This is a strengthening question: Which one of the following, if true, provides the most support for the argument in the passage?
The first thing we learn is that Zeria is severing its diplomatic relations with Nandalo ostensibly because of its human rights violations. However, hypocritically, Zeria continues to maintain relations with countries known to have a far worse human rights record than Nandalo. Based on this, the author concludes that this decision to sever diplomatic ties cannot be because of Zeria’s commitment to human rights. We are essentially being given an explanation for an event, that Zeria cut ties because of human rights violations, and being asked to support the conclusion that this explanation is not true. In this case I think it might be helpful to treat this like a weakening question; we want to weaken a hypothesis, so introducing an alternate hypothesis would be a great answer! Let’s see our options:
Correct Answer Choice (A) This gives Zeria another motivation to sever diplomatic ties, and consequently is an excellent alternate hypothesis. Zeria cut ties because of foreign pressure, not human rights violations.
Answer Choice (B) This does nothing to support that Zeria had other motives.
Answer Choice (C) Who cares what countries have expressed concern about.
Answer Choice (D) This doesn’t provide any support that Zeria didn’t sever diplomatic ties because of human rights violations.
Answer Choice (E) Who cares about the opposition party’s policy. Why did the government of Zeria sever diplomatic relations?
Here we have a strengthening questions: Which one of the following most strongly supports the explanation given in the argument?
Our stimulus begins with a phenomenon; distemper virus has caused two thirds of the seal population of the north sea to die since 1988. Our author then offers the hypothesis that the reason the normally latent virus has acted up is that pollution weakened the seals immune systems. Since this is a strengthening question and we have a hypothesis, a great answer would be one which eliminates an alternative explanation for why the virus killed so many seals, or introduces more information consistent with the hypothesis. Let’s see what we get!
Correct Answer Choice (A) If pollution is weakening the immune system of the seals, we would expect it might be doing this to other animals! This answer introduces a result we would expect if our hypothesis was true, and therefore strengthens it.
Answer Choice (B) Good for them, but this doesn’t strengthen our hypothesis. If anything it weakens it since our hypothesis requires “severe” pollution and this suggests pollution could be much better than it was before.
Answer Choice (C) I certainly hope the pollution isn’t that bad then, but this does nothing for our argument.
Answer Choice (D) This is just a factoid.
Answer Choice (E) This weakens our argument by introducing an alternate explanation.