GMATPrep CR question

[RonPurewal]

it's not "stupidity"; it's "not imagining the problem in real-life terms".
if you actually took the time to mentally experience the situation described--i.e., to imagine the situation as though you yourself were involved in it--then you'd definitely understand "ok, something weird is happening specifically in the capital".
at that point, you would immediately realize that any valid explanation would have to single out the capital.

[RonPurewal]

also-- this may sound strange to you at first, but think about it for a moment-- i think one key contributor to the challenge of this problem is that no NAME is given to the capital city. it is discussed only as "donia's capital city".

in the real world, we would NEVER have a (decently in-depth) discussion of something unique that's happening in a certain city without naming the city! so, since the capital city is weirdly left unnamed, this problem becomes a lot more distant from our ordinary lives--and thus much harder.

try looking at the problem again, but this time giving the capital city a name. (for the moment, don't change anything else at all-- just name the city.)
the impact on your ability to solve the problem will, i'm betting, be HUGE.

[RonPurewal]

^^ for the same reason, you should give names (and personalities, where appropriate) to the speaker(s) delivering the arguments in CR problems.

see, in real life, it's almost impossible to be confused about "Which side of this issue is person X on?"
likewise, if you discover a key fact affecting the issue, it's almost impossible to be confused about "Which side does this fact help? Which side does it hurt?"

on the other hand, the concepts of "the argument", "strengthen", "weaken", etc. are all faceless and lifeless, so it's much easier to become confused about them-- to such an extent that, in CR, people routinely choose wrong answers that are exactly the opposite of what is desired.

just try it on a few problems--give names, and (if appropriate) personalities, to the speaker(s). again, you'll find that the impact on your problem-solving ability is much larger than you may have suspected.

[RonPurewal]

here's what i mean by "personalities":

open up the OG 13th/2015 edition to CR problem 21 (can't reproduce text here). if you have OG 12th, it's problem 20.

this speaker is someone who believes that the worlds of "art" and "useful things" simply cannot intersect.
in other words, the speaker is an extreme "art snob". when i see this argument, i picture a stuffy, super-conservative speaker, with a tweed vested suit and round-rimmed glasses, sitting in a well-appointed office at a museum (because of course he works at a museum!). he's the type of guy who is enraged by rock'n'roll, rap music, and street art. he simply does not understand that anything other than "classical" art is, well, art.

if you can picture this man vividly enough, then it should be totally clear that...
...choice A is exactly the opposite of what he would think (heavens! he'd have a heart attack if he found out that his art museum was going to show furniture)
... choices B and C are exactly the opposite of what he would think, for essentially the same reason (he thinks that ALL furniture-makers are concerned solely with functional use; the thought that any of them think about anything else, such as aesthetics, would not occur to this man).

thus you can eliminate those choices immediately, even without taking the time to come up with rational grounds for that elimination.

[RonPurewal]

more generally,
for ALL cr passages, try to ...

... reduce the text to language that a 9-year-old (or someone with an extremely limited command of english) would understand,

AND

either...
1/ directly personalize the situation (= put yourself in a key role, and imagine how the situation plays out)
...or...
2/ if that's not possible, imagine a dialogue or dispute about the topic in question.

these are easily the most important things you can do in CR.

(if your native language is not english, then you can replace "explain to a 9-year-old" with "translate into words that you would actually say in conversation in your own language".)

the problems depend fundamentally on human intuition; it's impossible to solve them otherwise. (if you could lay out completely objective rules--of the sort you could program into a computer--that could solve even a small fraction of CR problems, you would absolutely revolutionize the field of artificial intelligence.)
so, you should give yourself the maximum possible opportunity to use human intuition! as in real life, the more personally invested you are in a situation, the more likely you are to have intuitive insight into it--so you should make yourself "personally invested" in these situations, even if only in your imagination.

[gbyhats]

Whoa thank you for your long posts, Ron!


And Congratulations! you now reach 15K posts now. Someone should at least offer you a budget or something:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
****Cheers! *****
The first person in this forum to reach 15K! And, also Happy Easter!
Apr 3, 2015
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

--

^^ for the same reason, you should give names (and personalities, where appropriate) to the speaker(s) delivering the arguments in CR problems.

