LSAT 103 – Section 1 – Question 12

LSAT 103 - Section 1 - Question 12

September 1998

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT103 S1 Q12
+LR
+Exp
Most strongly supported +MSS
Quantifier +Quant
A
4%
154
B
1%
160
C
65%
166
D
1%
155
E
28%
162
146
157
169
 +Harder 147.884 +SubsectionMedium

J.Y.’s explanation

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On their way from their nest to a food source, ants of most species leave a trail of chemicals called pheromones. The ants use the scent of the pheromones to guide themselves between the food and their nest. All pheromones evaporate without a trace almost immediately when temperatures rise above 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit), as is typical during afternoons in places such as the Sahara Desert.

Summary
The author explains that most ant species use pheromone trails to find the way between their nest and food sources. However, the power of pheromones is limited: they are destroyed by temperatures over 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit). Incidentally, afternoons in the Sahara Desert usually rise above this temperature.

Strongly Supported Conclusions
The stimulus strongly supports these inferences:
Pheromone trails would be destroyed by heat during most Sahara afternoons.
Ants are not able to navigate using pheromone trails when the temperature is above 45 Celsius/113 Fahrenheit.
If any ants forage in the Sahara in the afternoon, for the most part they can’t use pheromones to navigate during that time.

A
Most ants forage for food either only in the morning or only during the night.
This is not supported. The stimulus doesn’t talk directly about when ants forage. We also can’t draw a conclusion from temperatures, because we only know about Sahara afternoon temperatures. When and where is it cool enough for pheromones? We have no clue.
B
Most ants that do not use pheromones to mark the paths they take between their nest and food live in the Sahara Desert.
This is not supported. The stimulus doesn’t indicate if any ants live in the Sahara at all, much less that most non-pheromone-using ants do.
C
If any ants live in the Sahara Desert and forage for food at no time but in the afternoon, those ants generally do not use pheromones to guide themselves between food and their nest.
This is strongly supported. We know that ants can’t use pheromones to navigate during most Sahara afternoons. This means that if any ants only forage during Sahara afternoons, they generally can’t—so don’t—navigate using pheromones.
D
If any ants do not use pheromones to navigate between food and their nest, those ants use a different substance that does not evaporate in temperatures above 45 degrees Celsius.
This is not supported. The author never suggests how ants might navigate other than by using pheromones. We have no idea if it’s a different substance or some other method altogether.
E
If any Saharan ants forage for food in the afternoon, those ants forage for food less efficiently when temperatures are above 45 degrees Celsius than they do when temperatures are lower.
This is not supported. It might seem like not being able to use pheromones in high temperatures would lead to less-efficient foraging, but we don’t know about other ways ants could navigate. Maybe there are equally or more-efficient methods than pheromones.

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Section 1 - Logical Reasoning

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