Politician: The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal

Politician: The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted. My support of this bill is motivated by a concern for public safety. Using a car phone seriously distracts the driver, which in turn poses a threat to safe driving. People would be deterred from using their car phones while driving if it were illegal to do so.

Conclusion: Bill banning phone usage in cars should be adopted
Reasons: Author's concern for public safety + Distraction to driver (-> threat to driving) + Illegal, so will be curbed

Answer Choices :
(A) The more attention one pays to driving, the safer a driver one is.
-> Attention one pays is not relevant to the conclusion

(B) The only way to reduce the threat to public safety posed by car phones is through legislation.
-> What if there are other ways and author just doesn't talk about it? This is not a required assumption hence.

(C) Some distractions interfere with one’s ability to safely operate an automobile.
-> The negation of the choice - distraction don't interfere with automobile safety weakens the conclusion and hence is the correct choice.

(D) Any proposed law that would reduce a threat to public safety should be adopted.
-> This is not a required assumption as the author makes the point about adoption of some particular bill (which has reasons for adoption other than just reducing threat to public safety) and not any law which does so.

(E) Car phone use by passengers does not distract the driver of the car.
-> out of scope because passenger phone usage is not correlated with the argument

Politician: The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted. My support of this bill is motivated by a concern for public safety. Using a car phone seriously distracts the driver, which in turn poses a threat to safe driving. People would be deterred from using their car phones while driving if it were illegal to do so.

The argument’s main conclusion follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?

if that;s the case than one should adopt the legislation that driving should be banned since it's dosmissal will improve public safety
someone please respond

Crytiocanalyst, that isn't really what the question is about though, is it? We are not really trying to evaluate the soundness of the argument itself.

Also, who is to say that a ban on driving will improve public safety?

This is my take on the argument

(A) The more attention one pays to driving, the safer a driver one is.
We are not in aposition to comment on the same

(B) The only way to reduce the threat to public safety posed by car phones is through legislation.
It might be one among an option there may be other possiblities

(C) Some distractions interfere with one’s ability to safely operate an automobile.
This may or may not be the case sometimes there might be nothing intefering the scenario

(D) Any proposed law that would reduce a threat to public safety should be adopted.
yes this certainly falls in line with the proposed argument

(E) Car phone use by passengers does not distract the driver of the car.
The oppposite is the effect
Hence IMO D

It's hard to digest that option D is the correct answer.

It's the same as saying:

I will adopt this particular stray dog because the adoption is motivated by my love for animals.
Assumption mentioned here: Any stray dog that would justify the love for animals should be adopted.

This is not making any sense to me. Why are we generalising for "any" members of the set?

Experts, please help.

The real problem here is that people assume that the last sentence in paragraph is the conclusion. However, here, the real conclusion is the first sentence given by the politician - The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted. We are trying to strengthen that conclusion, hence option D is the natural answer.

This is an assumption inside an assumption, well done!!!
If indeed the last sentence in the paragraph is the conclusion then the logical answer would be B.

Hey friend,

I do have considered the correct conclusion that you have mentioned in you post. But can you please help me out in understanding how option D is the natural answer by elaborating a bit more?

Refer my above post: https://gmatclub.com/forum/politician-t ... l#p2824685

assumption is somewhere between the reasoning of the author and his conclusion.
Reasoning -> If banned then people will stop using phones while driving
Conclusion -> it should be banned thru legislation.

Now what's that something that comes between the reasoning and conclusion and also strengthens the conclusion? Yeah you guessed it -> If the ban helps then it should be adopted

However B uses the word ONLY, and is quite specific. D is better

Thanks for the explanation.. Yes, out of these definitely D is the better one. And also it falls on the lines of our "pre-thinking".
The only problem I am having with D is the addition of the word "any".

That would fall in the case of generalisation. But hey, A,B,C and E are even worse

Experts, please help me out here. IanStewart sir need your guidance here

Hey sssanskaar, it would be interesting to know why you think the use of any is a problem here. If D is assumed, the argument definitely holds true. Obviously, D is not the only assumption that can bridge the gap in the argument, you could always have an assumption more specific to smoking. D is not the only assumption in the world that works, but it definitely does work. Why would generalisation be a problem?

Hey Brian123,

Sure. Let me elaborate on this. And before i write down what I thought, i would like to say it out loud that I am in no way an expert and can be fatally wrong here I am just trying to learn and correct my logic, wherever I am wrong, by discussing with you guys

Coming back to what I thought while solving this question (similar analogy):

I will adopt this particular dog (Mr. Chicken McPaws) because the adoption is motivated by my love for animals.
Assumption mentioned here: Any dog that would justify the love for animals should be adopted.

The problem that I am facing is - I think "the adoption is motivated by my love for animals." can be one of the many other factors to be taken into consideration while adopting the dog. The dog might be a corgi, a buttery-brown color, or similar other factors. So I am facing a hard time concluding that just because ANY dog (example - one from another breed altogether) fulfills one of the criteria, same as the one mentioned above in quotes, it can be adopted.

Exact problem in the argument: The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted because of public safety. Now, public safety is one of the factors for the bill to be adopted.

Can we conclude that ANY bill that improves public safety should be adopted? There can be other factors. For example - what if the cost of implementing this bill is so high that it makes it practically impossible to implement the same. Or What if there is no majority in the legislation for passing this bill? These may not be near perfect reasons but I am trying to list other factors which may affect the adoption of this bill.

Please correct me wherever I am faltering. You are helping a fellow learner

I might see the issue here


You've rephrased the question -- it's not asking what conclusion you can draw. It's asking what assumption makes the argument valid.

The style of this question is much more LSAT than GMAT.

Thank you sir IanStewart!

Sorry for typing "conclude" instead of "assume" (i actually meant to write assume ). But I get your point that the usage of "any" is valid here.

Basically, if an effect XYZ is caused by various factors - let's say - A, B, C and D, then we can safely assume that any action related to any factor A, B, C or D shall produce an effect XYZ.

Thank you Brian123 and sir IanStewart! This concept wasn't properly cemented for me, but this whole discussion has helped a lot to understand this concept.

Politician: The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted. My support of this bill is motivated by a concern for public safety. Using a car phone seriously distracts the driver, which in turn poses a threat to safe driving. People would be deterred from using their car phones while driving if it were illegal to do so.

The argument’s main conclusion follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?

(A) The more attention one pays to driving, the safer a driver one is.

(B) The only way to reduce the threat to public safety posed by car phones is through legislation.

(C) Some distractions interfere with one’s ability to safely operate an automobile.

(D) Any proposed law that would reduce a threat to public safety should be adopted.

(E) Car phone use by passengers does not distract the driver of the car.

Only C and D are the contenders. The problem arises for two reasons - what is the exact conclusion of the passage and which one of the two options choices are better than other.

Conclusion is 'The bill that makes using car phones while driving illegal should be adopted'. However, 'people would be deterred from using their car phones while driving if it were illegal to do so' does stand to be confusing enough as a conclusion. This problem can be resolved by doing a causality test i.e. which one preceeds the other, thus the first sentence is the conclusion.

Among the two choices C and D, C loses because it can be possible that some distractions don't interfere with one's ability to operate safely. Thus, in that case the conclusion still holds. So, what would strengthen conclusion.
If the law is not effective then conclusion falls apart. D tells us that a law which reduces the threat must be adopted, if it does not then the conclusion falls apart.
I don't know about how 'any' or 'not all' work but thinking it logically helps.

Answer D.

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