Hi @lizaclark95, thanks for your post. You cannot draw a valid conclusion from two "some" statements - that is not what is happening here. Let's carefully review the stimulus, which includes two premises:
P1: Some environmentalists question the prudence of exploiting features of the environment, arguing that there are no economic benefits to be gained from forests, mountains, or wetlands that no longer exist.
P2: Many environmentalists [i.e., some] claim that because nature has intrinsic value it would be wrong to destroy such features of the environment, even if the economic costs of doing so were outweighed by the economic costs of not doing so.
Answer choice (B) can be logically inferred from the passage: some environmentalists appeal to a noneconomic justification in questioning the defensibility of exploiting features of the environment.
This is textually supported by the second premise - which tells you that some environmentalists believe nature has "intrinsic value." This is a noneconomic justification.
Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any additional questions.
jjApril 23, 2018
I am running into a lot of trouble when it comes to quantifiers and their wording, I am confusing some and most statements fairly often. (If i had known many meant some I would have chosen B) Can you guys give me tips on how to combat this dilemma?
OQMay 31, 2018
Kevin, I think the word "many" indicates a "some" relationship, not a "most". Does that help?
ChristopherJune 3, 2018
@ij, @OQ is correct. "Many" could mean 1,000,000, but if the total is 10,000,000, it is not accurate to say "most." You cannot know exactly how many "many" is in comparison to "all," therefore you can only safely say "some."
May-SalahDecember 27, 2020
@mehran, im having trouble with your explanation, you say that "2 some statements is not what is happening here", then you go on and explain that the first statement is a "some" quantifier statement, and the second one as well, therefore both statements are "some" quantifiers statements, therefore you cannot make a deduction and a conclusion off of 2 "some" statements as mentioned earlier.
