PrepTest 127, Section 3, Question 22
On the basis of relatively minor morphological differences,(93 more words not shown)
If the statements above are(10 more words not shown)
- AMorphological differences between(19 more words not shown)
- BThe daily challenges(12 more words not shown)
- CThere are greater(14 more words not shown)
- DUse of similar(21 more words not shown)
- EThrough much of(11 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The opening disagreement concerns morphological differences: differences in physical form. Such differences need not automatically mean different species. People can differ in height, for example, without belonging to different species. Still, the author's appeal to similar tools makes me pause. Why would using the same kind of tool settle a biological classification?
The stem changes what we must do with that reaction. It asks us to accept the statements and find the one answer that could not be true alongside them. We are not choosing the best criticism of the species argument. Four choices can fit the information; only one must conflict with it.
What we’re looking for
Track the relevant facts carefully. The groups lived in different environments and used tools of exactly the same type. The passage says they would use such similar tools only if they faced the same daily challenges and met them in the same way. Accepting that rule, the same tools give us the same challenges despite the different environments. That combination will matter more than our independent opinion about how species should be classified.
Working the answers
- A
This is compatible with the passage. The author suggests that the groups could be members of the same species despite their minor physical differences. Nothing requires every morphological difference to mark a species boundary.
- BCorrect
If an environment's daily challenges were unique to that environment, two different environments could not present these groups with the same daily challenges. But the passage gives us different environments and, through its rule about the similar tools, the same challenges. B cannot fit both facts.
Keep the three ideas separate: their tools were alike, their daily challenges were alike, and their environments were different. B incorrectly makes the different environments rule out the stated similarity in challenges.
- C
The passage doesn't compare the size of Cro-Magnon–modern-human differences with Cro-Magnon–Neanderthal differences. The proposed comparison could therefore be true without contradicting what we know. It doesn't have to be established to survive an EXCEPT question asking what could be true.
- D
The argument presents similar tools as evidence for common species membership; it doesn't establish that such tools are required. But that lack of proof doesn't make D impossible. The proposed requirement could also hold. We need a contradiction, not merely a claim that goes beyond the evidence.
- E
Different environments could have been geographically separated for much of the groups' coexistence. The passage doesn't require regular contact between them. Their similar tools and challenges are compatible with geographical isolation under the facts we have been asked to accept.
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