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I had it down to A and B in this resolve the paradox question.

Paradox is:

Why would blackouts occur even after the residents heeded the voluntarily cut back of AC use.

I liked both A and B.

A seems to resolve the discrepancy by letting us know that even though the residents cut back on AC use, AC is not the only significant drain. Thus, it is reasonable to see why their lack of use of AC would not necessarily stop the blackouts.

B seems to resolve the paradox because if it is true that most of the air conditioning in the region is used for businesses and factories, then simply cutting back at resident homes may not be enough to stop the blackouts at times.

Same with answer choice (A), the cut back of AC usage at home may not stop the blackouts necessarily because AC is not the only significant drain.

Thoughts on this?

"Air conditioning use has overloaded the region's electrical power grid..."

This suggests that air conditioning is the problem. We can presume that there were not blackouts before the recent heat wave, and air conditioning use would not have been nearly as significant then.

Tiago Splitter wrote:"Air conditioning use has overloaded the region's electrical power grid..."

This suggests that air conditioning is the problem. We can presume that there were not blackouts before the recent heat wave, and air conditioning use would not have been nearly as significant then.

Sure it suggests that AC is the problem. However, if (A) were true, as we are supposed to grant it, then it would ALSO be the case that there are other problems.

Would this not show that simply having residents reduce their AC usage may not lead to the cessation of blackouts?

I think it would and I am intrigued to understand a way to dismiss this answer choice.

I was down to A and B.

Don't overthink this one. It was #8.

The "discrepancy" in the stimulus is that even if citizens cut back their personal use, the problem will persist unless the heat wave abates. If the issue was being caused by other power sources, the heat wave abating would not stop the blackouts.