Question

Beautiful beaches attract people, no doubt about that. Just look at the city’s most beautiful beaches, which are amongst the most overcrowded places in the state. Which of the following exhibits a pattern of reasoning similar to the one exhibited in the argument above?

• A. Moose and bear usually appear at the same drinking hole at the same time of the day. Therefore, moose and bear must be feeling thirsty at about the same time.
• B. Children who are scolded severely tend to misbehave more often than other children.Hence if a child is not scolded severely, that child is less likely to misbehave.
• C. During warm weather my dog suffers more fleas than during cool weather. Therefore, fleas must thrive in a warm environment.
• D. Tally accounting software helps increase the work efficiency of its users. As a result, these users have more time for other activities.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is C

The argument in the question involves a reasoning pattern that associates a certain attractive feature (the beautiful beaches) with an outcome (overcrowding), under the assumption that the feature causes the outcome. We need to find a similar pattern of reasoning in the options provided. Let's analyze each option:

• Moose and bear usually appear at the same drinking hole at the same time of the day. Therefore, moose and bear must be feeling thirsty at about the same time.
  This argument uses simultaneous appearance as an indication of a shared cause, which is not parallel to our original argument's cause-effect reasoning about attraction leading to overcrowding.
• Children who are scolded severely tend to misbehave more often than other children. Hence if a child is not scolded severely, that child is less likely to misbehave.
  This presents a conditional cause-effect reasoning, focusing on severity leading to more misbehavior, which is the opposite logical direction of the author's original pattern.
• During warm weather my dog suffers more fleas than during cool weather. Therefore, fleas must thrive in a warm environment.
  This argument suggests that warm weather (an attractive condition for fleas) leads to a higher occurrence (more fleas), similar to how beautiful beaches (an attractive feature) lead to overcrowding. Thus, this option follows the same pattern of cause-effect reasoning as highlighted in the argument.
• Tally accounting software helps increase the work efficiency of its users. As a result, these users have more time for other activities.
  Here, improved efficiency is linked to an outcome where users gain more time, but it does not parallel the idea of attraction leading to crowding.

Hence, the option that exhibits a similar pattern of reasoning to the one presented in the original argument is: During warm weather my dog suffers more fleas than during cool weather. Therefore, fleas must thrive in a warm environment.