PrepTest 123, Section 3, Question 21
Ethicist: On average, animals raised on grain must(76 more words not shown)
Which one of the following,(8 more words not shown)
- AEven though it(23 more words not shown)
- BOften, cattle or(19 more words not shown)
- CIf a grain(22 more words not shown)
- DAlthough prime farmland(25 more words not shown)
- ENutritionists agree that(13 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Sixteen pounds of grain for one pound of meat? I can see why someone concerned about feeding people would question that use of food. The meat is more nutritious pound for pound, but the passage says the sixteen pounds of grain could feed many more people.
That leaves us with a tradeoff to understand. How much food do we have, and how much do people need? If feeding grain to animals leaves people without enough to eat, the ethicist has a serious concern. But leveling grain yields, lost farmland, and a growing population don't tell us how close we are to that situation. A supply can shrink and still be enough, at least for a time. I'd want more support for the prediction that eating meat will soon be morally unacceptable.
And does every way of getting meat have this grain problem? What if someone hunts an animal instead of raising it on grain? The evidence concerns a particular way of producing meat. The conclusion covers consuming meat generally. An exception could matter a lot.
What we’re looking for
We're asked to weaken the argument. I'd look for a reason the broad moral conclusion doesn't follow—perhaps we still have enough food, or perhaps there's a way to get meat without diverting the grain that could feed people. We don't have to defend every meat-production practice. We need to challenge this argument's reason for condemning meat consumption across the board.
Working the answers
- A
Wanting meat and being willing to pay for it don't answer the moral objection. People can strongly prefer something that is wrong. A tells us the demand exists; it doesn't show why using food in the way the ethicist criticizes would be acceptable.
- BCorrect
Here is meat that avoids the specific tradeoff the argument relies on. These cattle or sheep can grow to maturity on grass, so they don't need the sixteen pounds of grain. And the pastureland can't be used for another kind of farming, so raising them there doesn't displace a crop people could have eaten instead.
This isn't the hunting example I had in mind, but it works for the same reason: the argument about sacrificing grain doesn't cover all ways of getting meat. B gives us an often-available exception to the broad conclusion. It doesn't settle every ethical question about eating animals; it weakens this particular argument from limited food resources.
- C
This makes a diet without meat look more nutritionally workable. It doesn't give us a reason to reject the ethicist's objection to using grain for meat. If anything, showing that other foods can provide comparable nutrition makes it harder to defend that use of grain as nutritionally necessary.
- D
Reversing farmland loss could help the food supply. But “we could reverse it” doesn't tell us we will choose to live differently, when the change would happen, or whether it would solve the pressure created by the other trends. The ethicist's conclusion concerns what will soon become unacceptable under the conditions described. D offers a possible change in policy and behavior; B directly identifies meat production that escapes the stated problem even under those conditions.
- E
A diet consisting only of grain is not the only alternative to eating meat. People might eat grain along with other plant foods. So the inadequacy of an all-grain diet doesn't establish that meat is necessary, much less that feeding grain to animals is justified despite the ethicist's concern. We need to challenge the claimed food-resource tradeoff, and E doesn't do that.
More Weaken questions
Learn the LSAT our way
Our platform drills Weaken questions at your level and adjusts as you improve.