Jane states that Professor Harper's design modifications have no value because there is no general agreement among musicians as to what a guitar should sound like and no widely accepted basis for evaluating the merits of a guitar's sound.
Whereas Mark states "Harper's ideas have had enough time to be adopted if they really resulted in superior sound." He further elaborates by bringing forth the example of the Torres design that only took ten years to be universally adopted because of the improvement it made to tonal quality.
Thus, Jane is saying that musicians cannot agree on what a guitar should sound like and how to evaluate the sound of a guitar, whereas Mark is saying that if Harper's design did create superior sound it would have been universally adopted as Torres' design had been. So, Jane and Mark disagree on whether musicians can agree on what a guitar should sound like and, in turn, how to evaluate that sound. We gather this from Mark surmising that if Harper's design modifications were superior, it would have been universally adopted. So, we can assume through Mark's argument that there is a way to evaluate the merits of the guitar's sound, which completely goes against what Jane is trying to convey. That is how their arguments are based on conflicting suppositions.
Hope that was helpful! Please let us know if you have any other questions.
Shiyi-ZhangFebruary 4, 2019
Why is A incorrect?
RaviFebruary 5, 2019
@Shiyi-Zhang,
Great question. Based on Jane and Mark's arguments, it appears that they are both in agreement that Harper's ideas are of no value. However, they have different reasons for their rejections of Harper's modifications of guitars. Jane argues that a universal agreement about guitar design, but Mark's argument centers around the universal adoption of Torres' guitar design. While both of them agree that Harper's ideas stink, the evidence each of them gives is at odds with the other's support.
We're looking to accurately describe the relationship between Jane and Mark's argument.
(A) says that Mark's argument shows how a weakness in Jane's argument can be overcome.
However, in our analysis of the argument, we noted that Jane and Mark essentially have the same conclusion. Therefore, how could he be addressing a weakness in her argument?
He's not doing this; what he's doing is arriving at the same conclusion with evidence that contradicts Jane's support, which is why (E) is correct.
Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any more questions!
