Self-study
People cannot devote themselves to the study of natural processes unless they have leisure, and people have leisure when resources are plentiful, not when resources are scarce. ████████ ████ ███████████████ █████ ████ ████████████ ███ ███████████ ██ ██████ ████████ █████ █████ ██████████ ██ ███████ ███ ███████ ███ █████ █████████ ████ ████████████ ██████ ████ █████ ████ ██████████ ███ ███ ██████ ████ ██████████ ██████████ ██████████ ███ ████ ██ █████████ █████ ███████ ███████████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ██████ █████ ██ ███████ ██████████
Summary
Despite what some anthropologists claim, agriculture must not have begun under conditions of drought and hunger. Why? Because agricultural discoveries are the result of the study of natural processes. People cannot study natural processes without leisure, and people have leisure only when resources are plentiful.
Strongly Supported Conclusions
Agriculture began under societies that had plentiful resources.
17.
The argument is structured to ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ████
a
whenever a society ███ █████████ ██████████ ████ ███████ ██ ████ ███████ ██████ ██████████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ███████ █████████
Plentiful resources are a necessary condition for people to devote themselves to studying natural processes. We don’t know whether a sufficient condition occurs just because a necessary condition occurs.
b
plants cannot be ██████████ ██ ███████ ███████ ███████████ █████████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ █████ ██████████ ███ ██████
We don’t know whether plants cannot be cultivated if a person lacks theoretical knowledge. The stimulus also does not address what would be considered theoretical knowledge.
c
agriculture first began ██ █████████ ████ ██ ████ ████ ██ █████ ███████ ███ █████████ █████████
Since some anthropologists are wrong, agriculture must have begun when a society had plentiful resources.
d
early agricultural societies ████ ████ █████ ███ ███████ ████████ ████ ███ █████ ███████████████ █████████
We don’t know anything about nonagricultural societies. Additionally, the stimulus is limited to agriculture, whereas “natural sciences” is too broad.
e
early societies could ████ ██████████ ██ ████████ ███ ███ ██████ ████ ██████████ ██████████ ███ ████
We don’t know whether early societies discovered agriculture by accident.