Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years were printed

Question

Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years were printed on acidic paper. Unfortunately, every kind of acidic paper gradually destroys itself due to its very acidity. This process of deterioration can be slowed if the books are stored in a cool, dry environment. Techniques, which are now being developed, to deacidify books will probably be applied only to books with historical significance.

If all of the statements in the passage above are true, which one of the following must also be true?

(A) If a book was published in the past 150 years and is historically insignificant, it will probably deteriorate completely.

(B) Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years will gradually destroy themselves.

(C) Almost all of the books that gradually deteriorate are made of acidic paper.

(D) If a book is of historical significance and was printed before 150 years ago, it will be deacidified.

(E) Books published on acidic paper in 1900 should now all be at about the same state of deterioration.

vaibhav1221 · Answer

B for me.
Re reading the first two lines makes it clear that B is correct. Almost all of the books  published in the past 150 years were printed on acidic paper . Unfortunately,  every kind of acidic paper gradually destroys itself .

rahulkashyap · Answer

is the ans A? it says insignificant ones will not be saved and hence destroyed

vaibhav1221 · Answer

I believe that the last line says that the technique which is being developed will be applied on NEW books with historical significance. 
Talking about historical significance, it is, i guess, only limited to the new books. I feel A is incorrect. 
Waiting for OA.

Regards,
V

rahulkashyap · Answer

I don't see where it says its applied only on NEW books. Can you highlight the same?

Posted from my mobile device

vaibhav1221 · Answer

The last line.
I think i was wrong, just realized.

praveenkuragodi · Answer

Lets go Option wise:
(A) If a book was published in the past 150 years and is historically insignificant, it will probably deteriorate completely. Correct -  As the last line states only books with significance will be saved i.e. insignificant books get destroyed
 
(B) Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years will gradually destroy themselves.  Already stated in paragraph

(C) Almost all of the books that gradually deteriorate are made of acidic paper.  Not necessary to be true, non acidic paper will also degrade

(D) If a book is of historical significance and was printed before 150 years ago, it will be deacidified.  Already stated in paragraph, also irrelevant

(E) Books published on acidic paper in 1900 should now all be at about the same state of deterioration.  Irrelevant

prashant6923 · Answer

Why OA is A and not B?Passage says the process of deterioration can be slowed. OA should be B.Kindly explain.

nightblade354 · Answer

Further explanations here, should you find that you want some more: https://gmatclub.com/forum/almost-all-o ... 62691.html

AdityaHongunti · Answer

I disagree.
The stem says ALMOST ALL. ie NOT ALL.
Option A says if its not significant it will probably deteriorate completely. Though there is probability mentioned The probabilty isalmost negligible.

option C is also not entirely right.

I would like to know the source of the question. NOT AN OFFICIAL that's for sure.

IN2MBB2PE · Answer

This is an official LSAT Question and the Answer is A.

0ExtraTerrestrial · Answer

Well but they might be deacidified before they’re able to destroy themselves

Posted from my mobile device

bringrice · Answer

Hi, can anyone help me understand why A is the correct option?

Option A could be correct using conditional reasoning. If a book was published in the last 150 years, it is probable that it was printed on acidic paper. If a book is deacified, then the book was of historical significance. Contra positive of this statement: if the book was not historically significant, then it will not be deacified and will destroy itself. Option A says it is "probable" and thus it is correct in that sense.

Option A could be incorrect as well and here's why. Say a total of 100 books were published in the last 150 years. 95 of those books were published on acidic paper and rest were published on another kind of paper. Further, let's say the same 95 books were of historical significance and the rest 5 were insignificant. This makes Option A wrong because now the "probability" is low that the insignificant books will destroy themselves.

TheVDR · Answer

The possibility that the number of pH Neutral / Alkaline / Non-acidic paper based "historically insignificant" books will seriously outnumber the acidic paper based "historically insignificant" books is zero as it has already been stated that  "almost all of the books published in the past 150 years were printed on acidic paper"

bringrice · Answer

The argument does state that "almost all books published in the last 150 years were printed on acidic paper" but it does not distinguish between historically significant vs insignificant books. Based on the argument alone I do believe a possibility such as the example I drew up exists.

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

Interesting idea, but note that A uses the flexible word "probably." Therefore, it can allow for the unlikely scenario that a) there are few insignificant books and b) somehow all of these insignificant books were printed on special acid-free paper (that also does not deteriorate for any other reason). Sure, in that unlikely scenario, the insignificant books won't degrade. But it's still fair to say that they probably will degrade.

TheVDR · Answer

Considering non-acidic books are few (All minus almost all) in number, it is safe to assume that historically insignificant non-acidic books are even fewer than total. Again, we might now know the proportion of historically significant to historically insignificant books for both acidic and non-acidic papers, Option A cleverly says "probably", and we can surely say that the probability is absolutely high. There can be an outlier case as the one you mentioned but using "probably" leaves that room for outliers!

ishan1110 · Answer

B will be wrong as according to the last statement, books of historical significance will be deacidified and preserved from destroying themsleves

Johny23 · Answer

This is, by far, the best explanation of why A is correct. )

JLambert · Answer

I think the reason it's 'A' is because there's no discussion on how many books are historically significant. We can infer an amount and that most won't meet the criteria, but that's an added step of inference.

'A' doesn't require that. If we are reserving the protection for books that are historically significant, then the ones that aren't won't be protected. It's mainly restating the idea that's written without us having to add context to it.

Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years were printed

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Almost all of the books published in the past 150 years were printed

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