?
According to the second sentence of the paragraph 2:
"They assert that dowsers' use of inert tools indicates that the dowsers themselves actually make subconscious determinations concerning the likely location of groundwater using clues derived from surface conditions;" , suggesting that we can infer the clue from surface, supposedly affected by rainstorms


Please help.
Thank you.
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ballest127
Hi Experts,

I have a question on Q5.
Why (D) is correct?

I understand that the first sentence of the passage states that
"Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain."
However, it is just a definition of dowsing, so can we be sure that it is ever utilized to try by someone?

Also why B is incorrect?
According to the second sentence of the paragraph 2:
"They assert that dowsers' use of inert tools indicates that the dowsers themselves actually make subconscious determinations concerning the likely location of groundwater using clues derived from surface conditions;" , suggesting that we can infer the clue from surface, supposedly affected by rainstorms

Please help.
Thank you.

Why B is incorrect?

The passage didn't mentions rainstorms. The only mention of water is that dowsers often search in areas water is likely to be found. But that’s underground water, not rain.

Why D is correct?

Lines 1-2 in the passage say that dowsing is used to locate resources or objects. Lines 3-4 say that water is merely an example of what dowsing is used to find. So dowsing is used to locate many things.

Answer D
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Quote:
5. The passage provides information most helpful in answering which one of the following questions?

(A) When was dowsing first employed as a means of locating groundwater?
(B) Is the success of dowsers affected by rainstorms that may have saturated the ground in the area being dowsed?
(C) What proportion of successful dowsers use forked sticks in locating groundwater?
(D) Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water?
(E) What are some of the specific surface clues that can indicate the presence of groundwater?
VeritasKarishma AndrewN
I am really hoping to get good answer for below query.
Correct answer given option D "Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water?"
We don't know.
Nowhere mentioned that dowsing utilized to locate anything other than water.
Below lines from passage
"Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain."
We can't infer if dowsing utilized for anything else.
As per theory there can be objects but do we really have proof as per passage that dowsing used for them also ?
Please help.
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Sajjad1994
ballest127
Hi Experts,

I have a question on Q5.
Why (D) is correct?

I understand that the first sentence of the passage states that
"Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain."
However, it is just a definition of dowsing, so can we be sure that it is ever utilized to try by someone?

Also why B is incorrect?
According to the second sentence of the paragraph 2:
"They assert that dowsers' use of inert tools indicates that the dowsers themselves actually make subconscious determinations concerning the likely location of groundwater using clues derived from surface conditions;" , suggesting that we can infer the clue from surface, supposedly affected by rainstorms

Please help.
Thank you.

Why B is incorrect?

The passage didn't mentions rainstorms. The only mention of water is that dowsers often search in areas water is likely to be found. But that’s underground water, not rain.

Why D is correct?

Lines 1-2 in the passage say that dowsing is used to locate resources or objects. Lines 3-4 say that water is merely an example of what dowsing is used to find. So dowsing is used to locate many things.

Answer D

Hi Sajjad1994,

Can you change the topic from social science to science.

Next I still have doubt with above reasoning.
The exact sentence says "dowsers typically determine prospective water-well drilling locations by walking with a horizontally held forked tree branch until it becomes vertical, claiming the branch is pulled to this position."

The above sentence is explaining about the procedure.
Dowsers usually determine prospective water-well drilling locations by..... abcde

This doesn't show dowsers used for other object also.
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Harsh2111s
Quote:
5. The passage provides information most helpful in answering which one of the following questions?

(A) When was dowsing first employed as a means of locating groundwater?
(B) Is the success of dowsers affected by rainstorms that may have saturated the ground in the area being dowsed?
(C) What proportion of successful dowsers use forked sticks in locating groundwater?
(D) Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water?
(E) What are some of the specific surface clues that can indicate the presence of groundwater?
VeritasKarishma AndrewN
I am really hoping to get good answer for below query.
Correct answer given option D "Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water?"
We don't know.
Nowhere mentioned that dowsing utilized to locate anything other than water.
Below lines from passage
"Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain."
We can't infer if dowsing utilized for anything else.
As per theory there can be objects but do we really have proof as per passage that dowsing used for them also ?
Please help.
Hello, Harsh2111s. There are two ways you can approach the question that should lead to the correct answer. The first is to seek to justify choice (D). You have, in fact, singled out the line that you need to support the answer.

Q: Is dowsing ever utilized to try to locate anything other than water? (My italics.)

A: Yes, because dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground. (Again, my italics.)

One uses a detector in an attempt to find or locate something, and, not to be overlooked, a practice in this context indicates an established procedure, one that exists in more than theory only. Water is definitely a resource; I can call an ice cube an object, but not water itself. Thus, it must be true that dowsing is used to locate non-water objects, whatever those objects may be. That is all we need here. (We need not press any further for exact answers. We just need to answer this particular question.)

If you are curious, the second method to arrive at the answer is to attempt to disprove each answer as part of an assay against the passage. I would rather arrive at a conclusion by disproving other potential answers than to think I had simply spotted the one true answer. Were you thinking that something else among the five answer choices given was supported by the passage?

I hope that helps. Although you had found the pertinent part of the text already, maybe you had not picked it apart the same way. Thank you, in any case, for drawing my attention to the question. The LSAT passages can be tricky.

