Question Stem Confusion from PT 34, Section 3, LR, #21 Forum

[secretad]

#21 from Section 3 of PT 34 has the following question stem: "Which one of the following, if assumed, helps most to justify the conclusion above?"

Am I to treat this as strengthen question or as a sufficient assumption question?

I understand that technically, necessary and sufficient assumption questions are strengthen questions, just different techniques in deriving the correct answer.

For this question stem, the sufficient assumption seems likely, but it does not seem to have that same air tight quality of logically deriving the conclusion 100% of the time.

[minnesotasam]

It probably won't allow you to derive the conclusion 100%, that's why it's phrased "helps most to justify" in the stem. Sounds like you have the right idea.

[secretad]

It probably won't allow you to derive the conclusion 100%, that's why it's phrased "helps most to justify" in the stem. Sounds like you have the right idea.

So this is essentially a less strict sufficient assumption question?

[nodrog]

according to powerscore method, it is a strengthen question.


edit: I wouldn't think of it as a "less strict" sufficient assumption question, because "most to justify" could be helping the argument between 1-100%.

[minnesotasam]

according to powerscore method, it is a strengthen question.


edit: I wouldn't think of it as a "less strict" sufficient assumption question, because "most to justify" could be helping the argument between 1-100%.

Yeah, this. The nuance between "strengthen" and "sufficient assumption" is exactly what we're talking about: the difference between "100%" being able to derive a conclusion and <100%, like nodrog says. Think of sufficient assumption questions as a subset entirely contained by the more broad set of strengthen questions, like you recognized in the OP, and then approach any problem where it might be <100% with your line of attack for any strengthening question.