Hi,

I need some clarification regarding what exactly is a judgment and what is a hypothesis. Saw this question in GPREP2(about Paleontologist and planktons) which asked:

First Bold statement: The cold probably did cause the population declines, though indirectly.
Second Bold statement: Most probably, the plankton suffered a severe population decline as a result of sharply lower temperatures.

The choices I was torn between were:

1. first is hypothesis and second is judgment in spelling out that hypothesis.
2. first is a judgment advanced in support of a conclusion and second is that conclusion.

Chose 1 which is correct, but not sure why. I can see first is a hypothesis but why it is not a judgment? In fact what is a judgment really? javascript:emoticon(':roll:')
Rolling Eyes

Help appreciated!
Thanks!

:roll: :roll: :roll: :P :P :P :P

hey -

please post the whole passage for any cr question you post here. ideally, you should also post all 5 answer choices, even if you are only interested in one of them, for the benefit of other forum readers.

(nb: if you're going to post RC problems, we don't expect you to type out an entire RC passage - just the portion of the passage that provides the appropriate context - but we do expect you to post the entire passage on CR problems.)

thank you.

Could you explain this question?

Paleontologist: About 2.8 million years ago, many species that lived near the ocean floor suffered substantial population declines. These declines coincided with the onset of an ice age. The notion that cold killed those bottom-dwelling creatures outright is misguided, however; temperatures near the ocean floor would have changed very little. Nevertheless, the cold probably did cause the population declines, though indirectly. Many bottom-dwellers depended for food on plankton, small organisms that lived close to the surface and sank to the bottom when they died. Most probably, the plankton suffered a severe population decline as a result of sharply lower temperatures at the surface, depriving many bottomdwellers of food.
In the paleontologist's reasoning, the two portions in boldface play which of the following roles ?
A. The first introduces the hypothesis proposed by the paleontologist; the second is a judgement offered in spelling out that hypothesis.
B. The first introduces the hypothesis proposed by the paleontologist; the second is a position that the paleontologist opposes.
C. The first is an explanation challenged by the paleontologist; the second is an explanation proposed by the paleontologist
D. The first is a judgement advanced in support of a conclusion reached by the paleontologist; the second is that conclusion
E. The first is a generalization put forward by the paleontologist; the second presents certain exceptional cases in which that generalization does not hold good

in MOST "boldface" questions, you will be able to answer the question by doing the following:
* identify the conclusion of the argument (using a diagram if necessary)
* then, for each boldface, tell whether it:
- IS the conclusion
- SUPPORTS the conclusion
- OPPOSES the conclusion

in this problem, that's all you have to do.

if you understand the argument at hand, you'll be able to identify that its conclusion is
"...the cold probably did cause the population declines, though indirectly."

therefore, the first bold IS the conclusion.

the second is definitely on the side of the conclusion (i.e., SUPPORTS the conclusion), since it provides a reason why the first may be true.

the only answer choice that correctly identifies the first as the conclusion and the second as supporting the conclusion is (a).

Hi Ron thanks for your explanation. It really helps a lot. I got this one wrong because i thought 1st bold is support to the conclusion, is there a way to identify which one is the conclusion? i thought the conclusion could be " The notion that cold killed those bottom-dwelling creatures outright is misguided" or even the 2nd bold. hence got this one completely wrong :(

if you have "x, (transition), y" -- in this case, “x, nevertheless, y” -- then x isn't the conclusion of the argument.
the conclusion has to be a conclusion; in other words, you don't transition from it into further statements.