- Thu Oct 02, 2025 7:50 am
#121739
Hi p.arya,
For Parallel Reasoning questions (including Parallel Flaw questions), you want to pick the answer that most closely matches the reasoning in the stimulus. Ideally, the answer should be essentially identical in form to the stimulus, where you could match up the terms one to one with their counterparts in the stimulus. In arguments involving conditional reasoning like this one, the diagram of the correct answer should really be identical in form to the diagram in the stimulus.
The stimulus does contain a Mistaken Reversal, but that does not mean that any answer containing a Mistaken Reversal is perfectly parallel. You want an answer that contains the exact same Mistaken Reversal, meaning that the Mistaken Reversal takes place in the exact same place in the argument's reasoning.
When arguments contain multiple conditional statements like this argument, a Mistaken Reversal can occur in several different places/ways. Several of the answers in this question contain Mistaken Reversals (Answers B, D, E), but only Answer D is identical in form to the stimulus.
Using letters to abstractly describe the reasoning in the stimulus, the logic goes:
Premise: A -> C
Premise: B -> C
Conclusion: A -> B
You want an answer that follows this exact same form/diagram. In other words, you want two conditional premises that contain the same necessary condition (like C in the diagram above) and then a conclusion that incorrectly links the two sufficient conditions into a conditional relationship (like
A -> B in the diagram above).
While Answer E does contain a Mistaken Reversal, the conclusion does not link the two sufficient conditions from the premises into a conditional relationship like the stimulus (and like Answer D), so it is not the best/closest parallel.