PrepTest 144, Section 2, Question 1
In the bodies of reptiles, some industrial by-products(48 more words not shown)
The reasoning in the argument(11 more words not shown)
- Aprovides no explanation(11 more words not shown)
- Bfails to consider(15 more words not shown)
- Cfails to address(12 more words not shown)
- Dfails to say(18 more words not shown)
- Euses evidence drawn(15 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Something has affected these alligators' hormones. Why blame industrial waste?
The passage gives us a reason to trace the abnormal body parts back to elevated hormonal activity: those abnormalities occur only when hormonal activity is elevated. That part works. But the next step needs more support. Some industrial by-products cause elevated hormones; that doesn't make industrial by-products the only possible cause.
What if the temperature affected the hormones? What if a naturally occurring chemical did it? We don't have to know that either possibility is the real explanation. We just need to see that the argument has not ruled out other ways the alligators could end up with elevated hormones and abnormal development.
What we’re looking for
The flaw question asks us to identify that unsupported step. We can accept both the abnormalities and the elevated hormones while questioning whether industrial by-products entered the swamp.
Working the answers
- A
The passage already says these abnormalities occur only with elevated hormonal activity. So abnormalities without elevated hormones would conflict with the information we're given. The missing explanation concerns what caused the elevated hormones, not whether the abnormalities could occur without them.
- BCorrect
Industrial by-products are one possible source of elevated hormonal activity. If temperature, natural chemicals, or some other factor could also raise that activity, the abnormal development would not establish that industrial by-products entered the ecosystem. The argument needs to address those other possible causes.
- C
Contaminated food would still put industrial by-products in the swamp's ecosystem. That would be a possible route for the contamination, not a reason to doubt the conclusion that contamination occurred. We don't need to determine whether the alligators ate it, drank it, or encountered it another way.
- D
We don't need abnormal snakes or other lizards to investigate what happened to these alligators. The conclusion concerns contamination in this swamp. Evidence from the alligators could establish that without a survey of every reptile species, if the causal connection were sound.
- E
The argument doesn't use these alligators to conclude that all alligators everywhere have the same problem. It uses animals found in a particular swamp to draw a conclusion about that swamp. The unsupported part is identifying the cause, not generalizing to all alligators.
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