#17 - In a bureaucracy, all decisions are arrived at by a

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Justify the Conclusion. The correct answer choice is (D)

Decisions in bureaucracies involve many people; no one person has the authority to decide. The conclusion then follows these two premises: risky projects are never undertaken. The author is trying to say that risky projects are never undertaken in bureaucracies because the decisions involve too many people.

In attacking this Stimulus, we also see that the author is implying decisions involving risky projects involve one person, or at least as few people as possible. Looking at the Question Stem, we know that the correct Answer Choice will involve identifying what is missing from the Stimulus. In this case it is a Justify question.

In order to assure than the correct answer choice is selected, one should always look at all answer choices even when the pre-formed answer is similar to one answer choice and that answer choice is confirmed correct by something like the Assumption Negation technique.

Answer Choice (A): This answer states that all projects in a bureaucracy require risk. This is directly opposite the conclusion that no risky projects are undertaken in a bureaucracy. Therefore, Answer Choice (A) should be eliminated.

Answer Choice (B): This answer states that decisive individuals never choose to work in a bureaucracy. If this is added to the Stimulus, does the conclusion follow? No. It is not that a bureaucracy has no decisive individuals that prevent risky projects from being undertaken; it is the bureaucracy itself and the fact that all decisions involve many people. Answer Choice (B) should be eliminated.

Answer Choice (C): This answer states that an individual with decision-making power will take risks. How is this related to the conclusion that no bureaucracy will undertake risky projects? If this is added to the Stimulus, does it make the conclusion true? No, and because the answer is no, Answer Choice (C) should be eliminated.

Answer Choice (D): This is the correct answer choice. Our pre-formed Answer Choice is very similar to Answer Choice (D). It states that the only risky projects undertaken are ones where one person has decision-making power. The Assumption Negation test will also confirm this as the right answer. When negated, Answer Choice (D) states “the only risky projects undertaken are those for which no single individual has decision-making power.” When negated, this Answer Choice weakens the conclusion of the Stimulus, indicating that it is the correct Answer Choice.

Answer Choice (E) states that people will take risks as individuals that they will not take as part of a group. This may very well be true but it does not explain why risky projects are not undertaken by bureaucracies. Answer Choice (E) should also be eliminated.

[LustingFor!L]

Why would you use an assumption negation technique on a justify the conclusion question? I correctly selected D, but debated between it and answer choice C for awhile. Can you offer another explanation for why D is correct?

[Emily Haney-Caron]

Hi LustingFor!L,

Here you have a Justify the Conclusion question that is asking you to select the assumption necessary to Justify the Conclusion. Because of that, the Assumption Negation Technique is appropriate here!

D is saying:
risky project undertaken single decision maker

The stimulus says:
Premise: bureaucracy multiple decision makers
Conclusion: bureaucracy risky projects undertaken

Which means:
Premise: multiple decision makers [that is, single decision maker] bureaucracy
Conclusion: risky project undertaken bureaucracy

Can you see how D fills the gap between the premise and the conclusion, given that explanation?

[tld5061]

Does it always work to use assumption negation technique with "justify" questions? Thanks!

[Adam Tyson]

Not always, tld5061, so we don't recommend using it! Problem is that while sometimes it works (because Justify answers can be straight Assumptions) in many cases it won't. For example, if I want to justify the claim that I am the tallest man in California, I can do that by saying that I am the ONLY man in California. What effect does negating that answer have? What if there are other men here? No impact at all - I still could be tallest. We don't like to recommend strategies that only work in some cases, so it's not a strategy I suggest using. Could you ever use it? Yes, but only if you were totally lost and desperate, and even then it might not work but perhaps it might work as a Hail Mary.

So, reserve the negation technique for Assumption questions. Thanks for asking!

[oli_oops]

Hi LustingFor!L,

Here you have a Justify the Conclusion question that is asking you to select the assumption necessary to Justify the Conclusion. Because of that, the Assumption Negation Technique is appropriate here!

D is saying:
risky project undertaken single decision maker

The stimulus says:
Premise: bureaucracy multiple decision makers
Conclusion: bureaucracy risky projects undertaken

Which means:
Premise: multiple decision makers [that is, single decision maker] bureaucracy
Conclusion: risky project undertaken bureaucracy

Can you see how D fills the gap between the premise and the conclusion, given that explanation?

Hello!
Thank you for your explanation!
I'm just having a hard time seeing why D is correct, while C is not. The way you explained it seems to be plugging in (knowingly) the correct answer so it does make a lot of sense. However, when I'm just doing this question by going through each answer choice, what's the fastest way to spot the difference between C and D? is it possible by using the Mechanistic Method?
I feel like I'm always tripped up when I see answer choices like C and D, and wouldn't know which to choose, yet I totally know what mistaken reversal and mistaken negation are.

Hope I made sense. If you could let me know that would be great!

[Jay Donnell]

Hi oli_oops!

Love your Forum name

I'm hoping to help clear up the C vs D issue for this question and also extend to a broader discussion that should help you on future Justify questions!

For this and every Justify question, we have to read the stimulus expecting a flawed argument, meaning there will be a conclusion that is not yet 100% proven by the given premises. On top of that, Justify questions are likely the most often conditional question offered in LR, so it's hugely important to keep your eye out for disconnected terms across the premise/conclusion divide, and to pre-phrase the missing conditional link that will bridge the gap.

