If the needle on an industrial sewing machine becomes badly worn, the article being sewn can be ruined. In traditional apparel factories, the people who operate the sewing machines monitor the needles and replace those that begin to wear out. Industrial sewing operations are becoming increasingly automated, however, and it would be inefficient for a factory to hire people for the sole purpose of monitoring needles. Therefore a sophisticated new acoustic device that detects wear in sewing machine needles is expected to become standard equipment in the automated apparel factories of the future.

Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the information above?

(A) In automated apparel factories, items will be ruined by faulty needles less frequently than happens in traditional apparel factories.
(B) In the automated apparel factories of the future, each employee will perform only one type of task.
(C) Traditional apparel factories do not use any automated equipment.
(D) The needles of industrial sewing machines wear out at unpredictable rates.
(E) As sewing machine needles become worn, the noise they make becomes increasingly loud.

Vote for B.
If people could combine different task there will be no need to hire a person who detect niddle wear out. This could be done by already existant person.

IMO D......

if the rate is predictable, the essence of automated equipment to monitor the needles is not required.

Option D is the best answer. If needles wore out at predictable time intervals, then there would be no need for workers or machines to monitor them.
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(A) In automated apparel factories, items will be ruined by faulty needles less frequently than happens in traditional apparel factories.
(B) In the automated apparel factories of the future, each employee will perform only one type of task.

Why not (B).Although it works as an assumption, it also strengthens the argument by stating that each person can perform only one task so there is no use of keeping one person just for this task.

(C) Traditional apparel factories do not use any automated equipment.
(D) The needles of industrial sewing machines wear out at unpredictable rates.
(E) As sewing machine needles become worn, the noise they make becomes increasingly loud.


Plz Advice !!!

We want to know which of the five answer is "most strongly supported by" the passage. In other words, what's the most justified conclusion we can draw?

We know they are bring in "a sophisticated new acoustic device", which suggests the change in the needles will be detected via some sort of sound. But, do we know that it's a loud sound? Or, does the worn out needle change its sound in some other way, such as a higher pitch frequency or something like that. In a way, the fact that the need a "sophisticated" device suggests that the change in sound might be something unapparent to the ordinary ear. We certainly do not have evidence that the needles get "increasingly loud" as they wear out. That's why (E) cannot be correct.

Does that make sense?
Mike
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Hi YL,

Let me see if I can take that one.

In the sort of question that this is 'support'. What I generally advise is to work out what the paragraph is saying in simple terms and then do 2 things.

1) Work out if each option choice is talking about the same thing (often choices are irrelevant.

2) If it is relevant, work out if it supports or goes against the paragraph.

In this example:

The paragraph says:
-Worn needles ruin clothes.
-People used to operate the machines and check for this themselves
-Now the factory is automated, it is not cost efficient to employ someone for one task
-So the solution is a new bit of technology.

Option B says:
- In the automated apparel factories of the future, each employee will perform only one type of task

or in simple terms, in automated factories, everyone does only one type of job.

My analysis:

I would call this irrelevant. The question is about one particular factory and one particular task, this talks about factories in general and 'each' employee. You can't extrapolate from the one to the other.

In addition, it's not clear that even if you ignore this, that B supports the passage. Where does it say in the passage about employees only doing one thing? It simply says they can't do one particular job in a cost effective manner.

I hope that helps.

James

It was clearly between the options B and D.

Option B is cancelled out as first and foremost in an automated sewing factories, we dont know as to whether they are hiring human employees and if hired, what type of a job is been done by each one of them.

As it is clearly mentioned that in the stimulus that there is monitoring required in order to check whether the needles are worn out or not, then we can infer that
the needles become worn-out at unpredictable times.

Hope the above explanation helps.

Thanks!