Ask me Anything about GMAT Critical Reasoning


Hello and welcome to my CR Expert Topic. Let me know if you have any CR questions I can help with - strategy, specific ones, etc.

You may know me from forum discussion - I am one of the resident Veritas Prep Experts on GMAT Club. I have over 8,000 posts and 22,000 Kudos. I hope you find my replies and explanations helpful. If you have any specific questions about Critical Reasoning in General such as strategy/approach, feel free to post them here and I will be happy to address them. I intend to have this thread be as a "Everything You Need to Know about CR" type of thread.

If you have questions about a specific CR question and why something does not seem right, please post a link here for me with your specific question/concern. Please do not double-post - that's not polite and against the GMAT Club rules.

Thank you all - good luck on the GMAT and look forward to seeing you in the CR forum!
Karishma.
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Hello VeritasKarishma .... thanks a bunch for starting this thread.

I have got this CR- problem from OG2019-Q662. I am yet not comfortable with the logic. Really appreciate ur help :

In the country of Marut, the Foreign Trade agency's records were reviewed in 1994 in light of information then newly available about neighboring Goro. The review revealed that in every year since 1963, the agency's projection of what Goro's gross national product (GNP) would be five years later was a serious underestimate. The review also revealed that in every year since 1963, the agency estimated Goro's GNP for the previous year—a Goro state secret—very accurately.

Of the following claims, which is most strongly supported by the statements given ?

(A) Goro's GNP fluctuated greatly between 1963 and 1994.
(B) Prior to 1995, Goro had not released data intended to mislead the agency in making its five-year projections.
(C) The amount by which the agency underestimated the GNP it projected for Goro tended to increase over time.
OA = (D) Even before the new information came to light, the agency had reason to think that at least some of the five-year projections it had made were inaccurate.
(E) The agency's five year projections of Goro's GNP had no impact on economic planning in Marut.

Thanks in appreciation
u1983
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You are most welcome, u1983!
Here you go: https://gmatclub.com/forum/in-the-count ... l#p2145327
By the way, even if you put just the relevant link in the thread, I will get to it.
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Hello VeritasKarishma
Would you elaborate on the time to be dedicated to CR questions in the new format of GMAT?

Sent from my Moto G (4) using GMAT Club Forum mobile app

Hi VeritasKarishma

Here is a tricky one

Most of the students preparing for GMAT jump to OG / OG VR after studying
from books (read power score CR bible / Manhattan CR) or after viewing 2-3 hours
of 'how to approach CR qs' from online courses. Unfortunately, it is quite practical
that not all students are able to achieve desired accuracy (read 80% and higher) on official
qs and falter in applying what they learnt.

In such a scenario, if a student has an exceptional memory by which he/she recalls OE/OA,
do you think it is a wise decision to move to LSAT to erase OG memory and
come back to those qs within a fortnight? What best tactics can be used by a student
under the current situation and time crunch?
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Hi VeritasKarishma ,
Please provide your expert advice on my queries specified in the given links-

1. https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-exchange ... l#p2145404

2. https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-current- ... l#p2144604
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Here you go:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-exchange ... l#p2147704

https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-current- ... l#p2147748
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Hi VeritasKarishma,
While reading the answer for the question specified in https://gmatclub.com/forum/the-current- ... l#p2144604 , I found the below explaination for the below explanation from a MGMAT instructor on its forum. (https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... t4492.html). He stated that 'therefore test' DID NOT work in that question for the particular user because there's a confusion between causality and logical deduction.


1. It was raining, therefore Tom's shoes got wet.
Here, the word 'therefore' shows causality. There isn't actually any argument here.

2. Tom's shoes are wet, therefore it must have been raining.
Here we have an argument (I'm making a claim and supporting it with evidence).

My understanding - In statement 1, we know both the parts - it was raining and Tom's shoes got wet actually happened. So, we establish cause and effect using "therefore".
Whereas, in statement 2, we ONLY know that Tom's shoes are wet and we DO NOT know for sure whether it was raining. So, here we make a claim and thus its an argument.


3.PROPOSITION A: BECAUSE "The current administration and Congress have once again practiced bad public policy" THEREFORE "the gap between the rich and poor in this country will continue to widen" - This is causality, not an argument.

4.PROPOSITION B: BECAUSE "the gap between the rich and poor in this country will continue to widen" THEREFORE "The current administration and Congress have once again practiced bad public policy" - Here, the argument is supporting a judgement of the government's policy with a claim about it's consequences.


In statement 3, which is a causality as per MGMAT instructor, do we know that both the parts(the parts that follow BECAUSE and THEREFORE) are true?
Because even the part that follows THEREFORE in statement 3 looks like CLAIM to me.

Whereas in statement 4, which is an argument as per MGMAT instructor, we ONLY know that the part that follows BECAUSE is true and make a claim about the part that follows THEREFORE ?
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Haven't forgotten about this! Just a bit stretched at the moment. Will get to it!
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Hi karishma ,
Can you please help me with below question .

According to recent studies, people whose diet is unusually high in protein are more likely to suffer from insomnia than people whose diet contains moderate amounts of protein. It is therefore likely that a diet high in protein is a cause, though perhaps not the only cause, of insomnia.

Which of the following, if true, casts the most serious doubt on the conclusion drawn above?

1)Diets that are high in protein are often low in foods that help keep the immune system working effectively.
2)People whose diet is unusually high in protein often have other characteristics in common, some of which are
likely to cause insomnia.
3)Reducing the amount of protein in one's diet can be harmful.
4)People whose diets are unusually low in protein often experience insomnia.
5)Insomniacs who switched from high-protein diets to more moderate levels of protein intake have reported
that the change was so unpleasant that it worsened their insomnia.