If a person chooses to walk rather than drive, there is one less vehicle emitting pollution into the air than there w...

Victoria on September 24, 2020

Hi @shrivenkatesan,

Happy to help!

This is a Strengthen with Necessary Premise question. We are looking for the assumption upon which the argument depends i.e. without this premise, we can no longer draw the conclusion.

What is the conclusion of the argument? If people walk whenever it is feasible to do so, then pollution will be greatly reduced.

Why? Because if a person chooses to walk rather than drive, then there is one less vehicle emitting pollution.

Answer choice (E) is the correct answer choice because, without it, we can no longer draw the conclusion. Answer choice (E) tells us that some people drive when it is feasible to walk. If everyone already walked when it was feasible to do so, there would be no impact on pollution as nothing would change.

If we assume that some people drive when it is feasible to walk, then their change in behaviour (i.e. choosing to walk instead) would result in a noticeable change in pollution levels.

Answer choice (B) is incorrect because it has no impact on the conclusion. The stimulus does not discuss taking public transportation; rather, it is focused on the differences in pollution between walking and driving.

Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any further questions.