GMAT Club World Cup 2022 (DAY 4): Researcher: The calories in, calorie

I know what you might be thinking: official CR questions do not have three separate speaking parts in a dialogue-based format. But first, you should be comfortable with the idea that not everything in the OG may be representative of all that can appear on the test. And second, you might not know the catalogue of official questions as well as you think, as this GMAT Prep question, with a dialogue in three parts, will attest.

Rather than break down the passage line by line, I think it would be better to gather what lies at the heart of the debate between the researcher and the dietician.

• The researcher argues against the calories in, calories out diet and fitness paradigm
• The dietician objects, as the question stem phrases it, on scientific grounds—you do not have to know the laws of thermodynamics to take on the question, but you should appreciate that a certain law is established

The response in question relies heavily on contextual information. As a standalone line, That’s just the point can appear to be in agreement with the previous line. However, the remainder of the dialogue, in particular the final line, should make it clear that the researcher is sticking to his guns, as the saying goes, and disagreeing with the paradigm, not with any law of thermodynamics. In fact, it seems as though the researcher is invoking thermodynamics to reaffirm the earlier argument. See the examples in lines two and three, which are prefaced by [t]he body, as a thermodynamic unit. It is hard to ignore this content in an effort to support this answer choice.

There are examples in that last bit of dialogue, but there is no comparison to be found. The as in as a thermodynamic unit should be interpreted as an explanation: because it is a thermodynamic unit.

Be careful with this one. An inherent discrepancy is a statement that seems to bend the rules of accepted fact and would require further explanation to allow someone to evaluate properly. If I tell you that gravity is not present where I am, you have a right to wonder whether I am in outer space. There is no inherent discrepancy in the first spoken part (even if the dietician would probably believe so). The researcher disagrees with a certain diet and fitness paradigm and briefly outlines why. If you are working too fast, this one can be an alluring option, since the earlier half of the answer choice looks perfectly reasonable.

Probably the easiest elimination. It should be apparent that the researcher does not change tack. The very reference in the final line to the paradigm should make it clear that this is the same paradigm as before, and that the original objections are still in place.

Context is everything in verbal communication (even when reported in writing). The objection is that the researcher is arguing against an established law of thermodynamics. The researcher turns around and says no, it is because of this unnamed law of thermodynamics that the paradigm fails. There is nothing to find fault with in this answer choice.

In all, not the easiest question, in my view, with two pretty reasonable options in (A) and (C) that could easily snare a test-taker who was not paying close enough attention to every word in the answer choice. I am reminded of a difficult boldface question that I dug up from the archives a few months back. In a very different sense from more typical usage, watch that language.

Well done if you navigated this minefield successfully. Good luck with the rest of the competition.

- Andrew