Recording executive: Many musicians resent Web sites that allow peopl

This argument relies on a classic flaw: correlation vs. causation. The author uses a correlation between X and Y (increase in copying, increase in legit sales) to attempt to prove that X causes Y (increase in copying CAUSES increase in legit sales). Any time we see this flaw, we can identify a few alternatives. Maybe X doesn't cause Y, but rather one of the following alternatives is true:

*Y causes X. (In other words, maybe increased sales lead to increased copying, not the other way around).
*Z causes X and Y. (In other words, some other factor, such as publicity, increases both copying and legit sales, and neither causes the other.)
*Coincidence. (These just happened to correlate for no reason.) This usually only applies when the data set is small. For instance, if I turn the lights off and the phone rings, it may not be that one thing caused the other--it may just be a coincidence. But if my phone rings EVERY time the lights go out, it's hard to write it off as a coincidence.

One other thing before we get to the answers. This is a FLAW question, a type we don't see too frequently on the GMAT. What many people (including some folks on this thread) don't realize about flaw questions is that their answers can come in three types. 1) They can point out an assumption, using terms such as "assumes," "presumes," "takes for granted," or "fails to establish." C and D are both assumption-type answers. 2) They can point out potential weakens, using terms such as "overlooks the possibility," "neglects," or "fails to address." A, B, and E are all weaken-type answers. 3) They can describe the flaw in abstract terms, using descriptions such as "conflates correlation and causation" or "draws a general conclusion based on an a sample that is unlikely to be representative." Although A-B are written directly as weakens, they also feature abstract descriptions, with no mention of the actual terms from the argument, so they fall a bit into this category, too.

A) CORRECT. There's the "Z causes X and Y" that we predicted. This is phrased as a weaken, and if a third factor caused both of the increases, then it would not be clear that one caused the other. This makes A a successful weaken, so it correctly describes a flaw in the reasoning.

B) First, this ignores the fact that the premise is about song downloads in general, not just a few isolated cases. They may well have considered that a different result is possible, but found that this doesn't happen or rarely happens, so it's not something that the argument clearly overlooked. Second, the conclusion only says that copying "appears to increase" record sales, not that it must always do so and could never have the opposite result. In any case, since the argument never proves causation in the first place, it doesn't seem pressing for us to point out that causation may not ALWAYS happen. It may be that it doesn't happen at all!

C) This is addressing a further conclusion that the author never makes. The author mentions the resentment that musicians feel, but only argues with the part about sales. The author never concludes that musicians have no reason to resent free copying.

D) This seems pretty closely related to our "Y causes X" alternative. Since it's phrased as an assumption, we can test it by negation: is it a problem for the argument if significant sales of an album OFTEN (rather than seldom) occur before the songs become popular on copying sites? Well . . . no. The key difference here is a subtle one, but the correlation we're given is about INCREASES, not "significant sales." So even if there are significant sales (let's call that 100k in downloads, just to have a figure) before the copying takes off, it could still be that an INCREASE in copying (from near-zero to, say, 10k per day) could still lead to an INCREASE in legit sales. Also, D tells us nothing about the nearness of these sales to the increase. If the copying happens, say, a full year after the strong initial sales, then the correlation in the premise is not going to be at stake. According to the premise, we'd still expect to see an increase in sales near the time of the increase in copying.

E) This seems to be trying to attack the connection between copying and legit sales, but the author never said that the SAME people will get the songs both ways. (Why would they?) We just need to know whether more copying leads to more sales, and E doesn't give us any further information to help figure that out.