Seven countries signed a treaty binding each of them to perform specif

couldn't be D, the actions were "conditional on simuptaneous (I'm assuming simultaneous) action taken by the other countries," hence, all the countries would comply at the same time and the start signal for one is the start signal for all of them. I'm going with C, because if one country does not comply, then the other six countries have "well-founded excuses, based on the provision, for their own lack of compliance." meaning that if one doesn't pull the trigger the other six don't have to, becuase the actions are conditional on the simultaneous action of the other six countries in the treaty, which is one possibility that "the simultaneous-action provision of the treaty leaves open."

Answer: C

karishma dont u think D is a paraphrase of the stimulus

Actually, I think the stimulus and option (D) say different things.

Stimulus says: All 7 had to perform specified actions on a fixed date simultaneously. Each country was to notify six others when it had completed its action.

(D) the treaty specified that the signal for one of the countries to initiate action was notification by the other countries that they had completed action.

D says that one country initiated its actions only after it received a signal from other countries that they had completed their actions. This is against the simultaneous specification of the treaty mentioned in the stimulus.

I got it right on C. All other choices are irrelevant and consume largely the reader's consideration. Tips: Find the most relevant answer. Skip those long sentences but irrelevant to the passage. Save time and get the answer straight

The reasoning behind C is that the treaty is binding on a country only when actions are taken by other countries but the actions taken are supposed to be simultaneous. For the sake of simplicity, given two countries A and B, you may have the situation where A is waiting for B to take action and B is waiting for A to take action and so actually simultaneous actions can never be performed. So each country can give the excuse that the condition of compliance was not met and hence is not bound by the treaty.

Hi,

As per discussion above, I think everyone agrees with option C as the contender for answer choice; however, some consider option E as the strongest contender and thus the answer choice.

Let's read option E with the question stem:

The simultaneous-action provision of the treaty leaves open the possibility that there was ambiguity with respect to the date after which all actions contemplated in the treaty are to be complete.

Does the ambiguity arise due to the simultaneous provision? The answer is no. This simultaneous provision doesn't bring in any ambiguity with respect to the dates; it only makes it possible that none of the countries would do it since the action of one is contingent on the action of all others.

Thus, the answer to this is option C.

Hope this helps

Feel free to ask in case further clarity is required.

Meanwhile, dont forget to attend the SC session on Saturday. Please find the link below:


Thanks,
Chiranjeev

On the day of action, each country depends on 6 other countries. So, one of them could easily argue that it couldn't proceed without all others' actions completed. Similarly, any other country could argue the same, resulting in no action. This would be a well-founded excuse based on the provisions, as the provisions don't rule out a "circular dependency".

Hence, Answer: C.

The others are ruled out inline:

VeritasPrepKarishma

While I agree that no answer is better than C, I still not clear with E.

Assume that there are 7 countries: A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7

Because the argument only refer to a certain date of a type of action X for example the 1/1/2016.

In this date, A1 do X, then A2 do X, then A3 do X.....then A7 do X and finnish.
If A1 do X for 2 days, A2 do X for n day, A3 do X for 0 day.....

Because we don't know how long each nation do action X
=> it is an ambiguity to know the days required for all countries to do action X.

The argument gives you this: "... specified actions on a certain fixed date ..."

So the actions have to be performed on one single fixed date. No country can take 2 or 3 or more days to perform the actions. A certain fixed date had been decided. The actions had to be done on that day itself. There is no ambiguity regarding the end date.

The first thing to do when faced with a "method of reasoning" question is to simplify the language and then find a similar example in real life.
Lets start with it and break down the language in simpler using a real life example.

ORIGINAL :-Seven countries signed a treaty binding each of them to perform specified actions on a certain fixed date,
SIMPLIFIED :-Seven countries have to do a similar action on one fixed date/day.
EXAMPLE :- Seven persons have to eat burger on valentine's day

ORIGINAL :-With the actions of each......
SIMPLIFIED :-The action of any one country.....
SIMPLIFIED :-A person will start eating burger.......

ORIGINAL :- conditional on simultaneous action taken by the other countries.
SIMPLIFIED :- depends on all other country starting the action TOGETHER.
SIMPLIFIED :- only when six person will start eating the burger at the same moment.

ORIGINAL :-Each country was also to notify the six other countries when it had completed its action.
SIMPLIFIED :-Every single country will also tell rest of the six countries that it has finished the action.
SIMPLIFIED :-Every person will shout loudly :- I finished the burger.

So this question becomes:-
Seven persons have to eat burger on valentine's day. A person will start eating burger only when six person will start eating the burger at the same moment. Each person after eating the burger then will shout loudly :- I finished the burger.
The weird condition that all persons have to start eating the burger simultaneously at the exact same time can result in:-

Now as you can see.
1) There is a condition that tells WHAT action has to be performed simultaneously. Eat burger
2)There is a condition that tells HOW the action has to be performed. Eat simultaneously
3) There is a condition that WHAT to do after the action is completed. Shout after eating burger
4) But there is no condition WHEN to begin the action.??? NOT GIVEN IN THE QUESTION STEM

Therefore it is possible that all 7 people are holding the burger, ready to eat but cannot eat it because no one is sure when the other six person are going to start eating. Since the condition say that they all to start eating at the same exact moment, there is a chance of lack of coordination resulting from hesitation. every person is waiting for other six to start. Hence no one can start on its own. And since no can start, the hamburger are not being eaten.[/b]

Imagine this conversation

YOU :- "Hey John ! why are you not eating that juicy burger?",
JOHN:- "Because the other six have not started " .
YOU :- "Don't wait for others. you eat it first" .
JOHN:-"I cannot eat it first. The condition states that we all have to eat it at the same time"
YOU:- WTF !!! WHAT A SILLY EXCUSE

(C) EACH PERSON WILL HAVE A VALID REASON/EXCUSE FOR NOT EATING THE BURGER

(C) Each country might have a well-founded excuse, based on the provision, for its own lack of compliance.

THEREFORE THE ANSWER IS C

(A) the compliance date was subject to postponement, according to the terms of the treaty.
(B) one of the countries might not be required to make any changes or take any steps in order to comply with the treaty, whereas all the other countries are so required.
(C) each country might have a well-founded excuse, based on the provision, for its own lack of compliance.
EACH PERSON WILL HAVE A VALID REASON FOR NOT EATING THE BURGER
(D) the treaty specified that the signal for one of the countries to initiate action was notification by the other countries that they had completed action.
(E) there was ambiguity with respect to the date after which all actions contemplated in the treaty are to be compete.

(A) the compliance date was subject to postponement, according to the terms of the treaty.
outside the scope of simultaneous action.

(B) one of the countries might not be required to make any changes or take any steps in order to comply with the treaty, whereas all the other countries are so required.
The action has to be simultaneous and the treaty is binding on each of the countries.

(C) each country might have a well-founded excuse, based on the provision, for its own lack of compliance.
Possible, if each country assumes that the other countries aren't complying and there's no means for it to know whether other countries have done their action or not unless the action is completed.

(D) the treaty specified that the signal for one of the countries to initiate action was notification by the other countries that they had completed action.
This restates the premise but doesn't explain what could happen resulting from the simultaneous-action provision.

(E) there was ambiguity with respect to the date after which all actions contemplated in the treaty are to be compete.
As per premise, there's a certain fixed date, so no ambiguity there.

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