- Andrew
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Hi AndrewN VeritasKarishma Sajjad1994 Although I selected the correct option choice for Q5. I am unable to eliminate option B. The passage states that

"Finally, skeptics note, dowsing to locate groundwater is largely confined to areas where groundwater is expected to be ubiquitous, making it statistically unlikely that a dowsed well will be completely dry".

Option B states "Is the success of dowsers affected by rainstorms that may have saturated the ground in the area being dowsed?" Does option B mean that rainwater is saturating the groundwater? If not then what does the phrase "saturated the ground in the area being dowsed" means?
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RohitSaluja
Hi AndrewN VeritasKarishma Sajjad1994 Although I selected the correct option choice for Q5. I am unable to eliminate option B. The passage states that

"Finally, skeptics note, dowsing to locate groundwater is largely confined to areas where groundwater is expected to be ubiquitous, making it statistically unlikely that a dowsed well will be completely dry".

Option B states "Is the success of dowsers affected by rainstorms that may have saturated the ground in the area being dowsed?" Does option B mean that rainwater is saturating the groundwater? If not then what does the phrase "saturated the ground in the area being dowsed" means?
Hello, RohitSaluja. Have you taken a look at this post above by Sajjad1994? I think it explains well enough why (B) is not a qualified answer. To answer your question about interpreting the answer choice, (B) conveys that rainwater (via rainstorms) is saturating the ground itself, thereby creating stores of groundwater.

As I wrote myself in an earlier post, this is a tough passage, more nuanced in its use of language than I am accustomed to seeing on the GMAT™. That does not mean I think it is a poor-quality passage, just that it may not be worth getting worked up over.

Thank you for thinking to ask. Good luck with your studies.

- Andrew
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In Q6, Why option C is incorrect??? if we refer these lines from first para: Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain. We can infer that dowser use different tools for different resources.

I was confused between C and E and after going through the explanation given above : According to proponents of dowsing, successful dowsers "are not well represented in the typical study". However, the study in the last paragraph was extensive and used teams of "the most successful dowsers." Combined, that suggests the last study is not your typical study involving a poor representative sample. I feel in the same way we can make the inference for option C . Overall the logic for choosing option E is not that strong
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In Q6, Why option C is incorrect??? if we refer these lines from first para: Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground by passing handheld, inert tools such as forked sticks, pendulums, or metal rods over a terrain. We can infer that dowser use different tools for different resources.

I was confused between C and E and after going through the explanation given above : According to proponents of dowsing, successful dowsers "are not well represented in the typical study". However, the study in the last paragraph was extensive and used teams of "the most successful dowsers." Combined, that suggests the last study is not your typical study involving a poor representative sample. I feel in the same way we can make the inference for option C . Overall the logic for choosing option E is not that strong


Hi akt715,

Let us know if you find the below explanations helpful:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/dowsing-is-the-practice-of-detecting-resources-or-objects-beneath-the-291247.html#p2246489


Thanks.
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For Q5 :
Why can't option E be correct?

What are some of the specific surface clues that can indicate the presence of groundwater?


-The number of paces indicates the distance to the water, and the strength of the pull felt by the dowser correlates with the potential well's flow rate.

KarishmaB , GMATNinja , MartyMurray­
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I have a doubt in Q4,
How to eliminate option C? I mean it pretty much is the result of the experiment conducted in P4.

Please help GMATNinja MartyTargetTestPrep Bunuel
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Question 5


Oppenheimer1945
For Q5 :

Why can't option E be correct?

What are some of the specific surface clues that can indicate the presence of groundwater?

-The number of paces indicates the distance to the water, and the strength of the pull felt by the dowser correlates with the potential well's flow rate.­
­From the final paragraph:
Quote:
The teams were unfamiliar with the areas targeted, and they agreed that no surface clues existed that could assist in pinpointing the locations of fracture zones.
In other words, the dowsers made their predictions WITHOUT the use of surface clues.

This tells us that the passage does not consider the stuff about the number of paces and strength of pull to be surface clues. Yes, those things are perceived on the surface, but they are subjective observations made by the dowser, not static features of the surface observable to anyone.

Choice (D) is a much better answer, thanks to the first sentence of the passage: "Dowsing is the practice of detecting resources or objects beneath the ground." From this, we can infer that that dowsing is used to locate other resources/objects besides water.

I hope that helps!­
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Question 4


daemon_slayer
I have a doubt in Q4,

How to eliminate option C? I mean it pretty much is the result of the experiment conducted in P4.
Yes, the dowsers did a better job than the geologists and hydrologists in this particular experiment, but that's not enough to prove conclusively that dowsing is the most dependable technique for finding water in arid countries.­ For all we know, the next study or experiment could yield conflicting results.

We get another clue from the author in the final sentence:

Quote:
"The dowsers consistently made significantly more accurate predictions regarding drill sites, and on request even located a dry fracture zone, suggesting that dowsers can detect variations in subsurface conditions..."
So even though the dowsers obviously fared very well in this particular study, the author only concedes that these results SUGGEST that dowsers can detect variations in subsurface conditions. The word "suggesting" shows that the author is not 100% convinced and does not believe that this one study proves anything.

That same sentence fits with choice (B): the study results certainly do not DISPROVE the claim "that successful dowsers may be sensitive to minute changes in Earth's electromagnetic field associated with variations in subsurface conditions". Again, the author is not 100% convinced, but the results do give skeptics something to think about -- maybe it is possible that dowsers can sense minute changes in Earth's electromagnetic field.

I hope that helps!­
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