PrepTest 119

Incorrect. If there is a view that the argument is designed to discredit, it's that a seriously maladaptive trait is likely to persist in a given animal population, but that view is never stated in the argument, and it's certainly not what the statement in question says. It's never questioned that the animals without the maladaptive trait will outcompete those with it..

Incorrect. It's a premise, not a conclusion, so this answer is incorrect.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Valid

Question Type:
Argument Structure

Stimulus Summary:
In a population, there's a lot of genetic variation, so some will have a maladaptive trait and others won't. The ones without it will outcompete those with it, resulting in them crowding out the maladaptive ones, and thus it's unlikely to stick around.

Answer Anticipation:
Throw out all the weird language and the science of this argument and focus just on the structure and, as needed, the logic.

The argument starts with a statement of what is "unlikely" to be true—that's a hypothesis with a likelihood attached to it, so it's almost certainly a conclusion of some kind. That's backed up by the following statement starting with "since," which highlights it as a premise supporting the other part of the sentence.

The following statement (which is the statement asked about) is presented as a fact, and it builds off of the premise that we just read, so it must be another premise. That last sentence is another conclusion ("Hence") supported by the preceding sentence.

Since we have two conclusions, we should evaluate which is the main point so that we can distinguish between answers that talk about which the statement in question supports. Here, the non-maladaptive animals crowding out the maladaptive ones supports the idea that such a trait is unlikely to persist in a population, so this last statement is an intermediate conclusion.

So the statement in question is a premise that supports the intermediate conclusion of the argument, which in turn goes on to support the main conclusion.

Answer Explanation:
We didn't even need to determine the main point vs. the intermediate conclusion! The statement in question is a premise of the argument, so this answer is correct. (Note that we should scan the answers multiple times to see if we can stop doing work, as that will waste time overall. While we did some analysis that we didn't need to here, overall, working through all of what you need to before heading to the answers in LR questions is the right way to go.)

Key Takeaway:
Some Argument Structure questions get in the weeds with the answers and require you to define the role of the statement in question in relation to other statements. Some have a correct answer that just says if the statement is a premise or conclusion.

Incorrect. The argument doesn't treat anything as an opposing point that needs to be undermined, so this answer is incorrect.

Incorrect. The last statement is the intermediate conclusion ("Hence"); this statement is the premise supporting it.