what's the purpose of the premise/conclusion?

Question

I understand what the premise and conclusion are, and I understand which is what and how to find them, but how does labeling the premise and conclusion actually help me solve a CR problem? Basically, how am I suppose to use the premise/conclusion?

Are premises taken as facts, and I should be attacking the conclusion only?

Are premises taken as facts, and I should be attacking the conclusion only?

abhimahna · Answer

Hi christeawortham , Welcome to GMATClub

Yes, premises are facts or the source of truth that MUST be not be broken. Understanding the premise and conclusion actually helps you to identify what needs to be broken/strengthened or what made author to come to that conclusion. Conclusion can always be weakened but premises not. Does that make sense?

apansari · Answer

Premise is basically set of facts which lead to conclusion via assumptions made.

Premise---------------------Conclusion
 (via assumptions)

Sent from my SM-T111 using  GMAT Club Forum mobile app

umg · Answer

We actually attack the assumption that take us from Premise(s) to conclusion. But yes, Premises are taken as Facts. So, every option going against a stated Premise should be eliminated right away, though you will hardly find any such question.

The most important reason for labeling sentences as Premise and Conclusion is that there are a lot of Strengthen Questions in which some options will support the Premise instead of the Conclusion and because our job is to Strengthen the Conclusion, those options would be the incorrect ones. I hope it makes sense.

ccooley · Answer

There's one type of CR question, 'structure'/'describe the role' questions, which will ask you directly about the premise(s) and conclusion of the argument.

It's also useful on other types of CR problem, because understanding an argument is synonymous with understanding the conclusion and premises. In order to get the right answer, for any problem type, you need to know what the argument is saying, and for that, you really only need to know two things:

- What is the author arguing? (That's the conclusion.)
- Why does the author think that his or her point is correct? (That's the premise(s)).

On problem types other than describe the role problems, you don't need to be able to label the exact sentence that contains the conclusion. But if you don't know what it is, there's no reliable way to tell whether an answer is right or not.

VerbalBot · Answer

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what's the purpose of the premise/conclusion?

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