#20- Sociologist: Climate and geology determine where human

[nrpandolfo]

I was having trouble with this one. I chose A as that seems the only likely thing backed up by the facts. B is too strong using "All" as well as D,E.

Why is C correct?

[Daniel Stern]

Unfortunately, A posits that climate is the "primary cause" of migrations. Although the stimulus tells us that climate changes always result in migrations, we can't conclude that the climate is the "primary cause" -- there could be millions of other things that cause migrations as well, and we don't know the frequency of the climate changes versus the frequency of all of those millions of hypothetical other causes of migration. For instance, maybe wars also cause migrations, and perhaps there are a lot more wars than climate changes, making war the primary cause of migrations. The stimulus simply doesn't give us enough information to support A.

However, the stimulus does tell us that a change in climate always results in migration, which is what allows us to conclude C -- that a population will stay put only when the climate doesn't change.

I hope that helps. Good luck in your studies!
Dan

[andwer123]

I am a little confused by the phrase "Migrations bring about the intermingling of ideas necessary for rapid advances in civilization."

I drew out the entire chain as such:
SC M IMI

To say the intermingling is necessary for RA means:

RA IMI
and therefore, we have to make a new chain for RA IMI, correct?

[atierney]

Hello,

The first chain is incorrect. SC ---> M. "Migrations bring about the intermingling of ideas" is a statement of causality rather than conditionality.

Rapid advances requiring intermingling of ideas is a conditional statement, so yes, you would have two separate conditional statements.

The correct answer here (choice C) only concerns the contrapositive of the first conditional statement. If Not M then Not SC, or not shifts in climate. This means that the climate is fairly stable, thus being the necessary condition to a settled population.

Let me know if you have further questions on this.

[andwer123]

@Atierney, that doesn't make sense to me. I got the question right but why would the chain be wrong?

Dramatic shifts always bring about migrations (SC M) and migrations bring about IMI (M IMI). These connect to make SC M IMI

An explanation of where I went wrong would help a lot.

[Adam Tyson]

The issue here is that we don't diagram causal arguments the same way we diagram conditional ones, andwer123. You have the relationships right, but in our methodology we would not suggest that you diagram them in that way, because then it can get very easy to confuse a conditional claim with a causal one, and from there it's an easy step to selecting wrong answers.

You said you were confused by the statement about migrations and rapid advancement, but your diagram of that was correct, so I think you understood it better than you thought you did! Nice work! That last claim is indeed conditional, while the rest of the evidence is causal. Shifts in climate CAUSE migrations, which CAUSE intermingling of ideas. That intermingling is NECESSARY for rapid advances, but there is no indication that intermingling causes advances or vice versa. That's why we cannot select answer E, for example - a migration will cause intermingling of ideas, but that intermingling might not be accompanied by rapid advances, because the intermingling of ideas is necessary for rapid advances but may not be sufficient for them.

[DYLANPQ]

I was having trouble with this one. I chose A as that seems the only likely thing backed up by the facts. B is too strong using "All" as well as D,E.

Why is C correct?

I used the reverse of the causal statement, if there is a shift in climate, then migration. So if no migration (remain settled), then no shift in climate (fairly stable climate)

[Jeff Wren]

Hi Dylan,

Based on your description, it sounds like you were actually using the fact that the effect (Migration) didn't occur to conclude that the cause (shift in climate) didn't occur. This is not actually the same as using the reverse of the causal statement, which would actually be an incorrect answer.

[CJ12345:]

Hi, Powerscore
If the first claim is causal rather than conditional, why do we choose C? (C is the contrapositive of the first claim; but if the first claim is causal, we can not do the contrapositive, right?)

first claim: drastic shift in climate -->(cause) migration
I don't think it is ok to reach: ~ migration (population settled)-->~drastic shift in climate (climate stable)

[Robert Carroll]

CJ12345:,

Note the mixed language: "always" is a conditional indicator, and "result in" is a causal indicator. Not only will one thing result in another, it will always result in it. So we know that anytime the cause happens, the effect will happen. That is indeed a conditional relationship.

Robert Carroll