Because dried peat moss, which is derived from sphagnum moss

Question

Because dried peat moss, which is derived from sphagnum moss, contains no chemical additives and is a renewable resource, many gardeners use large amounts of it as a soil conditioner in the belief that the practice is environmentally sound. They are mistaken. The millions of acres of sphagnum moss in the world contribute more oxygen to the atmosphere than do all of the world's rain forests combined, and the garden soil industry is depleting these areas much faster than they can renew themselves.

Which one of the following principles, if valid, most helps to justify the argument's reasoning?

(A) Using a product may be environmentally unsound even if the product is a renewable resource and contains no chemical additive.

(B) A practice is not environmentally sound if it significantly reduces the amount of oxygen entering the atmosphere.

(C) A practice is environmentally sound if it helps to protect rain forests that contribute large amounts of oxygen to the atmosphere.

(D) If the environmental benefits of a practice outweigh the environmental costs, that practice can be legitimately considered environmentally sound.

(E) If the practices of an industry threaten a vital resource, those practices should be banned.

Saasingh · Answer

OA B ?

We need to strengthen the reasoning => because S fields are being depleted at a faster rate than they can renew, practice is NOT environmentally sound!! We need to strengthen this reasoning.

(A) Using a product may be environmentally unsound even if the product is a renewable resource and contains no chemical additive.
This doesnt address the main point of the reasoning. WRONG.

(B) A practice is not environmentally sound if it significantly reduces the amount of oxygen entering the atmosphere.
CORRECT. If a practice is reducing oxygen, its not environmentally sound. Its inline with the reasoning and supports the claim.

(C) A practice is environmentally sound if it helps to protect rain forests that contribute large amounts of oxygen to the atmosphere.
WRONG because, it says that IF IT HELPS TO PROTECT RAIN FORESTS. What if it protects the rain forests, but further depletes other resources that provide MUCH MORE oxygen to the environment? Not bullet proof, too specific.

(D) If the environmental benefits of a practice outweigh the environmental costs, that practice can be legitimately considered environmentally sound.
can be ? that's a conclusion/judgement. I am not sure how to explain but I do know B is much better. This is more or less irrelevant to the reasoning..

(E) If the practices of an industry threaten a vital resource, those practices should be banned.
No judgement needed. SHOULD BE BANNED, irrelevant. WRONG.

ShreyasJavahar · Answer

A)Does not provide insight into why the product could not be environmentally sound.

B)Partially right, but fails to account for why a practice is being considered environment friendly to begin with. Simply states that the practice is bad.

C)Information provided only with regards to protection of rain forests, does not paint a holistic picture.

D)CORRECT. Aptly states that a certain practice might have a fair number of environmental benefits, but could ultimately be environmentally unsound if the harm it causes outweighs its benefits.

E)The passage does not state that anything should be banned.

garcmillan · Answer

Following Nightblade354 advise to push my CR skills beyond the limits, I'll post an extensive analysis of this questions, explaining the initial thoughts on the stimulus and the reasons why I reject four options and choose one as the winner

. I beieve this is one of the best ways to improve in CR. Don't just do questions, but try to extract as much as possible from each of them. I think doing blind review help a lot in doing so (more about blind review here: https://gmatclub.com/forum/mod-nightbla ... 95316.html) Here is the stimulus: Because dried peat moss, which is derived from sphagnum moss, contains no chemical additives and is a renewable resource, many gardeners use large amounts of it as a soil conditioner in the belief that the practice is environmentally sound. They are mistaken. The millions of acres of sphagnum moss in the world contribute more oxygen to the atmosphere than do all of the world's rain forests combined, and the garden soil industry is depleting these areas much faster than they can renew themselves. Initial thoughts : Clearly, the argument states that an action is not environmentally sound if it reduces a vital resource (in this case, oxygen being released to the atmosphere). This would be the general principle (whether we talk about oxygen or about another vital resource) Let's go into the answers: (A) Using a product may be environmentally unsound even if the product is a renewable resource and contains no chemical additive. It can be, but not always, so it is not a GENERAL principle. OUT (B) A practice is not environmentally sound if it significantly reduces the amount of oxygen entering the atmosphere This falls within my initial thoughts (in this case talks about oxygen specifically). KEEP (C) A practice is environmentally sound if it helps to protect rain forests that contribute large amounts of oxygen to the atmosphere. It does not need to be the case to protect rain forests! OUT (D) If the environmental benefits of a practice outweigh the environmental costs, that practice can be legitimately considered environmentally sound. Environmental cost, the argument does not mention anything about this. OUT (E) If the practices of an industry threaten a vital resource, those practices should be banned. Banned? The argument never mentions it. OUT OPTION B

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

This question asks us to strengthen the reasoning of the argument. The argument states that the practice of using dried peat moss as a soil conditioner is not an environmentally sound practice because the millions of acres of sphagnum moss from which the dried peat moss comes contribute more oxygen to the atmosphere than do all of the world's rain forests combined, and the garden soil industry is reducing these areas much faster than they can renew themselves,thereby affecting the oxygen in the atmosphere.