Sure!

Researchers prove that people are better at remember things that have names. Thus, "A story about a Tom" is easier to remember than "A story about a man". Probably can support your ideas

in other words, the speaker is an extreme "art snob". when i see this argument, i picture a stuffy, super-conservative speaker, with a tweed vested suit and round-rimmed glasses, sitting in a well-appointed office at a museum (because of course he works at a museum!). he's the type of guy who is enraged by rock'n'roll, rap music, and street art. he simply does not understand that anything other than "classical" art is, well, art.

I love this example! Very vivid and very attractive. Feels like it is taken from a well-written novel.

more generally,
for ALL cr passages, try to ...

... reduce the text to language that a 9-year-old (or someone with an extremely limited command of english) would understand,

Yeah! I would say, in my opinion, most people who made mistakes in CR are those who interpret the questions wrong. I believe 99.9% of people are capable of understanding the rational behind the right answer.

[RonPurewal]

And Congratulations! you now reach 15K posts now. Someone should at least offer you a budget or something:

i'm guessing that "budget" isn't actually what you meant here. (maybe you meant "award"? "prize"?)

a "budget" is an allotment of money for some purpose.

"budget" and "money" have pretty much exactly the same relationship as "diet" and "food"--all the way down to informal usage.
(e.g., "budget" and "diet" are mostly generic terms that imply nothing about excess or parsimony--but "i'm on a budget" can mean i don't have much money to spend, in exactly the same way "i'm on a diet" can mean i'm eating less food.)

[RonPurewal]

Researchers prove that people are better at remember things that have names. Thus, "A story about a Tom" is easier to remember than "A story about a man". Probably can support your ideas

the point is not memory, which is basically irrelevant here.
rather, the point is understanding, which is a completely different thing.

whenever a situation is personal, almost every human being (save those with certain psychological conditions) will have a much deeper understanding of that situation, and of the factors that bear upon it (= what is or isn't "in scope", as people on here are fond of saying).

the idea is captured nicely by an old saying, "medical school is easy if you're the patient."

[RonPurewal]

Yeah! I would say, in my opinion, most people who made mistakes in CR are those who interpret the questions wrong. I believe 99.9% of people are capable of understanding the rational behind the right answer.

yes. (in fact, this %99.9 figure is probably an underestimate!)

the other, equally important, observation worth making here is that precisely 0.0000% of machines/databases/logic engines/"rules" are capable of the same.
the consequences for test takers are clear.

[gbyhats]

Hi Ron,

Thank you very much for your replies!!!

i'm guessing that "budget" isn't actually what you meant here. (maybe you meant "award"? "prize"?)

Oops, I'm sorry! I confused "budget" with "badge".
I'm really impressed by your dedication to this forum!

--
What even impressive is that
You are definite a celebrity, and normally we can't see celebritys' online presence because they usually busy (spend time in their work or meeting different people)
It's so great to have you here!

the point is not memory, which is basically irrelevant here.

Gotcha!

yes. (in fact, this %99.9 figure is probably an underestimate!)

I agree!

[RonPurewal]

Oops, I'm sorry! I confused "budget" with "badge".

ah, ok, makes sense.

What even impressive is that
You are definite a celebrity, and normally we can't see celebritys' online presence because they usually busy (spend time in their work or meeting different people)

believe me, "i can't see ron's real-life face" is a good thing, not a bad thing. i've got the perfect face for radio, as they say.

It's so great to have you here!

thanks!

[VikrantS137]

The passage states that "the proportion of new cars in Donia's capital city has always been comparatively high".
"Comparatively high" means we're comparing the proportion of new cars in the capital with the same proprtion ... somewhere else.

The only sensible interpretation is that we're comparing the % in the capital with the % in other cities.

Please explain in detail for following reasoning:

(1)

Still not clear why A is wrong

Donia's Capital

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 200
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 900

Other Cities

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 10
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 200

But since, more of the cars in Donia’s capital city were made before 1993 than after 1993, there is insignificant decline in nitrogen dioxide. Hence A should be correct. Please comment.

