PrepTest 134, Section 4, Question 17
Passage A  Evolutionary psychology has taught us to(499 more words not shown)
Passage A(246 more words not shown)
Passage B(261 more words not shown)
How does the purpose of(9 more words not shown)
- AThe author of(21 more words not shown)
- BThe author of(25 more words not shown)
- CThe author of(18 more words not shown)
- DThe author of(21 more words not shown)
- EThe author of(21 more words not shown)
Reading the passage
B challenges the kind of explanation A offers. That's our starting relationship: criticism, not additional support. Now identify how B criticizes it. An answer that begins with criticizes can still describe the wrong method.
Working the answers
- A
B doesn't add support for A's main claims. It questions whether the evolutionary explanation has been established.
- B
The critical direction fits, but the stated method doesn't. B isn't building a parallel argument whose obviously false conclusion exposes A's mistake. It raises alternative motives and questions the inference from an evolutionary benefit.
- C
B doesn't claim that observations of human behavior were inaccurate. The concern is what those observations establish about the explanation. Accurate observations could still fit more than one motive.
- D
B sets a high standard for a decisive explanation and says cases meeting it are “vanishingly rare.” Rare isn't impossible. B doesn't claim that no conceivable evidence could confirm or disconfirm the explanation.
- ECorrect
B argues that an action's compatibility with a gene-propagating interest doesn't settle whether that interest explains it: other interests could make the same action reasonable. That challenges the reasoning used in an account like A's, rather than disputing observations or denying that evidence could ever matter.
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