Power Plant Spokesperson: "The water quality of the Phage River as it

Can someone please explain the difference between B and D.

Note the comments against each statement in color

Power Plant Spokesperson: "The water quality of the Phage River
as it passes through Praseopolis is below federal standards. ...................premise that introduces the water quality issue

The citizens of Praseopolis often blame the poor water quality on our
coal-burning power plant, which is upstream from Praseopolis...........This is boldface portion. It says people blame coal burning plant i.e., they judge or opine the plant to be the wrong doer....counter premise

But Vulcan Refinery in same place releases several toxins into the water.............premise against counter premise and inline with spokesperson argument

Moreover, over 99% of the toxic materials measured in the Phage River
in the vicinity of Praseopolis are consistent with metal refining,
but not with the by-products of coal combustion.".............................................additional info supporting spokesperson earlier claim

Conclusion:Spokesperson says that "People blames us wrongly but we did not do it and Vulcan must have did it."

In the power plant spokesperson's argument, the portion in boldface plays which of the following roles?

A) It is the main conclusion of the argument.(not true)
B) It introduces a judgment that the argument opposes.(This is the role played by boldface)
C) It provides evidence in support of the main conclusion of the argument.(Opposite)
D) It is a finding the argument seeks to explain.(May be but not sure)
E) It is an explanation that the argument concludes is correct.(opposite)

D is wrong because firstly this is not finding but just somebody's opinion and secondly argument denies this opinion and not explain it. It would be explaining if answer said that this opinion is correct for some reasons.

B is a judgment(Counter-premise) that the argument opposes(Spokesperson opposed later starting with word "but".)

I hope this helps.

Harley1980 I got the ans as B . But whats the conclusion here?

Hello anudeep133, congratulations

Very nice question and I do not know how to answer on it )

My bet that this question does not have a conclusion but it will be much better if mikemcgarry help with this question: "What is the conclusion in this argument?"

Conclusion:Spokesperson says that "People blames us wrongly for the poor water quality but thats not true and Vulcan must have been responsible for that water quality"

IMO the conclusion is not directly stated in one sentence , rather it has to be inferred.

Conclusion: coal-burning power plant is not responsible for the poor water quality.

Dear Harley1980,
I'm happy to respond. I am also the author of this particular question.

Notice the speaker. The speaker is a spokesperson for the Power Plant. This is a subtle clue about the tone of the argument. We can't draw a hard and fast conclusion just from the identity of the speaker, but this is the sort of detail that "nudges" us in the right direction. Obviously, the spokesperson for any company has that company's interest in mind, and is going to use his rhetorical skills to make his own company look "better," in some way, than other companies.

The Phage River has poor water quality. Everyone agrees on this unambiguous fact.

The BF statement tells us that citizen blame the Power Plant.

The rest of what the spokesperson say after this BF statement is designed lay responsibility for the problem elsewhere --- specifically, with Vulcan Refinery. VR releases toxins into the water, and 99% of the toxins measured at Praseopolis come from metal refining (i.e. what VR is doing), not from coal combustion (what the Power Plant is doing).

The conclusion is implicit. You have to infer the conclusion, as solitaryreaper astutely pointed out. Essentially, the spokesperson was saying, "Don't blame us for the problem! It's their fault!" Thus, the spokesperson completely disagrees with the idea expressed in the BF statement. The spokesperson is in fact 100% opposed to what the citizens think. In his view, the citizens mistakenly blame the Power Plant for a problem that Vulcan Refinery actually causes.

Choice (B) is correct. The argument of the spokesperson 100% opposes the BF statement.

Choice (D) is not correct. Why do the citizens of Praseopolis think the Power Plant is responsible for the poor water quality? We don't know: we could only speculate. The spokesperson is not interested in why the citizens have laid the blame for the problem with the Power Plant. He is only interested in changing their minds, so that the blame is laid with Vulcan Refinery. The spokesperson is not interest in explaining the BF statement: he is interested only in refuting it!

I will also point out: in GMAT CR arguments, it is very helpful to have a real-world perspective. You see, in the real world, the spokesperson could not come out and explicitly say, "People think that my Power Plant is responsible for the pollution of the Phage River, but we're not the culprits. It's really Vulcan Refinery who is responsible." Something like this is certainly the spokesperson's conclusion, the conclusion he wants to impart to the listener, but he can't say it explicitly, because if he did, Vulcan Refinery might slap a lawsuit on the Power Plant! Even if this conclusion is 100% factually true, it would be far to risky to come out and say it explicitly. That's precisely why the spokesperson's conclusion is not explicitly stated. Notice that the spokesperson in this prompt is very careful to stick to empirically verifiable factual statements, such as: "over 99% of the toxic materials measured in the Phage River in the vicinity of Praseopolis are consistent with metal refining, but not with the by-products of coal combustion." That's a scientific measurement, totally factual. No one can sue you for saying that. But if he said a judgment such as "Vulcan Refinery is guilty!", then the Power Plant could be sued for that. Does this distinction make sense? This is very important.

Real world spokespeople for company have to make public statements all the time, so they are scrupulously careful about saying along the types of things that would not incur any lawsuits. Agreed-upon facts and scientific measurement are very safe to say, but accusation and judgments are extremely risky to say.

For more on the important of real-world knowledge in GMAT CR problems, see:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2014/gmat-crit ... knowledge/

Does all this make sense?
Mike

mikemcgarry, thank you for your explanations.
This is really useful because I always thought that conclusion should be stated clearly. That's why this question confuse me a little.

Official Explanation

The power plant spokesperson doesn't want folks to blame her coal-burning powerful plant for the pollution in the Phage River. The bold statement contains the idea that people are blaming the coal-burning power plant. This is exactly the position that the power plant spokesperson opposes ---- she wants people to blame the Vulcan Refinery instead. The bold statement is a position with which the power plant spokesperson disagrees.

(B) is the credited answer. Folks make this judgment (power plant responsible for pollution in river), and the power plant spokesperson's opposes this, saying --- no, it's not the coal-burning powerful plant, but rather the metal refinery, that's causing all the pollution.

(A) is wrong: that bold statement is most certainly not the power plant spokesperson's main conclusion.

(C) is wrong: the bold statement doesn't support anything! The argument totally opposes it.

(D) is wrong: the argument holds that the bold statement is wrong, so it is not seeking to explain it.

(E) is wrong: the argument most definitely does not conclude the bold statement is correct.

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