| Critical Reasoning Butler: April 2025 |
| April 29 | CR 1 | CR 2 |
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CR 1 A controversial view at the renowned Royal Heart Medical Institute is that the departmental Medical Directors who take an active role in crafting and implementing treatment protocol are micromanaging. The champions of the view argue that, at an institute of high repute, the clinical staffers are more than capable of understanding and implementing medical best practices, and hence,
the Medical Directors’ role should be that of a communicator and mediator. However, those who hold this view are missing that no clinical professional can be said to have a flawless understanding of medical best practices and that failing to recognize potential blind spots can have drastic consequences. Moreover, medical science advances so quickly that
failing to study emerging best practices may lead to today’s advanced physician becoming obsolete quite soon. Clearly, this controversial viewpoint must be rethought.
In the argument above, the portions in boldface play which of the following roles?
A. The first is the argument’s primary conclusion; the second opposes that conclusion.
B. The first supports the argument’s primary conclusion; the second is a consideration put forward in support of that conclusion.
C. The first is a conclusion that the argument is in opposition to; the second is the argument’s primary conclusion.
D. The first is a consideration used to oppose the argument’s primary conclusion; the second presents evidence that supports that conclusion.
E. The first is a conclusion that the argument seeks to oppose; the second is a consideration that supports the argument’s primary conclusion.
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CR 2 Twenty years after the suburbs of Edisonville in the British Isles expanded to the edge of the Pine March Forest, none of the seven species of birds native to the Pine March Forest was still reproducing in the area closest to the suburbs. The expansion of the suburbs led to a rise in pollution that reduced the average range of nighttime luminescence from 0.998 lux (the standard unit of luminosity) to 0.5 lux. Therefore, ornithologists have theorized that the sharply increasing luminosity of the night sky must be part of what triggers the beginning of the native birds’ reproduction cycle.
Which of the following statements, if true, would most strengthen the ornithologists’ theory?
A. Nonnative bird species, introduced into the Pine March Forest after the suburbs were expanded, have begun competing for resources with the declining native bird species.
B. Before the suburbs were expanded, the Pine March Forest had many species of coniferous fir trees, the ideal nesting locations for the native bird species.
C. The lowest recorded nighttime luminosity in the Pine March Forest before the suburbs were expanded was 0.00014 lux, whereas the lowest recorded nighttime luminosity in the Pine March Forest after the suburbs were expanded has been 0.25 lux.
D. The native bird species could still reproduce in remote areas of the Pine March Forest where the average range of nighttime luminescence remains approximately 0.85 lux.
E. Six of the bird species native to the Pine March Forest are not native to any other forest in the British Isles.
28 Apr 2026, 08:00
