#18 - Parallel Reasoning

[moshei24]

I chose (B). Why doesn't that work? Can you explain the correct answer please?

Thank you!

[Nikki Siclunov]

Think of this as a Parallel question and apply the Test of Abstraction. The relevant information can be found on lines 49 - 54. In brief, we are looking for: (1) description of the event; (2) explanation of the social causes; (3) the life history of the individual involved in that event; (4) analysis of the consequences of the event both for history and for the individual.

(A) matches this quite well. The report concerns (1) the enactment of a bill into law; (2) discusses why the need for the bill arose; (3) sketches the bio of the principal legislator who wrote the bill; (4) ponders over the effect that the bill's enactment will have both on society and on the legislator's career.

Virtually every element of the description contained in the passage is matched by the work outlined in answer choice (A). By contrast, (B) ends with a recommendation as to what steps the patient could take to improve his condition. Nothing in the original description comes even close to a "recommendation regarding a future course of action." Analyzing the historical consequences of an event is not quite the same as proposing a way to avoid these consequences in the future.