this is basically a Strengthen question. the approach here, just like in LR, is to find an answer that accepts the premise as true and shows that the conclusion can still be true from the premise.
C is tempting because it tries to disprove the premise. it tries to say "no, cooking could have been around for a long long time." but that's not how the LSAT wants you to think. the LSAT doesn't want you to argue with the premise, they want you to focus on the link between the premise and conclusion.
B is correct because it focuses on that link without trying to disprove the premise. B, when added to the sentence before the parentheses, says "well even if cooking is too recent, adaptation to drinking milk has also only been around for 5,000 years." this makes it possible that even if cooking is a recent phenomenon, it could still be linked to the evolution of humans in being able to drink milk. it makes the conclusion still viable.
now is this super strong? no. but it's the only answer that strengthens the link. even if it only strengthens it 1%.
E is a pretty extreme statement to make from just reading the stimulus. It's very absolute and requires a lot of proof. The stimulus only says A is better than B. E is saying throw B out altogether, don't ever do B again.
Ultimately what the stimulus is saying is - Oral traditions are better than written ones because oral ones force to you rely on your memory while written ones let you write too much. And because oral ones make you rely on memory, you forget the irrelevant stuff.
TLDR: Oral is better than written because it forces to you say only the important stuff while written allows you to ramble.
D says exactly this although in a super unnecessary way:
Economy of expression (saying only what you need to say) is to be preferred over (is better than) verbosity (saying more than you need to say/word vomiting).
Agreed. I also picked D both in timed and in blind review.
My best guess at why C is correct is because it seems like the question is asking for us to find the premise(s) that supports the claim that an initial condition is likely to resemble cold, empty space. I think that a lot of us who picked D were unknowingly thinking about the larger argument (of Caroll and Chen's theory being correct). For it to be correct, we were focused on wanting to prove that the big bang indeed could've come from a condition that is like a cold, empty space.
But that's not what we're supposed to support in this question. We're just supposed to support the claim that an initial condition is likely to resemble, cold empty space. Whether that was the case for our universe, like Caroll and Chen's theory is trying to prove, is irrelevant.
Why do they say that an initial condition is likely to resemble, cold empty space? The same paragraph says that it is a mystery why there would have to be a hot, dense universe when "such a low entropy universe is an extremely unlikely configuration."
Okay. So a hot, dense universe is a low entropy universe and that is an extremely unlikely configuration. Then the initial condition could actually be more like cold, empty space. Why? Because according to passage 3, "there are more ways for a system to be disordered than for it to be ordered." In other words, there is more likely to be higher entropy (more disorder) than lower entropy (more order).
Now this still might not look appealing because it doesn't seem to be super strong. It's essentially saying well it's X because here's a reason it can't be Y. But weakening an alternative explanation is still a way to strengthen an argument. Plus, most strongly support isn't necessarily looking for a "strong" answer. This answer choice may not support the claim to be extremely convincing, but it is the only one that supports the claim at all.
Answer D supports the overall argument of the entire passage, but not specifically the claim of why an initial condition is likely to be cold, empty space. Answer D explains why a cold, empty space as an initial condition still fits well in the theory of our universe's beginnings, but answer A explains why a cold, empty space is a likely initial condition for any universe in general.
I don't remember which video I heard this piece of advice in but they said if an answer choice is making you create a lot more assumptions and explanations, it's probably not the answer - which I think is what you're doing in your second paragraph.
I would say because of the fact that the stem identified efficiency and time management separately, then I take them as two different things. If they meant it as the same thing they would've just said one word and not called them two different names.
Efficiency doesn't have to be defined as time management, that would be an assumption you're making. Efficiency could just be someone finishing a ton of tasks in the shortest amount of time for all we know.
Contrary to your post, I think understanding the two concepts as separate just by reading it how they wrote it is actually the side where you aren't making other assumptions. Thinking of them as the same thing because of some other reasoning is you making an assumption that shouldn't have been made.
To your question "If we concede a conclusion based off of incorrect premises, then why doesn’t the conclusion follow?": He asks us not to evaluate the "correctness" of the premises or the conclusion. When says to concede the conclusion or the premises, he just means those are not what you're looking to attack.
So when this friend says "Avatar is the most touching movie..." (conclusion) "... because it has a sad scene where Jack freezes to death while Rose stays on the little piece of wood" (premise), we want to avoid making responses that try to disprove either of those. Some examples:
Attacking the conclusion: No, it's not the most touching movie. Marley & Me is the most touching movie.
Attacking the premise: That scene is not even in Avatar. That's in Titanic so you're wrong.
For purposes of the LSAT we are told to challenge not the truth of the premises or the conclusion but rather the bridge (assumption) between them.
So in this scenario, I will pretend that the friend is right about that ocean scene being in Avatar. An assumption that is being made here though is "Having a sad scene makes a movie the most touching movie." This is unsaid but bridges the gap between the premise and the conclusion.
Having a sad scene makes a movie the most touching movie.
The Avatar has a sad scene where Jack freezes to death.
Therefore, The Avatar is the most touching movie.
So the proper way for me to attack this argument on the test is not to disprove the fact that frozen Jack scene is in the Avatar. Or that the Avatar is the most touching movie. The right answer would say something along the lines of - well, it's not true that having one sad scene qualifies a movie to be the most touching movie. What if it didn't even make me cry? What if I said actually, what makes a movie the most touching movie is how much time I spend being sad after it ends. Or how much time I spend crying during?
The point is, I can agree that the premise may be true (even if it's not because that's not the point). But I challenge what it does/assumes to prove the conclusion.
For context, I am taking the April 30 LSAT. Is there such a thing as taking too many practice tests between now and the actual test (11 days) that would do more harm than good? Doing it for the endurance practice.
Or would I be better off doing fewer practice tests and more drills on weaker areas instead?
Thanks in advance!
as someone who incorrectly picked C for this, i think the best way to see why C is wrong is that: even if it's true that students not being sure of their majors could explain why people who came in as a chem major are switching out of it, it leaves open the possibility that students who came in as other majors switched into chemistry (meaning there could be more chem graduates than started with it as their major).
what makes E better than C is that it explains why chem first years could not want to continue and graduate with a major in chemistry, regardless of whatever else people in other majors are doing.