We need a principle that will support this argument.

Option E  is the easiest to eliminate. It is an extreme statement and is also out of scope. The argument is not only about the practices of an industry. It focuses on how a practice that is thought to be environmentally sound is actually not.

Option D  can also be eliminated. The passage states that millions of acres of sphagnum moss contribute more oxygen than all of the world’s rainforests combined, so the environmental benefits do not outweigh the costs.

Option C  is irrelevant. Sphagnum moss is compared to the rain forests, but there is no mention of protecting the rain forests specifically. So, C can be eliminated too.

Option A  overlooks the way in which the product might be environmentally unsound. It only focuses on the fact that a product may be environmentally unsound even if it is renewable and has no chemicals. It doesn’t give weight to the fact that the depletion of the product has an effect on the oxygen levels. So, Option A can also be eliminated.

The argument states that the practice of using dried peat moss is environmentally unsound because the use of the moss depletes the area faster than it can renew itself. Since these areas contribute more oxygen than all of the rain forests combined, the practice reduces the amount of oxygen entering the atmosphere. Option B states this.

Therefore, B  is the best option.
Jayanthi Kumar.

LunaticMaestro · Answer

Finding everybody's explanation, to reject D, hard to digest; nobody is taking into the account the phrase "depleting these areas much faster than they can renew themselves." as environmental cost.

guddo · Answer

You’re right that “depleting faster than renewal” is an environmental cost. The reason (D) still isn’t the best principle is that the argument never claims (or needs to claim) that the costs  outweigh  the benefits. It just says this practice is not environmentally sound because it reduces a major oxygen source and is unsustainable.

So (D) is too general and adds a weighing test the author does not use. (B) fits the author’s actual logic:  if a practice significantly reduces oxygen input, it’s not environmentally sound , and depletion of a major oxygen producer does exactly that.

agrasan · Answer

Hi  KarishmaB   DmitryFarber   MartyMurray

I don't understand how (D) is wrong. My reasoning is following:
 Benefit  = The millions of acres of sphagnum moss in the world contribute more oxygen to the atmosphere than do all of the world's rain forests combined
 Cost  = garden soil industry is depleting these areas much faster than they can renew themselves

The author concludes  "They are mistaken"  using the last sentence in the argument as a premise so I assumed that costs must have been higher than benefits of using dried peat moss.

Is (D) wrong because we are not  explicitly  given that the costs outweigh benefits? If that's the reason why (D) is wrong then why can't we infer costs > benefits, the premise would not support the conclusion otherwise.

ParamjitDasGMAT · Answer

Hi  agrasan ,

You're on the right track. Here's the piece of the puzzle that you may have overlooked.

We can conclude, based on the author saying "The other people are mistaken", that if  a practice reduces the amount of oxygen  , then it is unsound . We could  possibly, although not definitely , perhaps go a step further and infer that the general principle would be " if benefits are outweighed by the costs, the practice is unsound ".

Irrespective of how far we can infer, what we  CANNOT  do is infer "  If ~X, (then) ~Y  " from "  If X, (then) Y  ".

Consider the following example:

If it rains, John will carry an umbrella.

From this, can we conclude that if it  doesn't  rain, John  won't  carry an umbrella?

No, because raining is only a  sufficient  condition for John to carry an umbrella. He might very well choose to carry an umbrella based on his fashion sense (although, it would be quite difficult to carry one just for the sake of fashion!). In other words,   raining   isn't the  ONLY  set of conditions under which John carries an umbrella. It's only a  sufficient condition  .

Since we cannot infer   If ~X, (then) ~Y   from   If X, (then) Y ,  Option (D) is incorrect.

Hope it helps. Let me know if anything is unclear.

gullyboy09 · Answer

Hi  agrasan , let me help you with how I proceed with rejecting D.

In my understanding, what author tried to point out is that given practice is not good (unsound) for enviroment, whereas D talks about if benefit is more than cost, it is fine (author never made his/her point in that way).

Because dried peat moss, which is derived from sphagnum moss

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Because dried peat moss, which is derived from sphagnum moss

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