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Explanations

PT101.S2.Q16

SECTION 1 · rc

PASSAGE 1
Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5 Question 6

PASSAGE 2
Question 7 Question 8 Question 9 Question 10 Question 11 Question 12 Question 13

PASSAGE 3
Question 14 Question 15 Question 16 Question 17 Question 18 Question 19 Question 20

PASSAGE 4
Question 21 Question 22 Question 23 Question 24 Question 25 Question 26 Question 27

SECTION 2 · lr

Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5 Question 6 Question 7 Question 8 Question 9 Question 10 Question 11 Question 12 Question 13 Question 14 Question 15 Question 16 Question 17 Question 18 Question 19 Question 20 Question 21 Question 22 Question 23 Question 24 Question 25

SECTION 3 · lr

Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5 Question 6 Question 7 Question 8 Question 9 Question 10 Question 11 Question 12 Question 13 Question 14 Question 15 Question 16 Question 17 Question 18 Question 19 Question 20 Question 21 Question 22 Question 23 Question 24 Question 25 Question 26

SECTION 4 · rc

PASSAGE 1
Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5 Question 6 Question 7 Question 8

PASSAGE 2
Question 9 Question 10 Question 11 Question 12 Question 13 Question 14

PASSAGE 3
Question 15 Question 16 Question 17 Question 18 Question 19 Question 20

PASSAGE 4
Question 21 Question 22 Question 23 Question 24 Question 25 Question 26 Question 27

PrepTest 101 - Section 2 - Question 16

Question

Explanation

Analytics

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The authors of a recent article examined warnings of an impending wave of extinctions of animal species within the next 100 years. █████ ███████ ███ ████ ██ ████████ ██████ ██ ███████ ███ ████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ██████████ ██ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ █████████████ ████ ███ ██████ ████████ ████████ ████ ███ ████ ██ ███████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████████ ██ █████ ████████ ██████ ████ ████████ ██ ███ █████████ ████████ ██ ███████ ████ ███ █████ ███ ██ █████ █████

Summarize Argument: Phenomenon-Hypothesis

The author concludes that, contrary to the recent article, the rate of animal extinctions is indeed accelerating. She supports this hypothesis with the observation that more fish species have gone extinct since 1950 than went extinct between 1900-1950.

Notable Assumptions

The author takes a very small sample—the number of fish extinctions in each of two time periods—and assumes that they accurately reflect a trend toward increasing extinctions of animals in general. This means she assumes that fish extinctions weren’t significantly higher prior to 1900, and also that the rate of extinction hasn’t now started to slow down. She also assumes that the rate of fish extinctions accurately represents what’s happening with other animal species more broadly.

Analysis by AlbertGauthier

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16.

The answer to which one ██ ███ █████████ █████████ █████ ██████████ ████ ██ ██ ██████████ ██ ███ █████████

Were the fish ███████ ███ ██████████ ████ ██████ ███████ ████████████████ ██ ██████ ███████ ██ ███████ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ███████ ██ ███████████

If yes, then there’s no reason to conclude that the overall rate of animal extinctions is increasing. If no, then the data on fish suggest more strongly that extinction is accelerating for other animals, too.

How numerous were ███ ███████████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ███ ██████████ ██ █████ ████████ ██████ ████ ████ ██████ ███████ █████ █████

Irrelevant—the argument isn’t concerned with the population dynamics of any individual species. The argument is focused solely on whether or not populations have gone completely extinct, and how the total number of extinctions is changing over time.

Did any of ███ ███████ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ████████ ██████ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ █████████ ███████ █████████ ██ ███████ ███████ ██ █████ ████████

Irrelevant—the origins of those fishes have no bearing on the extinction numbers being reported.

What proportion of █████ ████████ ████ ███████ ███ ██████████ █████ ███████████ ████ ██████████ ██ ████ ███ ███ █████████

Irrelevant—the argument isn’t concerned with the population dynamics of any individual species. The argument is focused solely on whether or not populations have gone extinct, and how the number of extinctions is changing over time.

Were any of ███ ███████ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ████████ ██████ ████ ██████ ███████ ██ ███ █████████ ███████ ████████████ ██████████

Irrelevant—the argument isn’t concerned with which fish species went extinct or what those species might have been used for. The argument is focused solely on the number of extinctions and how that number is changing over time.

Difficulty

Question

68% of people who answer get this correct

This is a moderately difficult question.

CURVE

Score of students with a 50% chance of getting this right

25% 137

146

75% 156

Analysis

Question Stem Tags

Evaluate

Stems asking us to articulate a piece of unknown information which would have a significant effect on the argument in one direction or another depending on how it's resolved.

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Stimulus Tags

Link assumption

Arguments that feature an unjustified shift from one concept to another, which don't fit neatly into other common flaw categories (e.g. moving from premises about "houses" to a conclusion about "dwellings").

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Sampling

Stimuli that take data from a small pool (e.g. college students) and draw conclusions about a larger pool (e.g. people in general), where the sample pool may be unrepresentative of the broader pool (e.g. measuring science literacy).

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Answer Popularity

Popularity Avg. score

68%

158

16%

148

144

148

149

Question history

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