The attribution of the choral work Lacrimae to the composer Pescard

IMO D.

If later treatises are based on the previous one which apparently is not considered genuine or valid, then later treatises do not provide sufficient evidence.

OA is D. Thanks economist.
I have observed from the forum that your hit ratio and explanation of CR is really good.
My exam is in 2 weeks of time.
Any tip for CR?

My guess is D

This is the way I understood it:
Lacrimae is believed to be composed by Pescard but even that is in doubt. Recently the treatises have attributed the work to Pescard. However, one cannot say Lacrimae was composed by Pescard because:

D is the best answer for me

I narrowed them down to A & D. However the passage doesn't provide any information about the 'misidentification'. But it is possible that later treaties could be wrongly identified as there were no other sources than the earlier treaties. Since earlier ones are tentatively accepted, the later ones may not be accepted at all!
Therefore IMO D.

P.S. Certain words in the para may not be easily identifiable, however it is important to understand the gist that the passage conveys. Think of 'treaties' as a 'work of art', for instance.

Lacrimae -> composed by Pescard (but not sure)

Other people saying Lacrimae is composed by Pescard by referencing the given information above is only going to be as good as what knew from the start. And that's that Pescard was only "tentatively" the composer of that piece of work.

Thus (D) fits this - the new treatises lended no support for that claim...one way is that they were all doing what we just described above, referencing a weak "source" to begin with. As a result, the conclusion will also be weak or tentative.

I must say tough question. D is correct.

This is FLAW OF REASONING question. This is not weaken question. The basic difference between the two is that Weaken questions accept "New" information, but Flaw questions do not. In flaw question, you mus base solely on Fact.

ANALYSIS:
Premise: a single treatise from the early 1500s that named Pescard as the composer.
Premise: Recently, several musical treaties from the late 1500s name Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae
Sub-conclusion: The attribution of the choral work Lacrime to the composer Pescard (1400-1474) has been regarded as tentative.

Main-Conclusion: newly discovered treatises lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard

Why? what if the later treatises and earlier treaties used the SAME source for their attribution. It means the contribution of the later treaties is the same as that of earlier treaties. The later does not provide more evidences to support the sub-conclusion. That's why the sub-conclusion fails.

D clearly states that.

@Mun23:
Why D is correct? You can refer to my explanation above.
Why B is wrong?
B says: "the author of the treatise from the early 1500s had no very strong evidence on which to base the identification Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae".
"No very strong" does not mean "weak" evidence. Moreover, if the later treaties used different source for their contribution, even stronger evidences, the sub-conclusion is still correct.

Hope it helps you a little bit.

Two main parts of the paragraphs are:
Argument Part1: Attribution of the choral work Lacrime to the composer Pescard (1400-1474) has been regarded as tentative
Reason: It was based on a single treatise from the early 1500s that named Pescard as the composer

Argument Part2: several musical treaties from the late 1500s have come to light, all of which name Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae.
However these newly discovered treatises lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard.
Reason: ?
Only option D is able to relate the early 1500 and late 1500 treaties in a way which can be used as a reason for argument part2

Thanks,
ssbisht

Hi e-GMAT,
Can you please come up with an explanation here why B is wrong over D? I found these two close ones and then chose D but unfortunately as 2nd thought selected B which got me wrong.

@Chiranjeev- look forward to your analysis!

Hi ssbisht,

Can you elaborate the POE because as what you have stated in RED I have query about it.

Somehow I am unable to get the RED part itself.

Initially it says that late 1500's treaties name X as composer of Y.
And then these treaties lend no support in attribution of Y to X.

Please advise !

Let me try.

Two main parts of the paragraphs are:
Argument Part1: Attribution of the choral work Lacrime to the composer Pescard (1400-1474) has been regarded as tentative
Reason: It was based on a single treatise from the early 1500s that named Pescard as the composer

Argument Part2: several musical treaties from the late 1500s have come to light, all of which name Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae.
However these newly discovered treatises lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard.
Reason: ?

Go with the flow of argument, First the author says the attribution is tentative because it was based on a single treaty from the early 1500s. Then, he went on to state that several treaties came up in the late 1500s supporting the attribution. But, Unfortunately, so the author is not again convinced with these several treaties that came up in the late 1500s.

Reason: These late treaties don't have sufficient evidences or they are based on the assumptions/source/info from the earlier treaty.

D: says exactly the same
B: does not give an explanation as to why the author is not convinced with the several treaties that came up in the late 1500s

Hope it helps.

OFFICIAL ANSWER IS CLEAR ENOUGH TO UNDERSTAND THE QUESTION

Here is the office answer


Situation: A choral work has been tentatively attributed to Pescard based on a single treatise from
the early 1500s. But several treatises from the late 1500s have recently been discovered,
and all of them attribute the work to Pescard.

Reasoning: Which of the answer choices provides the strongest reason for the conclusion? The argument’s
conclusion is that the newly discovered late-1500 treatises lend no support to the
attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard. It is worth noting that prior to the conclusion the
passage provides information which suggests that these newly discovered treatises do lend
support to the attribution. So the question is: Why don’t they? A good reason for
thinking they do not is that the newly discovered treatises probably derive solely from the
attribution given in the earlier text. Thus the attributions in the later treatises are only as
reliable as the attribution in the earlier treatise—and the argument suggests that that
reliability has not been conclusively established.

A This makes the treatise from the early 1500s less reliable, but it does not explain why the newly
discovered treatises are unreliable.

B Like answer choice (A), this is irrelevant. The question is not why the treatise from the early 1500s
fails to lend support to the attribution but why the treatises from the late 1500s fail to do so.

