Hello everyone! I am now teaching the GMAT independently; I'll be posting here regularly.
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This argument has a fundamentally
mathematical conclusion: It's saying that the
amount of exhaust from buses (= a NUMERICAL QUANTITY) will
decrease thanks to the addition of new parking spots near tourist attractions.
For arguments whose
point is fundamentally MATHEMATICAL—ESPECIALLY if that point just deals with
absolute increases or decreases—BEFORE YOU LOOK AT THE CHOICES, you should
try to LIST EVERYTHING that could possibly contribute to the increase/decrease in which you're interested.
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Here are a couple unrelated examples:
Xxxxxxxxxx xxx xxx xxxxx xxxx. Therefore, the region's population will continue to increase.—> There are EXACTLY 4 THINGS IN THE WHOLE WORLD that affect POPULATION:
•
births (which CONTRIBUTE TO an increase in population)
•
deaths (which work AGAINST an increase in population)
•
immigration (which CONTRIBUTES TO an increase in population)
•
emigration (which works AGAINST an increase in population)
...and that's it. Only choices that deal
directly with at least one of these 4 things could possibly affect this argument.
Xxxxxxxxxx xxx xxx xxxxx xxxx. Therefore, the country will need to import more oil next year.—> There are EXACTLY 2 THINGS IN THE WHOLE WORLD that affect IMPORTS OF OIL:
•
production of oil WITHIN the country (which works AGAINST the need for imports)
•
DEMAND for oil within the country (which CONTRIBUTES TO the need for imports)
...and that's it. Only choices that deal
directly with at least one of these 2 things could possibly affect this argument.
Etc.
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What do we have here?
(Damage to Palitito's buildings from) the buses' exhaust will diminish significantly.More exhaust means more damage, so, the part in parentheses doesn't change anything.
Unlike population or fuel imports, "bus exhaust" is NOT something that works in an unchanging way; it could be affected by totally different factors from one instance to the next. So, we need to
stick to factors ACTUALLY GIVEN in the problem.
We're given exactly
3 CONSIDERATIONS:
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Driving, which PRODUCES exhaust.
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Idling, which PRODUCES exhaust.
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Parking, which, of course, DOESN'T produce exhaust (this is common sense; we don't have to be told this).
These are the ONLY relevant factors.
Furthermore, we have
driving = idling (in terms of exhaust output), so, really it's just
DRIVING AND/OR IDLING —versus— PARKING.
...Yep. That's it.
NOW you're equipped to go to the choices.
For each choice,
think ONLY about how—or whether—that choice AFFECTS THE BALANCE OF THESE 3 ACTIVITIES! Nothing else is relevant (...and now it should be obvious why you should list the factors BEFORE going to the choices—you have a NARROWLY FOCUSED GOAL now).
A/
We're concerned ONLY with buses, so, this choice is irrelevant.
Even if this choice said "Autos pollute just as much as buses do", it would STILL be irrelevant! Make sure you understand EXACTLY why this is the case—and that you can POINT TO THE SPECIFIC WORDS that guarantee this.
B/
This choice is irrelevant for exactly the same reasons as A.
(It's unusual for an official problem to have 2 choices that are
functionally identical—but, as you can see, that occasionally happens.)
C/
If this is true, then the buses
"WANT" to PARK for more than 75% of the total duration of the tours!
This DEFINITELY means that the extra parking spaces will
allow a significant number of buses to IDLE LESS and PARK MORE.This answer is correct.
D/
Like A and B, this choice is irrelevant because we care ONLY about buses (...not about other factors, nor about
comparing bus exhaust to other issues).
E/
Since we're told specifically that
IDLING = DRIVING in terms of pollution, the relative amounts of idling and driving are irrelevant—the same amount of pollution is generated by
any combination of those two activities.