Emmorens,

I understand your intuition of it not being "strong enough". However, one needs to remember that it is very possible to have four answer choices that are essentially nonsense and don't weaken the conclusion, and a single correct answer choice that weakens but... ever so slightly.

That is the sort of situation were in here with this AC. Imagine a situation in which, despite our population growth, were consuming only a small percentage of the available water supply for our needs.

What B is trying to say is that... the availability of water across the globe varies in its degree of availability significantly. Perhaps a hypothetical will capture it a bit better.

Imagine someplace like the United States, where there is an abundance of fresh water available to meet the needs of a growing population. Conversely, imagine someplace of a very different climate, perhaps some places where due to climate, there is quite a severe amount of drought. If a massive spike in population occurs in the former location, human kind there will NOT be plagued by water shortages. However, in the second location, if a massive population surge occurs, there is likely to not be enough water to accommodate such an expansion of population, hence they very may well suffer water shortages!

In summary, answer choice B is pointing out that populations and water supplies are not uniformly distributed across the globe. Populations could expand in a location and have the water supply available to meet such an expansion, however other location may be near the breaking point already.

Heya

I think where you might be tripping up is a mis-identification of premises vs. conclusion. Whats the conclusion here? Its what you quoted as a premise.

"The advent of television helps to explain why homicide rates began earlier in Urban Area...etc"

What is the support the argument gives for this? Well... they give some information about a correlation, that the significant rise in violence in urban areas correlated with the advent of popularity of television, and then they combine that with some "stats" to further corroborate it.

What this lame argument is trying to say is hey, right when violence went up in urban areas, television became popular? Coincide?? I think not! (lol what a bad argument).

In the end, they are drawing a conclusion that says "helps to explain", in the sense that television has some casual effect on this rise in violence.

Jumping from correlation to causation can be supported or attacked in a multitude of ways.

Whats the first thing I'd try to say in real life if someone presented me with this? I'd say... well... what if television shows are just presenting the violence that's already there, like what if television is just an affect of the violent nature of humanity? A little bit of creative thinking I'm sure you can come up with tons of weakeners.

What answer (B) is doing, is affirming that this is NOT an effect, but rather causing the violence. Establishing this, we're saying that the portrayal of violence on television causes violent behavior, which strengthens the conclusion that "television helps to explain..."

The jump towards assuming the monarch butterflies are not protected by its toxicity isn't warranted here. In fact, the stimulus itself says that the toxin makes the adult monarch poisonous to many predators.

Reading the stimulus, this is what we know.

We know the monarchs feed on this milkweed, which causes them to be toxic towards predators in their adult stage of life. We then contrast that to the viceroy who does not feed on milkweed, but in appearance looks quite similar.

The author then concludes that what is leaving the viceroys so seldom preyed upon is the similar appearance to the toxic butterfly, the monarch.

Your goal is to weaken this conclusion, bring in some new facts such that the evidence the author presents isn't sufficient to bring about such a conclusion.

What if there's something else about the viceroy the author isn't telling us? What if its generally mean, what if it has a big posse of friends lol?? Your task is to go find in the AC, an alternative explanation.

D is precisely the answer you're looking for, it says that actually, hey, the viceroy itself is toxic. If its toxic, perhaps thats why is so seldom preyed upon, not because it just "looks" like the other known toxic butterfly.

To break down B further, the logical equivalent is:

Being toxic to predators will protect an individual → most members to which the species of butterfly belongs are similarly toxic

Can you see how little this does to weaken? First off, we don't even know these species are related in any way, nor do we know the prevalence of toxicity amongst its other members. We cant trigger this sufficient condition for the viceroy, it doesn't help us conclude anything about it. We can trigger it for the monarch, which then implies that most members of the species to which the monarch are related to are indeed toxic. However, that doesn't imply the viceroy is, we have no information on how they're related.

I would like to join, PT'ing in the 172-180 range.

Intuition would tell me that perhaps were allowed to make that small leap due to the fact that were focused upon books of "intrinsic merit", which more or less translates into books of high quality or... maybe perhaps books whose topic have intrinsic merit. The immediate example that came to my mind was philosophy textbooks.