Company spokesperson: In lieu of redesigning our plants, our company recently launched an environmental protection c...

Naz on October 15, 2015

Conclusion: we will reduce air pollution more by buying old cars than we would by redesigning our plants.

Why? Even though the plant accounts for 4% of the local air pollution, automobiles that predate 1980 account for 30%.

We are seeking to weaken the argument.

Answer choice (C) states: "Because the company pays only scrap metal prices for used cars, almost none of the cars sold to the company still run."

If none of the cars sold to the company still run, then the ones the plant is buying back in order to lessen pollution, are not contributing to the pollution since they no longer run. For the company's plan to work, they need to somehow give incentive to people to sell their used cars that run, i.e. the ones that are contributing to air pollution.

Thus, answer choice (C) helps weaken the argument.

Hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.

mws7129 on July 22, 2018

If these questions are supposed to be within the constraints of our knowledge afforded by the question, then I dont understand why the answer revolves around some subjective form of arbitrary inference. The company says nothing about revenue or it's future equity/sales, yet the answer calls for this. From the knowledge given, the company's sole interest is to lower air pollution by disposing of old cars, I do not think it is pertinent to make an inference about the potential decrease in sales that would void the overall plan.

Mehran on July 23, 2018

Hi @mws7129, thanks for your post, but you're thinking about Logical Reasoning questions too narrowly. You are right that certain Logical Reasoning questions require you to stick to what "Must Be True" on the basis of the information presented in the stimulus (or what "Cannot Be True" on the basis of that information). But this question stem is of a different kind - you are asked to select the answer choice that, *if true*, would WEAKEN the spokesperson's argument. Each answer choice here presents information beyond that set out in the stimulus itself. Your task is to select the answer choice that presents information that would weaken the spokesperson's assertions.

Hope this helps!

Tyler on May 2, 2020

Why not D?

kbernard on June 14, 2020

^ yes could we go over why D is not correct?

isabella on April 28, 2021

I think D is incorrect because talking about cars after 1980 are out of scope for this question since the plant is only concerned with ones before 1980

Victoria on May 2, 2021

Hi all,

@isabella is correct! The company spokesperson says that buying back old cars would have a greater impact on air pollution than redesigning their plants. The fact that cars made after 1980 account for over 30% of local air pollution does not affect the company spokesperson's argument as they are focused on comparing the impacts of old cars to the potential impacts of redesigning their plants.

Hope this helps! Keep up the great work and please let us know if you have any further questions.