LSAT PrepTest 109 - Section 1 - Question 8

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Few animals brave the midday heat of the Sahara desert. ██ █████████ ██ ███ ██████ ████ █████ ███████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ██ █████ ███ ████ ███ █████ ███ █████ █████████ ███ ███████ ██ █████████████ ████████ ████ ███ ██████ ████ ████████ ████ ██ ████████ ██ ████ █████ ████ ███ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███████████

Structure: Surprising Phenomenon

The stimulus describes a phenomenon: the silver ant goes out into the Sahara at midday — when few animals go out — to look for food. This phenomenon is surprising, presumably, because the silver ant isn't immune to the heat. It must also be "careful" not to become a "victim" of the heat.

Which one of the following, ██ █████ █████ █████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████ █████ ██████ ██ ██████████ ██████

Question Type

Except (LR)

Resolve reconcile or explain

For a normal Resolve, Reconcile, Explain question, we would be looking for one answer choice that explains why the silver ant goes out to look for food in the midday heat, when it is still at risk from the heat. Maybe the silver ant is less at risk from the heat than it is from predators that come out at other times of day, for example.

Since this is an "except" question, however, we expect to see four answer choices that provide an explanation for the silver ant's behavior. We're looking for the one answer choice that doesn't help clarify why silver ants prefer to go out at midday.

The chief predators ██ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ████ █████ ████ ███ ███ ██████ ███████

(A) helps explain why the ants come out at this time by pointing out a benefit that might offset the risk from the heat: the ants' predators are taking cover during midday. So (A) isn't the answer choice we're looking for.

The cues that ██████ ████ ███ ██ ████████ ██████ ████ ████████ ██ ███ █████████ ███████████

(B) might not seem like a great explanation for why the ants come out at midday rather than (say) midmorning, but it at least gives us one reason why they come out at midday rather than later in the afternoon, despite the heat: they navigate better at midday than later. So because (B) provides some explanation for the silver ants' behavior, it isn't the answer choice we're looking for.

Other scavengers remove ███ █████████ ███████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ██████████

(C) provides a strong explanation for why the ants come out at midday despite the heat: because the corpses will get taken away as soon as it gets cooler. So (C) isn't the answer choice we want.

The temperature inside ███ ██████ █████ █████ █████ ███████ ███ ███████ ███████████ ██████ ███ ███████ █████ ██ ███ ████

(D) also provides a good explanation for why the ants come out at midday, despite the heat: it often gets even hotter inside the ants' nests. So (D) isn't the answer choice we want.

Silver ants cool ██████████ ██ ████████ ████ █████ ██████ ██ █████ ██████████ ██ ████ █████████ ██ ██████ █████ ████████

(E) only tells us about one strategy silver ants use to cool themselves. We don't know how effective this strategy is, though the stimulus suggests that this strategy doesn't save all silver ants from the midday heat (they can still become "victims" of the heat). Just knowing that this strategy exists doesn't tell us why the ants choose to come out at midday, specifically, rather than at other times of the day. So (E) is the answer choice we want.

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PrepTest 109 - Section 1 - Question 8

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