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#73612
Complete Question Explanation

Justify the Conclusion. The correct answer choice is (C).

The author tells us about an early entomologist who had a hypothesis about some ants, who were observed to be carrying stuff to their neighbors. The early entomologist thought the ants were bringing food to the neighbors - how very neighborly of them! But our author says no, that's wrong, because all the ants were doing was emptying their own dump sites. They were just taking out the trash, so they were definitely NOT bringing food to the neighbors.

The stem asks for an answer that would cause the conclusion to "follow logically," which means if we add the correct answer to the argument in the stimulus, the conclusion would have to be true. So what would prove that the entomologist was wrong, and that the ants were definitely NOT bringing food to their neighbors?

A good prephrase here, since we know that the stuff the ants were carrying was stuff emptied from their dump sites, would be that there was no food among the contents of the dump sites. If there was no food in what they were carrying, that would prove they were not carrying food to the neighbors.

Answer choice (A): Even if ants do not always interact with each other the ways that humans do, it still could be that they were carrying food to the neighbors. This answer does not prove the conclusion that they were not doing that.

Answer choice (B): Having "only weak evidence" isn't strong enough to prove that the ants were not carrying food to the neighbors.

Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice. If the dumping sites contain no food, and if all they were carrying was stuff taken from their dump sites, then clearly they were not carrying food, to the neighbors or anywhere else. This very strong answer eliminates all doubt and proves the conclusion must be true.

Answer choice (D): The fact that the ants who received the particles never carried the particles into their own colony might do a little to support the claim that the particles were not food. One would think that if it was food, they would have carried it inside. But this isn't strong enough to completely prove that the particles were not food, because the ants who received the food might not have wanted it, or needed it, or trusted the ants who brought it, or perhaps these ants store their food outside the colony somewhere. Without more information, this answer only slightly strengthens the claim but comes nowhere close to justifying it.

Answer choice (E): Like answer D, this answer strengthens the argument that the entomologist was wrong about the particles being food brought to the neighbors. If the entomologist retracted his earlier claims, that would suggest that he at least thought he was wrong. But like answer D, it isn't strong enough to prove anything. Perhaps the entomologist was right the first time, and wrong to retract his conclusion?
 cbchica
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#29487
Dear Powerscore,

Can you please explain question 5 on section 3 of 2007 June test?

On question 5 I was between C and D, but I choose D.

Thanks,

Camila
 Adam Tyson
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#29502
Happy to help, Camila, but before I do, please share your thought process on this Justify the Conclusion question. What led you to consider answer D? What was the conclusion that you were trying to Justify, and how did you see D as accomplishing that? Importantly, what made you feel that it was a better choice than C, the correct answer, since you had it down to those two? We can probably be of more help if we know more about your process.

Looking forward to your reply!
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 sabrinayadidi
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#98402
I chose E because I thought that it follows logically, however is C correct because the stimulus does not state that the ants are not emptying food from the dumping site, and therefore it makes the entomologists claim completely wrong? Because I think he is already wrong so this just supports the conclusion even more? I think I am not not thinking of the question the right way.
 Rachael Wilkenfeld
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#98447
Hi sabrinayadidi

In Justify questions, we are looking for the answer choice that proves the conclusion. In order to do that, we look at what the argument already provides, and what the author concludes. We then need to bridge that gap between the premises and the conclusion to find something that will justify the author's conclusion. In these stimuli, there will always be a part of the conclusion that is not fully supported by the premises. We need to locate and address it with our correct answer.

Here, the conclusion is easy---the early entomologist was wrong. But when we analyze a question, we want to make the thought process as easy as possible for our brain. We want to flesh out that conclusion a bit more--what was that early entomologist wrong about? Atrens concludes the entomologist was wrong about the ants bringing food to their neighbors. Why? Because the particles the ants brought were coming from the ants' dumping site. Let's look at this structurally.

P: Particles that the ants brought to their neighbors came from their dumping site

C: Entomologist was wrong that the ants were bringing their neighbors food

Now that we understand the argument, we can go to the prephrase. Where do we notice a jump between the premises and the conclusion? I would start by looking at the difference between something that comes from a dumping site and food. We don't know what ants put in their dumping site. We don't know how careful they are about keeping food in one place and waste in another. None of that is given to us in the stimulus. So we are going to be looking for an answer choice that tells us that the ants were not bringing food from their dumping site.

That's where we get answer choice (C). If it's the case that ant dumping sites do not contain any particles that can be food, particles that came from the dumping site wouldn't be food. Then we could draw the conclusion that the ants bringing particles from the dumping site were not bringing food to their neighbors.

Answer choice (E) does not bridge that gap. Even if the entomologist cited retracted his claim that doesn't mean that he was right or wrong. We might have more evidence that he was wrong, but we still haven't proven Antens conclusion.

Hope that helps!

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