(2)

Option D:

Many Donians who own cars made before 1993 have had catalytic converters installed in their cars.

That means - because of these cars made before 1993 -- the pollution level was already less.

Hence, because of new cars (with the catalytic converters installed) will not help bring down the pollution level much.

Hence, D explains the insignificant decline in nitrogen dioxide emissions in Donia’s capital city

[sahilk47]

The passage states that "the proportion of new cars in Donia's capital city has always been comparatively high".
"Comparatively high" means we're comparing the proportion of new cars in the capital with the same proprtion ... somewhere else.

The only sensible interpretation is that we're comparing the % in the capital with the % in other cities.

Please explain in detail for following reasoning:

(1)

Still not clear why A is wrong

Donia's Capital

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 200
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 900

Other Cities

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 10
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 200

But since, more of the cars in Donia’s capital city were made before 1993 than after 1993, there is insignificant decline in nitrogen dioxide. Hence A should be correct. Please comment.

(2)

Option D:

Many Donians who own cars made before 1993 have had catalytic converters installed in their cars.

That means - because of these cars made before 1993 -- the pollution level was already less.

Hence, because of new cars (with the catalytic converters installed) will not help bring down the pollution level much.

Hence, D explains the insignificant decline in nitrogen dioxide emissions in Donia’s capital city

Hi Vikrant

I am going to try my hand at making an analogy here. Ron would correct me if I go wrong:

My little daughter is crazy about candies. She simply loves them. She goes overboard with them. She cannot stop eating them. This gives her a bad sugar rush. This sugar rush is not healthy for her. So we went to the doctor last month and doctor suggested that every time she sees a candy, my wife (our daughter’s mother) must control her candy intake and stop her once the intake is more than say 2 candies (My daughter has no self control you see). So since last month, every time some one brings candy to our house, my wife keeps a check on the candy intake of my daughter. It is going all great now. But, then yesterday we went for a dinner party to our neighbour’s. They had the same candy that is loved by my daughter. So there, my daughter ended up having too many candies.

What explains the contradiction here? Contradiction that even though we got a fantastic arrangement here with my wife taking note of my daughter's candy intake, still my daughter ended up having so many candies ? Will it be that the my neighbour has had candies in his house before our appointment with the doctor (option A), or my neighbour has had candies in his house before my wife earned this responsibility to keep a check on my daughter (option D), or my wife got involved with her friends so much that she lost track of my daughter’s candy intake (option E) ?

Thank you

[RonPurewal]

Still not clear why A is wrong

Donia's Capital

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 200
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 900

Other Cities

New Cars (made after 1993) --> 10
Old Cars (made before 1993)--> 200

But since, more of the cars in Donia’s capital city were made before 1993 than after 1993, there is insignificant decline in nitrogen dioxide.

these numbers show nothing, because they contradict the passage.
if these were the correct numbers, then, sure, the decline in emissions would be small in the capital—but, OUTSIDE the capital, it would be even LESS significant.
i.e., you're arguing that the effect in the capital would be small because only 2/11 of the cars there are new.
you can see the problem here. with these numbers, OUTSIDE the capital only 1/21 of all cars are new! according to your logic, that means the effect would be tiny, practically negligible.

the passage explicitly states that 'nitrogen dioxide emissions have been significantly reduced throughout most of the country'. thus these numbers do not—and cannot—explain the story here.

once you've thought through this, you should realize that it is impossible for the numbers of new vs. old cars to explain this situation.
this is, in fact, the whole point of stating that 'the proportion of new cars in the capital city has always been relatively high'.
you can generalize further here: if something is purely an effect of having newer cars on the road, then that effect MUST be more pronounced in the capital city. this is GUARANTEED by the 'relatively high' thing.

...so, you need a reason that has NOTHING to do with how many new vs. old cars are on the road.

[RonPurewal]

Option D:

in this problem, the task is to explain why something is NOT happening in the capital, even though it IS happening throughout the rest of the country.

thus, right from the start, it should be clear that the explanation—whatever it might be—MUST be something that differs between the capital and the other areas.
choice D contains no such distinction, so it is automatically irrelevant. any further thinking about D is a waste of your time.