Mary, a Veterinary Student, has been Assigned an Experiment in Mammalian Physiology

Question: Mary, a veterinary student, has been assigned an experiment in mammalian physiology that would require her to take a healthy, anesthetized dog and subject it to a drastic blood loss in order to observe the physiological consequences of shock. The dog would neither regain consciousness nor survive the experiment. Mary decides not to do this assignment.

Mary’s decision most closely accords with which one of the following principles?

1. All other things being equal, gratuitously causing any animal to suffer pain is unjustified.
2. Taking the life of an animal is not justifiable unless doing so would immediately assist in saving several animal lives or in protecting the health of a person.
3. The only sufficient justification for experimenting on animals is that future animal suffering is thereby prevented.
4. Practicing veterinarians have a professional obligation to strive to prevent the unnecessary death of an animal except in cases of severely ill or injured animals whose prospects for recovery are dim.
5. No one is ever justified in acting with the sole intention of causing the death of a living thing, be it animal or human.

Mary, a Veterinary Student, has been Assigned an Experiment in Mammalian Physiology - is a GMAT Critical question. This particular GMAT Critical Reasoning topic has been taken from the book ‘GMAT Official Guide Verbal Review 2022’. This particular topic is the Assumption and conclusion type of question. For this type, the candidates need to provide an assumption supporting the conclusion in the passage. GMAT critical reasoning tests the logical and analytical skills of the candidates. Critical reasoning in GMAT requires candidates to find the strengths and weaknesses of the argument, or find the logical flaw in the argument.  The GMAT CR section contains 10 -13 GMAT critical reasoning questions out of 36 GMAT verbal questions.

Answer: B
Explanation:
This is an incredibly valuable question for helping test takers understand hidden conditional reasoning in answers. The problem statement focuses on Mary, who is a veterinary student. She is assigned a horrible task. In order to observe how shock works she must end the life of a healthy dog. The last line of the passage indicates that Mary has decided not to do this assignment.
The exact reason behind Mary's decision is not given. We can easily assume she objects to the assignment on some moral ground. However, we don't know for sure the question statement asks to provide a principle that would help make Mary's decision make sense. In other words, which one of the following answers could Mary have used to produce her conclusion (decision).

Now, we will check each option one by one:

Option A: Incorrect.
- At first, this seems to be the correct answer since it suggests we shouldn't hurt animals. But, would this experiment "gratuitously cause....pain"? The answer is No because the animal will be under anesthesia. Hence, citing this principle to strengthen the argument would not apply.

Option B: Correct.
- This is the correct answer choice. There is a conditional statement where the author used the word "unless." Thus, we have a statement here that can be diagrammed: Taking Life Justifiable Immediately Assist
As per the passage, we know that this is for veterinary training and not for immediate assistance. Thus the necessary condition above is not met, which enacts a contrapositive and produces the conclusion that taking the life is not justified. Using this argument, Mary’s decision would align since this is the same conclusion she made.

Option C: Incorrect.
- We should ask ourselves: why is this experiment being done? Mary is a student and the goal of the experiment is to observe the physiological consequences of shock. Since this is just to observe the consequences of shock, this will not stop in the future. Hence, this is not the correct choice. 

Option D: Incorrect.
 - This answer refers to "practicing veterinarians" whereas the stimulus notes that Mary is simply "a veterinary student." She is not yet a practicing veteran.This is enough to make (D) incorrect.

Option E: Incorrect.
 - The only intention of the experiment is not to cause the death of the animal. That's certainly an outcome of the experiment, but the intention is "to observe the physiological consequences of shock." Hence, this is also incorrect. 

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