Q25

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ManhattanPrepLSAT1
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Q25

by ManhattanPrepLSAT1 Thu Feb 17, 2011 4:25 am

danielalfino Wrote:On 25, I am very confused because there is no way to prove answer choice D correct. The passage says, "Cyclamen mites lay three eggs per day over four or five days of their reproductive life span; Typhlodromus lay two or three eggs per day for eight to ten days." Comparing these rates would be like comparing apples to oranges, no? If the passage had used a per day ratio or had used a total value, then we compare them; however, the fact that it precisely did not led me to believe that it was the trap answer. Thus I went with C, as it was the only other choice I had not already eliminated.

giladedelman Wrote:Let's move on to Q25.

On this one, don't get too bogged down in the numbers. We can look to the structure of the paragraph to find the answer. The question is basically asking, why does the author go into the whole egg-laying explanation? What claim is he or she trying to justify? Well, if we look at the beginning of paragraph two, we see it: "[Big T's] population can increase as rapidly as that of its prey." The discussion of parthenogenesis that follows is just serving to support this claim.

(D) is correct. It identifies the claim that Big T can reproduce as quickly as cyclamen mites. Don't worry whether you think the math makes sense; what we care about is the point the author is trying to make.

(A) is out of scope. The author is only talking about these two specific species.

(B) seems true, but it's not the author's main claim here; it's just a detail.

(C) is tempting, but be careful: the synchrony thing is actually discussed later, in regards to seasonal fluctuations in the mite populations. Here, the issue is reproductive rates, not timing.

(E) is out of scope. We don't learn anything about Big T's relative egg-laying rates in the presence or absence of cyclamen mites.

Does that answer your questions? Let me know if there's anything still bothering you about this passage.
 
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Re: Q25

by alinanny Sat May 07, 2011 1:05 pm

The problem I had with this question was that both D and B are true.
B. Predator mites AKA Typhlodrumus reproduce for 8 to 10 days and Cyclamen mites reproduce 4 to 5 days.
D. Typlodromus reproduce 2-3 eggs per day and Cyclamen lay 3 eggs. This means that T can reproduce as quickly as C.
Now the question is WHY did the author uses this claim? What is he trying to support?
When seen in this light D is a better choice since the second sentence of the paragraph says "Its population (refering to T) can increase as rapidly as that of its prey".
Hard to make all this connections when you are pressed for time but it makes sense.
 
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Re: Q25

by daijob Fri Jul 17, 2015 8:10 am

Hi,

Just want to double check...
So C lay three eggs per day over the 4 or 5 days of their reproductive life span, which means they will have eggs 12-15 in total, and P lay 2 or 3 eggs per day for 8 to 10 days, which means at least 16 eggs and at most 30 eggs in total, so their least number is more than C's max number of eggs, so this is why E is correct...although B is true, the sentence is more intended to show E is correct, so B is wrong.

Did I understand the sentence correctly?

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Re: Q25

by maryadkins Thu Jul 23, 2015 12:50 pm

You're right that while (B) may be true it's not the point here. And (D) is the correct answer, not (E).
 
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Re: Q25

by genieindavis Tue Nov 24, 2015 11:42 pm

For (D), I don't think we need to worry about doing math here.
Line 17-18 "Its population can increase as rapidly as that of its prey", and we can simply understand that three eggs per day~ as an illustration to show that Big T can reproduce as quickly as C mites.

No ?
 
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Re: Q25

by rodion.raskolnikov1866 Sun Jul 30, 2017 10:40 am

If I'm not mistaken, answer (B) is wrong because "predatory mites" could entail other mites that are not of the Typhlodrumus genus. While all Typhlodrumus are predatory mites, it is not necessarily the case that all predatory mites are Typhlodrumus. But assuming that (B) is true, because (B) states that "Predatory mites 'typically'..." and there is no way of knowing whether or not T's are typical predatory mites, and because the passage doesn't discuss other types of predatory mites, one can't say that (B) is supported by the passage.