The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's

Question

The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's report to the public, for the chairperson did not consult any other members of the commission about releasing the report before having it released.

The argument's conclusion can be properly inferred if which one of the following is assumed?

(A) It would have been permissible for the chairperson to release the commission's report to the public only if most other members of the commission had first given their consent.

(B) All of the members of the commission had signed the report prior to its release.

(C) The chairperson would not have been justified in releasing the commission's report if any members of the commission had serious reservations about the report's content.

(D) The chairperson would have been justified in releasing the report only if each of the commission's members would have agreed to its being released had they been consulted.

(E) Some members of the commission would have preferred that the report not be released to the public

kapil1509 · Answer

AshutoshB  Could you please explain .. I thought C is correct

TaN1213 · Answer

Since the premise talks exclusively about not consulting any member, their agreement or disagreement is not really in scope here. Option C, D and E can thus be rejected. B is irrelevant and that leaves us with A. 
A rightly talks about the members giving just their  consent , i.e. the chairperson consulting the members.
--A--

AshutoshB · Answer

OE:

CONCLUSION: The chairperson shouldn’t have released the report.

REASONING: The chairperson didn’t ask any other committee members whether the report should be released.

ANALYSIS: On sufficient assumption questions, you should look for a gap between reasoning and conclusion.

Here, we know only one fact: the members weren’t asked. We need to connect this to the conclusion. To prove that release was wrong, we should say “if members weren’t asked, then release was wrong”. The right answer is worded a bit differently (it’s harder to understand!) but it has the same effect.

Normally, you can diagram sufficient assumption questions. That’s because there are multiple conditional statements to link together. But this question doesn’t even have a conditional statement to diagram. There are just two separate facts. Diagramming is a useful tool, but don’t try to apply it blindly where it has no use.

___________

A. CORRECT. The contrapositive of this is: “consent ➞ permissible”
Since the chairperson didn’t ask the members, we don’t know whether they consented, Therefore, the release was not permissible.

B. This weakens the argument. It doesn’t prove that the release was ok, but this fact at least shows the members approved of the report.

C. We don’t know whether any commission members had objections. This doesn’t help.
Objection ➞ permissible

D. This doesn’t work. It’s possible that members would have agreed to a release if they had been consulted.
We need something that shows the release was wrong because the members weren’t consulted.

E. This doesn’t necessarily show the release was wrong. The stimulus never said that a release must obey the preferences of all members.

ballest127 · Answer

Hi Expert,

In A , is it necessary to have " most of other member gave their consent " to be true , in order to make the conclusion to be true??

I mean if we negate this sentence, we get "it would have been permissible too even though not most other member gave their consents". That would weaken or not the conclusion???

Please explain.

Perezstephen91 · Answer

Where is the OA from. None of these Answers fill in the GAP. The only answer that fits is E and thats bc it makes a generalization. Its obvious that someone didnt want the report released, thats why there is a negative connotation to the conclusion. There is absolutely no way A can be derived. All the argument is talking about is consulting with the other members not ask for permission. Poor quality question

Saasingh · Answer

I also got it wrong, but now I see why A is correct.

I was stuck badly between A,C, and E.

Conclusion: He did not consult even 1 person --> he was wrong.

Option C and E = some people had reservations about the law. Now, what if majority agreed and only ""some"" didn't like? This is not a "must be true" condition. Just because "some" people had problems or preferences against the law, does not imply that the lawmaker was wrong. ASSUMPTION STATEMENT MUST BE TRUE STATEMENTS.

However, in A, If most people's agreement is required, he was clearly wrong.

Hope it helps

Regards,
Saakhi

Mavisdu1017 · Answer

Hello expert,
The passage said “because the chairperson did not consult any other members of the commission about releasing the report before having it released”, my understanding is: the chairman can release the report as long as he asked any members of the commission. But A says “most members of the commission”, the word “most” really confused me. Could you help on this? Thanks in advance.

Arthurito · Answer

IMO you are good with your interpretation until "any". The passage dont mention the fact that the approval of any member is necessary nor that the approval of at least one member is a necessary condition for the release.

IMO you have to go w/ elimination :

in fact most of them are wrong because they make extra assumption or take the argument too far. A is the good answer because it seems the most logical and let's say it the least worst of all 5, even though it's not perfect. But the others are really not good, B C and D

Jarvis07 · Answer

Reposting the official solution (originally posted by @AshutoshB) with question stem for the ease of read:

CONCLUSION: The chairperson shouldn’t have released the report.

REASONING: The chairperson didn’t ask any other committee members whether the report should be released.

ANALYSIS: On sufficient assumption questions, you should look for a gap between reasoning and conclusion.

Here, we know only one fact: the members weren’t asked. We need to connect this to the conclusion. To prove that release was wrong, we should say “if members weren’t asked, then release was wrong”. The right answer is worded a bit differently (it’s harder to understand!) but it has the same effect.

Normally, you can diagram sufficient assumption questions. That’s because there are multiple conditional statements to link together. But this question doesn’t even have a conditional statement to diagram. There are just two separate facts. Diagramming is a useful tool, but don’t try to apply it blindly where it has no use.

___________
 
  A. CORRECT.   The contrapositive of this is: “consent ➞ permissible”
Since the chairperson didn’t ask the members, we don’t know whether they consented, Therefore, the release was not permissible.

B.  This weakens the argument. It doesn’t prove that the release was ok, but this fact at least shows the members approved of the report.
 
 C.  We don’t know whether any commission members had objections. This doesn’t help.
Objection ➞ permissible

D.  This doesn’t work. It’s possible that members would have agreed to a release if they had been consulted.
We need something that shows the release was wrong because the members weren’t consulted.

