In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imput

Question

In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imputes bad faith to researchers disagreeing with him. A troubling aspect of R’s book is his stated conviction that other investigators’ funding sources often determine what “findings” those investigators report. Add to this that R has often shown himself to be arrogant, overly ambitious, and sometimes plain nasty, and it becomes clear that R’s book does not merit attention from serious professionals.

The author of the book review commits which one of the following reasoning errors?

(A) using an attack on the character of the writer of the book as evidence that this person is not competent on matters of scientific substance

(B) taking it for granted that an investigator is unlikely to report findings that are contrary to the interests of those funding the investigation

(C) dismissing a scientific theory by giving a biased account of it

(D) presenting as facts several assertions about the book under review that are based only on strong conviction and would be impossible for others to verify

(E) failing to distinguish between the criteria of being true and of being sufficiently interesting to merit attention

GmatKnightTutor · Accepted Answer

You can't, I daresay, simply skim the answer choices and get the gist of what is being stated with this one.

In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imputes bad faith to researchers disagreeing with him. A troubling aspect of R’s book is his stated conviction that other investigators’ funding sources often determine what “findings” those investigators report. Add to this that R has often shown himself to be arrogant, overly ambitious, and sometimes plain nasty, and it becomes clear that R’s book does not merit attention from serious professionals.

The author of the book review commits which one of the following reasoning errors?

(A) using an attack on the character of the writer of the book as evidence that this person is not competent on matters of scientific substance
The answer. The reviewer clearly conflates the author's bad personality traits with the author's ability or credibility when it comes to scientific research. It sounds easy to say this now, but POE helped get me here as well.

(B) taking it for granted that an investigator is unlikely to report findings that are contrary to the interests of those funding the investigation
This one was fairly tempting. But if we really read the passage closely we see that the REVIEWER does not take it for granted. The AUTHOR may take it for granted, but the REVIEWER does not.

(C) dismissing a scientific theory by giving a biased account of it
Nope. Be careful not to conflate the bias the REVIEWER may have for the AUTHOR with the AUTHOR'S THEORY. The reviewer is not saying that there is something wrong with the theory proposed. The reviewer is saying that the author's bad traits make whatever has been theorized something that should be dismissed simply on that basis.

(D) presenting as facts several assertions about the book under review that are based only on strong conviction and would be impossible for others to verify
The only assertion was the TROUBLING aspect, but that could easily be verified by reading it, I daresay. I didn't really consider this option, I think.

(E) failing to distinguish between the criteria of being true and of being sufficiently interesting to merit attention
Nope. Nothing about attention that I can see. Didn't really consider this, I think.

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GDT · Answer

In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imputes bad faith to researchers disagreeing with him. A troubling aspect of R’s book is his stated conviction that other investigators’ funding sources often determine what “findings” those investigators report. Add to this that R has often shown himself to be arrogant, overly ambitious, and sometimes plain nasty, and it becomes clear that R’s book does not merit attention from serious professionals.

The author of the book review commits which one of the following reasoning errors?

The reasoning error in the book reviewer's argument is that he's judging the character of a person to pass a review on the book detailing a scientific research written by that person
 
(A) using an attack on the character of the writer of the book as evidence that this person is not competent on matters of scientific substance   Correct

(B) taking it for granted that an investigator is unlikely to report findings that are contrary to the interests of those funding the investigation  Incorrect

(C) dismissing a scientific theory by giving a biased account of it  Incorrect

(D) presenting as facts several assertions about the book under review that are based only on strong conviction and would be impossible for others to verify  Incorrect

(E) failing to distinguish between the criteria of being true and of being sufficiently interesting to merit attention  Incorrect

rahat16 · Answer

D appears to be correct answer choice.

Premises: 
1. R frequently imputes bad faith to researchers disagreeing with him. 
2. A troubling aspect of R’s book is his stated conviction that other investigators’ funding sources often determine what “findings” those investigators report. 
3. Add to this that R has often shown himself to be arrogant, overly ambitious, and sometimes plain nasty.

The reviewer presents some assertions about the author of the book based on which he concludes that  it becomes clear that R’s book does not merit attention from serious professionals.  . Here , The reviewer assumes that the asserations presented by him will be accepted by other serious professionals and hence R's book will not merit attention from serious professionals.

RudreshKal · Answer

Although I chose correct answer choice A, what a horrible way to construct a sentence in the question. Not only this but a lot of questions in the CR threads have absolute horrible language problems from Syntax and Grammatical errors to simple basic construction of a sentence which ends up consuming your time for no reason. I hope GMAT doesn't use this type of language.

tanishqgirotra · Answer

totally agree, I even pre thought this (a) logical flaw in the reasoning. But, the wording is so faulty that I ended up neglecting it.

In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imput

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GMAT Critical Reasoning (CR) Questions

In his new book on his complex scientific research, R frequently imput

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