Necessary Assumption Questions I
Summary
The content provides a comprehensive guide on identifying and understanding necessary assumption questions in the GRE, distinguishing them from sufficient assumption questions, and employing techniques to effectively tackle these questions.
- Necessary assumption questions require identifying something that must be true for an argument to work, unlike sufficient assumption questions which look for something that, if true, guarantees the conclusion.
- A necessary assumption is a statement that the author implicitly believes to be true but does not state explicitly, which is crucial for the argument's conclusion to logically follow from its premises.
- Two types of necessary assumptions are identified: those that bridge a gap between the premise and the conclusion, and those that block potential objections to the argument.
- The 'negation technique' is introduced as a powerful tool for determining whether a statement is a necessary assumption by considering the argument's validity if the statement were false.
- A strategic approach to tackling necessary assumption questions involves identifying the conclusion and premises, prephrasing to anticipate the assumption, and evaluating answer choices through negation.
Chapters
00:00
Identifying Necessary Assumption Questions
02:45
Understanding Necessary Assumptions
08:58
The Negation Technique
14:57
Strategic Approach to Necessary Assumption Questions
