Questions 15-16
Consumer advocate： Under the current absence of government standards for food product labeling, manufacturers are misleading or deceiving consumers by their product labeling. For example, a certain brand of juice is labeled “fresh orange juice,” yet the product is made from water, concentrate, and flavor enhancers. Since “fresh” as applied to food products is commonly understood to mean pure and unprocessed, labeling that orange juice “fresh” is unquestionably deceptive.
Manufacturer： Using words somewhat differently than they are commonly used is not deceptive. After all, “fresh” can also mean never frozen. We cannot be faulted for failing to comply with standards that have not been officially formulated. When the government sets clear standards pertaining to product labeling, we will certainly comply with them.
15. On the basis of their statements above, the consumer advocate and the manufacturer are committed to disagreeing about the truth of which one of the following statements？
（A） In the absence of government standards, common understanding is the arbiter of deceptive labeling practices.
（B） Truthful labeling practices that reflect common standards of usage can be established by the government.
（C） The term “fresh” when it is applied to food products is commonly understood to mean pure and unprocessed.
（D） Terms that apply to natural foods can be truthfully applied to packaged foods.
（E） Clear government standards for labeling food products will ensure truthful labeling practices.
16. Which one of the following principle, if established, would contribute most to a defense of the manufacturer's position against that of the consumer advocate？
（A） In the absence of government definitions for terms used in product labeling, common standards of understanding alone should apply.
（B） Government standards for truthful labeling should always be designed to reflect common standards of understanding.
（C） People should be free to the extent that it is legal to do so, to exploit to their advantages the inherent ambiguity and vagueness in language.
（D） When government standards and common standards for truthful labeling are incompatible with each other, the government standards should always take precedence.
（E） In their interpretation of language, consumers should never presume that vagueness indicates an attempt to deceive on the part of manufacturers unless those manufacturers would reap large benefits from successful deception.
17. Certain items—those with that hard-to-define quality called exclusivity—have the odd property, when they become available for sale, of selling rapidly even though they are extremely expensive. In fact, trying to sell such an item fast by asking too low a price is a serious error, since it calls into question the very thing——exclusivity——that is supposed to be the item's chief appeal. Therefore, given that a price that will prove to be right is virtually impossible for the seller to gauge in advance, the seller should make sure that any error in the initial asking price is in the direction of setting the price too high.
The argument recommends a certain pricing strategy on the grounds that
（A） this strategy lacks a counterproductive feature of the rejected alternative
（B） this strategy has all of advantages of the rejected alternative, but fewer of its disadvantages
（C） experience has proven this strategy to be superior, even though the reasons for this superiority elude analysis
（D） this strategy does not rely on prospective buyers estimates of value
（E） the error associated with this strategy, unlike the error associated with the rejected alternative, is likely to go unnoticed
18. In order to control the deer population, a biologist has proposed injecting female deer during breeding season with 10 milligrams of a hormone that would suppress fertility. Critics have charged that the proposal poses health risks to people who might eat the meat of treated deer and thereby ingest unsafe quantities of the hormone. The biologist has responded to these critics by pointing out that humans can ingest up to 10 milligrams of the hormone a day without any adverse effects, and since no one would eat even one entire deer a day, the treatment would be safe.
The biologist's response to critics of the proposal is based on which one of the following assumptions？
（A） People would be notified of the time when deer in their area were to be treated with the hormone.
（B） The hormone that would be injected into the deer is chemically similar to hormones used in human contraceptives.
（C） Hunting season for deer could be scheduled so that it would not coincide with breeding season.
（D） The hormone in question does not occur naturally in the female deer that would be injected.
（E） Most people do not consider deer meat to be part of their daily diet and eat it only on rare occasions.
19. A recent survey conducted in one North American city revealed widespread concern about the problems faced by teenagers today. Seventy percent of the adults surveyed said they would pay higher taxes for drug treatment programs, and 60 percent said they were willing to pay higher taxes to improve the city's schools. Yet in a vote in that same city, a proposition to increase funding for schools by raising taxes failed by a narrow margin to win majority approval.
Which one of the following factors, if true, would LEAST contribute to an explanation of the discrepancy described above？
（A） The survey sample was not representative of the voters who voted on the proposition.
（B） Many of the people who were surveyed did not respond truthfully to all of the questions put to them.
（C） The proposition was only part of a more expensive community improvement program that voters had to accept or reject in total.
（D） A proposition for increasing funds for local drug treatment centers also failed to win approval.
（E） The proposition to raise taxes for schools was couched in terminology that many of the voters found confusing.
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