C This is irrelevant because it does not refer to the newly discovered treatises whose attribution of
Lacrimae is at issue.

D Correct. The question is whether these newly discovered treatises lend additional support.
Lacrimae has already been tentatively attributed to Pescard based on the text from the early 1500s.
So, if the later treatises base their attribution solely on the earlier treatise, then they provide no
additional support beyond that already provided by the earlier treatise.

E This leaves open the possibility that there was no treatise at all in the 1600s that discussed Pescard
or Lacrimae. Also, it fails to provide significant evidence either for or against Pescard’s having
composed Lacrimae. But even if it did provide such evidence, it would be irrelevant because the
issue is why the late-1500 treatises fail to provide significant support for the attribution of
Lacrimae to Pescard, not whether Pescard composed the work.

The correct answer is D.

Pecked D here...
The structure: in the early 1500' Mr A wrote that Pescard is a composer of lacrimae -> is a BAD source
in the late 1500' Mr B,C,D wrote that Pescard is a composer of lacrimae -> Supports that Pescard is the author
Unfortunately, these newly discovered treatises lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard, since --> we have here a change of course WHY Since he later treatises probably had no source for their attribution other than the earlier treatise.

Last sentence talks about the tratises of the late 1500' - so we need them in the correct answer choice

A. the treatise from the early 1500’s misidentifies the composers of some of the musical works it considers --> we need Info about late 1500'
B. the author of the treatise from the early 1500’s had no very strong evidence on which to base the identification of Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae --> we need Info about late 1500'
C. there are works that can conclusively be attributed to Pescard that are not even mentioned in the treatise from the early 1500’s --> we don't need other works of Pescard, we need that particular.
D. the later treatises probably had no source for their attribution other than the earlier treatise --> CORRECT
E. no known treatises from the 1600’s identify Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae --> we need Info about late 1500's

B says that the author of the treatise from the early 1500’s had no very strong evidence on which to base the identification of Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae.

But we are not talking about early 1500's at all here in the latter part of the argument. We are talking about "late 1500's".

So, even if the author of the treatise from the early 1500’s had no very strong evidence, this does not tell us that musical treatises from the late 1500’s lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard.

However, as D states, the later treatises probably had no source for their attribution other than the earlier treatise, then obviously these later treatises lend no additional support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard.

These 'Complete the Argument' questions are Find the Assumption or Inference questions in disguise. In this case, the indicator word 'since' before the blank shows that a missing premise (an assumption) is required.

I went with the same mindset. All other choices apart from D talk about early treatise whereas the conclusion/last sentence focuses on the later treatise. Hence the other options get automatically rejected.

I particularly like this one specially the twist of language.

Premise:
1. a choral work L tentatively attributed to the composer P. Why so? based on a single treatise from the early 1500’s that named Pescard as the composer.
2. Recently, several musical treatises from the late 1500’s have come to light, all of which name Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae. ---- This seems like P is the real composer of L.
3. But none of these newly found treatise lend no support to the attribution of Lacrimae to Pescard. ---- We need to explainwhy so?

Well my best thought is that either new treatise can base their claim on earlier one or some other known/unknown source. As it is time of late 1500s, a live person cant do it. Mouth of word is not possible. these guys need all this in written. So only one option is possible. If we discard that option somehow, we can achieve this.

A. the treatise from the early 1500’s misidentifies the composers of some of the musical works it considers --- So if these guys are wrong for some others musical work, then should be wrong for this one too. well it makes this one unreliable. may be and may be not. Classic GMAT trap.

B. the author of the treatise from the early 1500’s had no very strong evidence on which to base the identification of Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae --- So first treatise is not on solid evidence. so it will become unreliable. but this does not say anything about new found once. may be later found treatise have some other solid source.

C. there are works that can conclusively be attributed to Pescard that are not even mentioned in the treatise from the early 1500’s ---- i think now it is out of context. new discovered evidence is not mentioned in abstract. more over it is not explaning the issue in hand either.

D. the later treatises probably had no source for their attribution other than the earlier treatise --- on the line of prethinking. as the first treatise is unreliable so does any thing based on it.

E. no known treatises from the 1600’s identify Pescard as the composer of Lacrimae --- out of context again.

D seems to be the best of the lot.

What happened:

There has been only one evidence that Lacrimae belongs to a certain composer. Thus when there is only one, there are not many people who actually all together agree that he is the composer. That makes the attribution tentative. Later that century came up other pieces of evidence claiming the same author as previously found evidence. However, these newly discovered papers give NO support that the author is certainly the one already mentioned. In our case Pescard. They must be irrelevant.



A) INCORRECT – If there are 100 names of works and 100 authors. And let's say only two of those names are mistakenly attributed. Then the list is pretty accurate and the fact the Author is the same as previously mentioned is really probable. And Still.. we want to find the evidence that lately discovered papers are irrelevant.

B) INCORRECT – Ok. when he didn't have very strong evidence on which he decided to attribute the work to Pescard, this has nothing to do with lately discovered evidence, which all mention Pescard as an author. If the author of the first treatise had stronger or weaker evidence doesn’t say anything about lately found papers.

C) INCORRECT - In this question, we are concerned about the work Lacrimae. We do not care whether there are any other works contributed to Pescard. This doesn't complete the passage at all.

D) CORRECT – Yes. This is exactly what we are looking for. If all the other people made a statement that work belongs to Pescard on the basis of only one previously found evidence. Then they didn't find anything new and they simply cited the first paper made by some folk. Thus, they are irrelevant

E) INCORRECT – Again we do not care about other treatise found in the following century. Even whether they prove Pescard author. This doesn’t explain why lately 1500s found evidence has no value.