PrepTest 105, Section 2, Question 8
Millions of female bats rear their pups in(68 more words not shown)
The argument seeks to do(5 more words not shown)
- Aderive a general(16 more words not shown)
- Bestablish the validity(10 more words not shown)
- Csupport, by describing(11 more words not shown)
- Dconclude that members(16 more words not shown)
- Edemonstrate that a(7 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
How does a mother find her own pup among millions of bats? My first guesses are a familiar location, a distinctive smell, or a recognizable call. Any of those might seem plausible before we read the rest.
The passage then rules out most of those guesses: calls are the only way the bats find one another. So returning to the same spot or following a scent isn't an available explanation within these facts. The pups also cannot distinguish their own mothers' calls from other adults' calls.
That leaves recognition in the other direction. The mother must recognize the pup's call. The argument is explaining a reunion we already know happens; it eliminates competing ways of accounting for it.
What we’re looking for
The question asks what the argument is trying to do. I'd describe it as establishing one explanation by ruling out the alternatives. The key is how the author gets to the mother's ability, not simply that the passage talks about bats recognizing calls.
Working the answers
- A
This would require a move from a sample of bats to the entire group. For example, we might observe five mothers recognizing their pups and generalize to all mothers. The passage doesn't present representative bats and extend their abilities to everyone else. Its reasoning turns on eliminating possible explanations for the described reunions.
- BCorrect
First, calls are identified as the only means of finding one another, which excludes explanations based on other cues. Then the pups' ability to recognize their mothers' calls is excluded. The remaining explanation places the recognition with the mothers: they recognize their pups' calls.
That is why my initial idea about a pup staying in the same place doesn't undermine the argument. The explicit “only means” premise rules that option out for this question. We need to follow the explanation within the stated facts.
- C
This is tempting because recognizing a call is a mechanism that could produce a reunion. But the author isn't using a possible mechanism to show that reunions can happen. The passage starts by telling us that the mothers are almost always swiftly reunited with their pups. What needs to be established is the explanation of that known phenomenon. C reverses the direction of the reasoning.
- D
The mothers and pups aren't said to share the same recognition ability. The inability attributed to the pups is part of the reason for attributing the ability to the mothers. Nor does the author infer a shared ability from other shared characteristics. This describes a different comparison.
- E
The author doesn't start with a general rule such as “mother animals recognize their offspring” and then apply it to these bats. The conclusion about the mothers is reached by examining and excluding other explanations of the observed reunions. That is the method B describes.
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