Parallel Reasoning Conclusion and Premise Matching & Verb Tense

[CharlesPasselius]

I read over the Parallel Reasoning chapter again and I checked what was available in the forums to see if this question has already been answered, but I could not find the answer. My question is, does the verb tense have to match in conclusions and premises? I cannot remember the exact question that I have in mind, but it has come up and I have wondered whether I could eliminate a contender on the basis of the verb tense being mismatched. I would appreciate help and clarification on this point. Thanks in advance.

[Beth Hayden]

Hi Charles,

That's a tricky question to answer without seeing a specific question, because my lawyerly answer is going to be "it depends." If you find a question where you think verb tense matters, please add it here and we can break it down in more detail.

Having said that, what has to match varies a little bit based on each question and what is central to the argument. That's part of why these questions are so tricky, you have to look for the most important elements of the reasoning in the stimulus and match those first. The more important the element is, the more important it is that it matches.

There may be some questions where verb tense is crucial to the reasoning in the argument. For example, if the argument's conclusion is based on some kind of temporal relationship, whether the verb happened in the past or the future might really matter. If the argument reasons that because something happened in the past, it must also happen in the future, than verb tense is probably going to play a key role!

But there may be other questions where the reasoning in the argument isn't really affected by timing, in which case it may not be a big deal if they don't match up. If the reasoning is based on cause and effect, it might not necessarily matter whether you are talking about a cause and effect that are happening right now as opposed to something that happened last week. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't, it really depends on how the argument reasons.

I know that's not a really satisfying answer, so please let us know if you think of some examples where you're not sure if/why verb tense matters.

Beth

[CharlesPasselius]

Well, while I was hoping for another "hack" so to speak to get faster at doing those problems, this is still helpful for the clarification that it provides. Thank you.

[Dave Killoran]

I know that's not a really satisfying answer

It may not be satisfying, but it's the right answer If verb tense was an ironclad litmus test for these questions, trust me, I'd be shouting it from the rooftops! But there are just too many possible constructions that allow them to to parallel situations without having to have identical tenses. so it's something we like to see, but it's not a dealbreaker on its own.

Thanks!