Self-study
P1
Until recently, many biologists believed that invertebrate "schools" were actually transient assemblages, brought together by wind, currents, waves, or common food sources. █████████ ██████████ ███ ████████ ██████ ██ █████████ ██ ██████████████████ ██████ █████ █████ ███████ ███ ██████ ██████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ████ ███
Biologists' old perspective ·
"Schools" of invertebrates are are not really schools
Example: groups of jelly fish are not cohesive social units that are evenly spaced from each other and face the same way. (Seems like we get a definition of "schools" here.)
New perspective ·
Some invertebrates do form schools
Example: krill (a type of invertebrate crustacean) sometimes group together in schools.
P2
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Support for new perspective ·
Groups of invertebrates can position themselves in a way that meets the definition of "school"
The way each member swims is consistent relative to other members, and they don't swim directly above or below a neighbor. (This sounds similar to the "evenly spaced" requirement.)
P3
Researchers' assumption ·
Researchers assume schooling has benefits
Concession ·
Schooling seems like it'd make animals more visible and attractive to predators
Benefits of schooling ·
Reduces chance of being eaten
School is harder to find, can scare away predators, and an individual member is more likely to get away, since there are a lot of other school members to eat.
P4
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Additional benefits ·
Active defense mechanisms
These are more active defenses, whereas the last paragraph described passive benefits. Schools have different approaches based on the size of predators and whether they are attacking.
P5
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Another benefit ·
Helps with finding food
When one member finds food, other members can follow.
Cost of schooling ·
Schools can get too big
Too many members may hurt ability to get food and mates. If school's too big, some members will join another school.
Passage Style
Phenomenon-hypothesis (RC)
Single position
7.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ █████ ████ ███████ █████████ ███ ██████████ █████ █████████ █████████ ██
a
Observation reveals that ████ ██████ ██ █████████████ ███ ██████ ██ ███████ ███ █████████ ██████████
This merely establishes that some groups of invertebrates can’t engage in one of the potential benefits of schooling. But this doesn’t suggest that those groups can’t benefit from other aspects of schooling (such as the passive advantages described in P3).
b
Biologists find that ████ █████████ ███ ██████ ████ ███ ██████████ ███████ █ ██████ ███ █ ██████ █████ ███████
This merely establishes that some predators aren’t affected by the issue of distinguishing a school from individual members. But there are still many other benefits to schooling; this doesn’t help show that schooling doesn’t bring important benefits to invertebrates.
c
Research demonstrates that ███ ████ ██ ████████████ ██████████ ████ ██████ ██ ███ ████████ ███ ██████ ███ ███████ ██ █████████
This undermines the assumption by providing evidence that invertebrates that don’t form schools are more likely to survive. This is evidence that schooling doesn’t actually bring invertebrates important survival benefits.
d
Biologists confirm that █████████ ███ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ █ ██████ ██████ ██ █████████████ ████ ██ ██████ █ ██████ █████████████
This doesn’t weaken, because the author already
e
Researchers determine that ███ ███████ ██████ █████ ███ ████████ ███████ ████ ████ ████████ ██ ████████ ██████
We have no reason to think that a decrease in the optimal size suggests that schooling doesn’t have important benefits. A smaller school is still a school and presumably grants benefits to its members.