E.  This doesn’t necessarily show the release was wrong. The stimulus never said that a release must obey the preferences of all members.

rohandayal · Answer

I believe there are a few important details to note here regarding why C is wrong:

1) Choice C talks about having serious reservations, it doesn't say anything about the report being approved for release by the members. The premise deals with consulting members and implies that the members should have reviewed and approved or allowed the report to be released.

2) Choice C talks about the members having serious reservations, so that implies that if they didn't have any reservations then the chairperson was not wrong to release the report. That doesn't seem correct. In any committee or commission, the members usually must review and approve documents for release.

3) Choice C states that the report shouldn't have been published if ANY members had serious reservations. So this could lead to a situation where even if 1 member had serious reservations, the report would not get published even if the majority were okay with publishing it had they been consulted. This 1 person could override the majority and that doesn't seem correct either.

Please let me know if you agree or disagree with anything I had to say.

Raman109 · Answer

Understanding the argument - 
The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's report to the public (conclusion), for the chairperson did not consult any other members of the commission about releasing the report before having it released. (premise).

The argument is that "consulting any other members or getting their consent was a minimum condition for releasing the report to the public." And he has not met that minimum condition. For example, if the 99.8 percentile is the cut-off for IIM Ahmedabad and someone hasn't met that minimum condition, they should not be admitted.

The argument's conclusion can be properly inferred if which one of the following is assumed?

(A) It would have been permissible for the chairperson to release the commission's report to the public only if most other members of the commission had first given their consent. - Most members giving their consent is a minimum condition for permitting the chairperson to release the report. Ok.

(B) All of the members of the commission had signed the report prior to its release. - out of scope. Our scope is to find a minimum condition for the conclusion in a literal sense.

(C) The chairperson would not have been justified in releasing the commission's report if any members of the commission had serious reservations about the report's content.

(D) The chairperson would have been justified in releasing the report only if each of the commission's members would have agreed to its being released had they been consulted. - it is hyperbolic. It says 100% consent from members is a minimum condition for the chairperson to release the report. Wrong. Option A is better as we don't need 100%.

(E) Some members of the commission would have preferred that the report not be released to the public—some can be 1. Say that one member was against it, but the chairperson could have consulted three others who were in favor, and then he could have released it. The preference of members has no bearing on finding the minimum condition.

Riyaagoell · Answer

Can anyone clarify how A is the answer when the word "permissible" is clearly used, and the chairperson does not need anyone's persmission to release the report.

guddo · Answer

The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's report to the public, for the chairperson did not consult any other members of the commission about releasing the report before having it released. 
 
The argument's conclusion can be properly inferred if which one of the following is assumed?

The argument says the chairperson did not consult any other commission members before releasing the report, and concludes that the release was improper.  The missing rule  must connect lack of prior approval from other members to the conclusion that the release was  not permissible .

(A) It would have been permissible for the chairperson to release the commission's report to the public only if most other members of the commission had first given their consent.

This is correct. “Only if” means prior consent from most other members was required for a permissible release. Since the chairperson did not consult any other members before releasing the report, most other members did not first give consent. Therefore, the release was not permissible.

(B) All of the members of the commission had signed the report prior to its release.

This does not justify the conclusion. Signing the report is not the same as consenting to its public release.

(C) The chairperson would not have been justified in releasing the commission's report if any members of the commission had serious reservations about the report's content.

This does not help. We are not told that any members had serious reservations about the report’s content.

(D) The chairperson would have been justified in releasing the report only if each of the commission's members would have agreed to its being released had they been consulted.

This is not enough. It focuses on what members would have agreed to if consulted, but the issue is that they were not actually consulted or asked for consent.

(E) Some members of the commission would have preferred that the report not be released to the public.

This does not prove that the release was wrong. The argument needs a rule requiring consent or consultation, not merely a fact about some members’ preferences.

Answer: (A)

guddo · Answer

I think the confusion is between “able to release” and  permitted to release .

(A) does not mean the chairperson physically needed permission to send out the report. It means the release was not  proper/allowed  unless most other members first consented.

Since the chairperson did not consult any member, most members clearly did not first give consent. So under (A), the release was not permissible, which proves the conclusion.

egmat · Answer

Hi Riyaagoell,

Your objection to the word "permissible" is a fair reading, but the stem is asking you to do something different from testing that word against the real world.

The stem says the conclusion "can be properly inferred  if  which one of the following is  assumed ." On a sufficient assumption question, the answer choice is not a fact you have to believe or verify - it is the rule you are being handed to fill the gap. So the test for A is not "does a chairperson really need anyone's permission?" It is "if I grant this rule, does the conclusion follow?"

And "permissible" here doesn't mean an official permission slip from a superior. It just means  allowed  - and A is itself the statement that defines what would have made the release allowed.

Why A closes the gap

- Premise: the chairperson consulted  no  other member before releasing the report.
- Grant A: releasing it was permissible  only if  most other members had first given consent.
- Since nobody was consulted, most members could not have consented first.  Therefore  the release was  not permissible  - which is exactly the conclusion that he should not have released it.

Nothing is left over and nothing extra is needed. That is what makes A  sufficient .

A simpler version of the same move

"Ravi shouldn't have taken the car, because he didn't ask his sister."

Assume:  "It would have been okay for Ravi to take the car only if his sister had first agreed."

You may personally think Ravi doesn't need his sister's approval - but that objection is exactly what the assumption overrules. Once you grant it, the conclusion is locked. A is doing the same job in this argument.

Answer: A

The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's

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The chairperson should not have released the Election Commission's

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