It is virtually certain that the government contract for building the new highway will be awarded to either Phoenix Contracting or Cartwright Company. I have just learned that the government has decided not to award the contract to Cartwright Company. It is ttherefore almost inevitable that Phoenix Contracting will be awarded the contract. The argument proceeds by ['concluding that it is extremely likely that an event will occur by ruling out the only probable alternative', 'refuting a claim that a particular event is inevitable by establishing the possibility of an alternative event', 'predicting a future event on the basis of an established pattern of past events', 'inferring, from a claim that one of two possible events will occur, that the other event will not occur']