In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many : Critical Reasoning (CR)

ykaiim

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31 May 2010, 23:13

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Please dont post the OA so early.

IMO E.
This is an Defender Assumption based question.

When you read the stimulus you will find that the author has presented his views fairly without missing some key assumptions. But, in the end, he makes a broad generalization based conclusion. We are asked to support the conclusion with an additional premise which is stated in E.

E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

If you negate this, it will become:
All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic cannot be traced back to the flawed copy.

If the copies cannot be traced back then how can all copies be corrected. The conclusion fals apart.

dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

smartmanav

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01 Aug 2013, 08:01

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ykaiim

Please dont post the OA so early.

IMO E.
This is an Defender Assumption based question.

When you read the stimulus you will find that the author has presented his views fairly without missing some key assumptions. But, in the end, he makes a broad generalization based conclusion. We are asked to support the conclusion with an additional premise which is stated in E.

E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

If you negate this, it will become:
All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic cannot be traced back to the flawed copy.

If the copies cannot be traced back then how can all copies be corrected. The conclusion fals apart.

dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

Lets look at A

Lets say some copies of Plato's republic predates Middle ages , that means "NOT ALL" copies needs to be replaced and again the conclusion is destroyed. What do you have to say about it ?

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dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages. At least one copy, prior to the mistake copy, has to exist or it's unlikely that the mistake would have been found.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected. The question stem only covers Plato's Republic.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text. Again already covered in the question stem.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week. Stated in the question stem.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy. Not previous included in the question stem. The fact all copies can be traced to the flawed copy is important information supporting the conclusion.

adityapagadala

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22 Aug 2013, 02:56

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smartmanav

ykaiim

Please dont post the OA so early.

IMO E.
This is an Defender Assumption based question.

When you read the stimulus you will find that the author has presented his views fairly without missing some key assumptions. But, in the end, he makes a broad generalization based conclusion. We are asked to support the conclusion with an additional premise which is stated in E.

E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

If you negate this, it will become:
All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic cannot be traced back to the flawed copy.

If the copies cannot be traced back then how can all copies be corrected. The conclusion fals apart.

dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

Lets look at A

Lets say some copies of Plato's republic predates Middle ages , that means "NOT ALL" copies needs to be replaced and again the conclusion is destroyed. What do you have to say about it ?

The author clearly mentioned 'All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.' The copies which are prior to medival age need not be corrected.

But i dont think that E is correct one too... the author simply stated that books need to be corrected, how these books can be corrected, is it possible or not is out of scope here

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22 Aug 2013, 19:12

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adityapagadala

The author clearly mentioned 'All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.' The copies which are prior to medival age need not be corrected.

But i dont think that E is correct one too... the author simply stated that books need to be corrected, how these books can be corrected, is it possible or not is out of scope here

The author thinks the books must be corrected because of an error in a single medieval copy. If some books didn't stem from that copy, then those books won't have the monk's error, and won't need correcting! Thus, the information in choice (E) is necessary for the author's conclusion to hold--without it, we have no reason to fix any copies that trace their lineage to a different monastery.

Hope this helps!

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27 May 2014, 01:55

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dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?
A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

"All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected" - author's reasoning of the correction. Author is not concluding on how to implement the correction.
However, option E -"All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy" this option tells how to implement the fix. and Implementing the correction is out of scope.

Please help me to understand.

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02 Jun 2015, 12:48

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Let's look at d & e as others can be eliminated easily..
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
If no one has ever noticed this before then obviously all subsequent books of this lineage need to be corrected(whether there are only a few or many or none or whether they can be traced or not is a whole different matter)

E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy
What if some one has observed this mistake before and has already corrected it before any subsequent copies were even made?

EDIT: Its crystal clear to me now. Answer is definitely 'E'.. thank you all for the nice discussions.

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23 Jul 2017, 09:21

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E is the correct answer as it talks about the subsequent copies of Plato's Republic that can be traced back to the flawed copy.
and the conclusion says all these flawed copies need to be corrected.

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24 Jun 2019, 21:16

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ykaiim

Please dont post the OA so early.

IMO E.
This is an Defender Assumption based question.

When you read the stimulus you will find that the author has presented his views fairly without missing some key assumptions. But, in the end, he makes a broad generalization based conclusion. We are asked to support the conclusion with an additional premise which is stated in E.

E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

If you negate this, it will become:
All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic cannot be traced back to the flawed copy.

If the copies cannot be traced back then how can all copies be corrected. The conclusion fals apart.

dixitraghav

In the Middle Ages, monks possessed the only copies of many of the great works of Antiquity. They maintained these works in their libraries and spent many hours transcribing them for distribution to other monasteries. However, last week a Classics scholar discovered that a monk had consistently miscopied a word while transcribing Plato's Republic, thereby altering the meaning of the entire text. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.

The conclusion above would be more reasonably drawn if which of the following were inserted into the argument as an additional premise?

A. No copy of Plato's Republic predates the Middle Ages.
B. Only Plato's Republic needs to be corrected.
C. A single word can alter the meaning of an entire text.
D. No one had ever noticed the mistake before last week.
E. All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic can be traced back to the flawed copy.

Posted from my mobile device

anubhavgdel

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01 Jul 2019, 01:58

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Hi Eli Mayer,

Can you please explain why "C" is incorrect?

Is it incorrect simply because it is stated in the passage as a fact? By the negation technique, if a single word does not alter the meaning of the text, then there will be no need for any amendments in any of the copies.

Please advise.

KapTeacherEli

adityapagadala

The author clearly mentioned 'All subsequent copies of Plato's Republic will now have to be corrected.' The copies which are prior to medival age need not be corrected.

But i dont think that E is correct one too... the author simply stated that books need to be corrected, how these books can be corrected, is it possible or not is out of scope here

The author thinks the books must be corrected because of an error in a single medieval copy. If some books didn't stem from that copy, then those books won't have the monk's error, and won't need correcting! Thus, the information in choice (E) is necessary for the author's conclusion to hold--without it, we have no reason to fix any copies that trace their lineage to a different monastery.

Hope this helps!

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15 May 2022, 13:59

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Hello from the GMAT Club VerbalBot!

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