The key to both this question and all other Justify questions is this: You should be able to have at the very least a strong expectation of what you want the answer to be (if not an exact prediction) BEFORE going to the answers. This up-front heavy approach is not only significantly easier, but SO MUCH faster by the end as it allows you to easily discard answers that fail to provide the idea we are looking for.

The basic argument structure of this question looks like this:

Premise: In a bureaucracy, every decision is made by many people, and no one single person has deciding authority.

( B --> ~SPA) aka: If it's a bureaucracy, then there is no single person with authority.



Conclusion: In a bureaucracy, risky projects are never undertaken.

(B --> ~RPU) aka: If it's a bureaucracy, then risky projects are never undertaken.



This leads to an EXTREMELY common shape of a flawed, Justify question structure, which is the equivalent of:

A --> B
( )
______
A --> C

Here, the correct answer would either be (A --> B) or its contrapositive, (~B-->~A), and I would go to the answers with this knowledge and only choose either of those statements. Of course you wouldn't be offered both, as contrapositives are identical logically and you would never be given two correct responses to have to choose between.


So in this question, the diagramming should look like this:

B --> ~SPA

__________
B --> ~RPU


Which means, the missing link would be provided by either (~SPA --> ~RPU) or its contrapositive (aka answer choice D):
RPU --> SPA.

Again, this should all be done before ever going down to the answer choices, and you simply have two statements to look for and can easily disregard answers that fail to provide either.

A bit more work up front can save you HUGE amounts of time and trouble in the big picture. Remember, when you're doing the right things, up-front work is not wasted time, it's invested time, and the payoffs are huge!


Answer choice C is diagrammed as (SPA --> R), where the R for risky could extend to the same idea as our RPU, or 'risky projects undertaken.' This is a mutated version of the answer we're looking for, and either a Mistaken Reversal or Mistaken Negation depending on whether you expected the correct response to be ~SPA --> ~RPU or RPU --> SPA.

In english, C and D look more similar than they really are logically, so hopefully this helped show the value and importance of leaning into your conditional diagramming skills to help show just how different the correct and incorrect responses are!

[oli_oops]

Hi oli_oops!

Love your Forum name

I'm hoping to help clear up the C vs D issue for this question and also extend to a broader discussion that should help you on future Justify questions!

For this and every Justify question, we have to read the stimulus expecting a flawed argument, meaning there will be a conclusion that is not yet 100% proven by the given premises. On top of that, Justify questions are likely the most often conditional question offered in LR, so it's hugely important to keep your eye out for disconnected terms across the premise/conclusion divide, and to pre-phrase the missing conditional link that will bridge the gap.

The key to both this question and all other Justify questions is this: You should be able to have at the very least a strong expectation of what you want the answer to be (if not an exact prediction) BEFORE going to the answers. This up-front heavy approach is not only significantly easier, but SO MUCH faster by the end as it allows you to easily discard answers that fail to provide the idea we are looking for.

The basic argument structure of this question looks like this:

Premise: In a bureaucracy, every decision is made by many people, and no one single person has deciding authority.

( B --> ~SPA) aka: If it's a bureaucracy, then there is no single person with authority.



Conclusion: In a bureaucracy, risky projects are never undertaken.

(B --> ~RPU) aka: If it's a bureaucracy, then risky projects are never undertaken.



This leads to an EXTREMELY common shape of a flawed, Justify question structure, which is the equivalent of:

A --> B
( )
______
A --> C

Here, the correct answer would either be (A --> B) or its contrapositive, (~B-->~A), and I would go to the answers with this knowledge and only choose either of those statements. Of course you wouldn't be offered both, as contrapositives are identical logically and you would never be given two correct responses to have to choose between.


So in this question, the diagramming should look like this:

B --> ~SPA

__________
B --> ~RPU


Which means, the missing link would be provided by either (~SPA --> ~RPU) or its contrapositive (aka answer choice D):
RPU --> SPA.

Again, this should all be done before ever going down to the answer choices, and you simply have two statements to look for and can easily disregard answers that fail to provide either.

A bit more work up front can save you HUGE amounts of time and trouble in the big picture. Remember, when you're doing the right things, up-front work is not wasted time, it's invested time, and the payoffs are huge!


Answer choice C is diagrammed as (SPA --> R), where the R for risky could extend to the same idea as our RPU, or 'risky projects undertaken.' This is a mutated version of the answer we're looking for, and either a Mistaken Reversal or Mistaken Negation depending on whether you expected the correct response to be ~SPA --> ~RPU or RPU --> SPA.

In english, C and D look more similar than they really are logically, so hopefully this helped show the value and importance of leaning into your conditional diagramming skills to help show just how different the correct and incorrect responses are!

Hi Don,

Thank you!! This helped a lot!!
one last question, would you say (B --> ~SPA) is equivalent to (B--> Multiple decision makers) ?
the B --> ~SPA really helped with the epiphany of seeing how clearly the conditional structure actually is. I was having a hard time using B --> multiple decision makers to try to bridge the gap.

Thanks again!
oli

[Jay Donnell]

Hey Oli!

Yep, in this case the negated version of SPA (single person having authority) could be activated by knowing that multiple people have the authority to make decisions, aka how things are done in a bureaucracy.

Hope that helps, and you are very welcome!

Keep on coming back and I hope to help out again

-Jay