PrepTest 142

Incorrect. These higher-priced goods might outlast other goods, but there's no indication that they outlast the whole—the store, or the entire rest of the stock. Additionally, the "solution" here isn't preventing the higher-priced goods from being impossible to sell—it's only having them on hand when they're going to be used, which is different from an organ that lasts as long as the rest of the organism.

Incorrect. First, this answer is suspect because the topic/content is so similar to the stimulus. Generally, when only one answer matches the topic/content of the stimulus, it's a trap answer. That's backed up by the logic here, which is about other organs compensating for the deficiency of one other organ, instead of one organ outlasting all the rest.

Incorrect. First, one car model outlasting other car models isn't the same as an organ outlasting the organism it's in. Second, the outcome here was that some of these other models stopped being sold—in the stimulus, evolution didn't drive other organs to fall into disuse.

Incorrect. The principle in the stimulus sees something not developing because it would outlast the organism itself; this answer features a part of an organism being developed to the point of injury in other organs.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Principle (Illustration)

Stimulus Summary:
There's no point in an organism having an organ that lives longer than the animal, so natural selection's efficiency will likely prevent this from evolving.

Answer Anticipation:
These Principle (Illustration) questions really have two steps—first, abstract the stimulus into a principle; second, analyze the answers against that abstract principle. The goal is to form a principle that's specific enough to only apply to the stimulus and the correct answer, but general enough that it actually does apply to an answer on a different topic.

Let's start with the first step—abstracting from the stimulus to form a principle. One way to form an abstraction is to start with a specific principle that applies to the argument, and then removing the content-specific information:

It's useless to have an organ that can outlast the organism, so natural selection's efficiency will stop it from happening.

From that, we can see that we need to remove all the discussion of organs, organisms, and natural selection, so we get:

It's useless to have a part that can outlast the whole, so efficiency concerns should mean that doesn't happen.

With that principle established, we should head to the answers—the correct one could deal with any number of topics, so there's no point in anticipating anything in particular!

Answer Explanation:
It's useless to have a(n automobile) part that outlasts the whole (car), so engineers citing cost-effectiveness don't do it. This answer follows the same logic as the stimulus, just with cars and parts instead of organisms and organs, so it's the correct answer.

Key Takeaway:
Principle (Illustration) questions will have answers that can't really be anticipated, so once you have your principle set, head straight to the answers!