PT36, Section 3 Q14 Forum

[JCElks1]

For PT36, in section 3 (LR) Q14, why is B wrong?

I narrowed it down to B and C, and can see why C is correct but I just can't seem to wrap my head around why B is incorrect. Can anyone explain this for me? Thanks!

[yzero1]

The conclusion is that tech. expertise does not serve tomorrow's job market better than verbal/quant education. This is based on the premise that machines are designed for nonexperts so we don't need to acquire technical expertise to learn how to use them.

You should automatically look for the missing link between the premises and conclusion, which in this case is "tomorrow's job market". (C) is a dead giveaway because it's the only answer that explicitly mentions tomorrow's job market. Sure enough, negating (C) will destroy the argument.

(B) does not have to be true for the argument to follow. Try negating it: expert technical knowledge DOES sometimes enhance your ability to operate machines designed for nonexperts. Even if this were true, it could still be possible that verbal/quant skills are more useful than technological expertise in terms of employment in tomorrow's job market. For example, what if most jobs in tomorrow's job market require significant use of verbal and quantitative skills but almost never require you to work with machines of any type? If this were the case, even IF expert knowledge enhanced your proficiency with nonexpert machines, it would not be better than getting enhanced verb/quant skills because you'd never have to work with machines.

[JCElks1]

Thanks! That's exactly what I needed--seems so simple now!

[yzero1]

no problem, assumption questions can be really easy if you approach them the right way.