Guidebook writer: I have visited hotels throughout the country and have noticed that in those built before 1930 the quality...
GMAT Critical Reasoning : (CR) Questions
Guidebook writer: I have visited hotels throughout the country and have noticed that in those built before 1930 the quality of the original carpentry work is generally superior to that in hotels built afterward. Clearly carpenters working on hotels before 1930 typically worked with more skill, care, and effort than carpenters who have worked on hotels built subsequently.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the guidebook writer's argument?
Passage Analysis:
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
| I have visited hotels throughout the country and have noticed that in those built before 1930 the quality of the original carpentry work is generally superior to that in hotels built afterward. |
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| Clearly carpenters working on hotels before 1930 typically worked with more skill, care, and effort than carpenters who have worked on hotels built subsequently. |
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Argument Flow:
The argument moves from a specific observation about hotel carpentry quality to a broad conclusion about carpenter abilities. The writer uses personal experience as the foundation and then makes a direct causal link between the quality of work and the quality of workers.
Main Conclusion:
Carpenters working on hotels before 1930 were more skilled and put in more effort than carpenters who worked on hotels built after 1930.
Logical Structure:
The writer assumes that if the carpentry work is better in older hotels, then the carpenters themselves must have been better workers. This is a direct cause-and-effect relationship where work quality directly reflects worker quality, without considering any other possible explanations for the difference in carpentry quality.
Prethinking:
Question type:
Weaken - we need to find information that reduces belief in the conclusion that pre-1930 carpenters were more skilled and put in more effort
Precision of Claims
The conclusion specifically claims pre-1930 carpenters had more skill, care, and effort. We need to challenge this causal explanation while accepting that the carpentry work does look superior
Strategy
Look for alternative explanations for why pre-1930 carpentry appears superior that don't involve differences in carpenter skill or effort. This could include survivorship bias, different materials, different standards, or different circumstances that affected the work quality
This tells us hotel carpentry is better than carpentry in other building types, but this doesn't address the time-based comparison the writer is making. Whether hotels have better carpentry than houses doesn't explain why pre-1930 hotels would have better carpentry than post-1930 hotels. This doesn't weaken the conclusion about carpenter skill differences over time.
The fact that newer hotels can accommodate more guests tells us about capacity differences but says nothing about carpentry quality or carpenter skill. Room capacity and carpentry quality are completely separate issues. This doesn't provide any alternative explanation for the observed difference in carpentry work.
This rules out material quality as an explanation, but actually this strengthens rather than weakens the argument. If the materials were the same quality before and after 1930, then the difference in carpentry quality would more likely be due to differences in carpenter skill and effort, which supports the writer's conclusion.
This introduces survivorship bias as an alternative explanation. If buildings with better carpentry are less likely to be demolished, then the pre-1930 hotels we see today represent only the best-built ones from that era, while the poorly built ones have been torn down. Meanwhile, we see the full range of post-1930 hotels since they haven't had time for selective demolition. This means we're comparing the best of the old with the average of the new, which weakens the conclusion that older carpenters were more skilled.
If apprenticeships have gotten shorter, this would actually support the writer's conclusion that modern carpenters are less skilled. Shorter training periods would logically lead to less skilled workers, which aligns with the writer's argument rather than weakening it.