LR Drill Set 2, Question 5
Over centuries, astronomers have reported seeing bright flashes(55 more words not shown)
Each of the following, if(12 more words not shown)
- AThe largest lunar(10 more words not shown)
- BThe low gravity(17 more words not shown)
- CVolatile gases are(8 more words not shown)
- DDust in the(10 more words not shown)
- EThe contours of(11 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Why would a landslide make the moon flash? The astronomers offer a possible chain: material slides into a crater, dust or gas rises, and that produces the light people have reported. I can follow the proposal, but I still want evidence for its steps. Did landslides occur? Could they release material that becomes visible from Earth?
One helpful discovery might be that something similar happens elsewhere. Another might connect the observed light with what we would expect from the disturbed material. We don't have to establish the entire theory with one fact; evidence for one link would make the account more plausible.
What we’re looking for
This is an EXCEPT question. Four choices should supply such support. We want the one that doesn't help explain the reported flashes.
Working the answers
- ACorrect
When the largest landslides happened doesn't tell us whether later landslides caused the flashes astronomers reported. Smaller slides could still produce visible effects. We don't need to have observed the biggest possible event for the hypothesis about these sightings to be true. A gives a historical detail without supporting the proposed explanation.
- B
If dust and gas can rise to significant heights in the moon's low gravity, the proposed rising-material step becomes more plausible. Material that immediately stayed on the ground would be less helpful to that account. B doesn't establish that a particular flash came from a slide, but it helps explain how disturbed material could rise above the surface.
- C
The hypothesis invokes volatile gases released after landslides. Knowing that such gases exist near the surface gives the proposal a possible source for that material. It doesn't prove that a landslide released them, but it supports a factual requirement of the account.
- D
This supplies a way dust could produce a visible light effect: it can reflect sunlight. The dust needn't create its own light. That helps with our opening question about how a landslide could be connected to a flash. The fact is supporting evidence for a mechanism, not proof that the entire lunar hypothesis is correct.
- E
Signs of landslides in the shapes of lunar craters support the claim that the proposed triggering events actually happened. We would still need to connect particular slides with particular sightings, but this gives the astronomers more than a wholly speculative account of crater movement. It therefore supports the hypothesis and isn't the EXCEPT answer.
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