Q4 - In Yasukawa's month-long study

[andyevans000]

So I was completely lost on this one. I think I completely misunderstand the stem. Didn't help that this was an unusual question type. Can someone provide a comprehensive explanation on this one?

[bbirdwell]

You should essentially treat it like a weaken question. Just remember that your job is to weaken the "critics" here, not Yasukawa.

First, let's review the core of each "side":

Yasukawa:
premise - % of surviving small birds exceeded % of surviving big birds
conclusion - size is a determinant

Criticism:
premise - smaller birds are younger than big ones
conclusion - size is not a determinant (age is)

(A) definitely weakens the critics' position by taking away their one piece of evidence. It does this by suggesting that Yasukawa could not have made the mistake of comparing old birds to young ones -- he compared one species to another.

This demonstrates that they "misunderstood" him in that their objection is irrelevant.

Does that help?

[andyevans000]

Yes, thanks!

[mcrittell]

It does this by suggesting that Yasukawa could not have made the mistake of comparing old birds to young ones -- he compared one species to another.

Not quite sure I follow.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Brian's got a ton going on today so I'll try to explain "his" words - not a task I'm sure I can manage!

The argument is designed to establish that Yasukawa's conclusion is probably mistaken. The evidence for this is that smaller birds are generally younger than larger birds. We're asked to point to a possible misunderstanding the author may have had when criticizing Yasukawa's conclusion.

It does this by suggesting that Yasukawa could not have made the mistake of comparing old birds to young ones -- he compared one species to another.

Answer choice (A) suggests that while the author thought that some birds were smaller than others because they were younger, when in fact they were smaller than others because they belonged to a different species of blackbird. Essentially, answer choice (A) denies an assumption the criticism rests on - that the size difference was due to age.

Does that answer your question?

[hychu3]

Hi,

How would you eliminate (D)?

Can I simply say this is incorrect because it does not address any assumption the argument makes in criticism of Yasukawa?

Can I even go on to say, even if the answer were "Yasukawa noted the smaller blackbirds had more success in fight" instead, it would still not matter because it does not indicate "misunderstanding" of Yasukawa's research?

[WaltGrace1983]

Can someone check over my reasoning for this one? I got it right but only after crossing out every answer choice and then reassessing!

Yasukawa:

Higher % of smaller birds than larger birds that survived during the study
→
Size is a determinant of a blackbird's chances of survival

Author:

Smaller blackbirds are generally younger than larger ones
→
Yasukawa's conclusion is mistaken; size is not a determinant of a blackbird's chances of survival

I really didn't know how to weaken this claim. Is there a slightly different approach to a "misunderstanding" question?

(B) This wouldn't matter because he examined both types of birds in the same way, within their natural habitat. If Y examined one bird in the natural habitat and then one bird in captivity than that might weaken Y's claim and explain why his claim may not be okay. However, this hypothetical is NOT what is going on and it doesn't seem to show a "misunderstanding" anyway.

(C) We don't care about other kinds of birds. This is completely irrelevant.

(D) But what conclusion does this "success in fights" actually lead to? We know that a bigger % of larger birds died anyway. Who cares if they were more successful in fights?

(E) This is very similar to (D). It gives us a reason why one would think that more larger blackbirds than smaller blackbirds would live. However, the point remains; this doesn't really matter because a bigger percentage of larger blackbirds did die. It is just hard to see why this would affect the argument.

(A) seems to be the only valid answer choice that cannot be discounted. I originally got rid of it because I made the same exact mistake that the author made. I automatically assumed that "large" meant large in size and "small" meant small in size. Therefore, I just thought (A) was weird and a direct contradiction to the premise. Yet upon review, (A) makes sense for the task of this question.

It says that Y was actually comparing two different species, the larger and smaller ones, NOT the sizes of those birds. Why does this matter? It matters because the author makes a distinction. The author seems to say, "not so fast Y! Large birds are older and thus we could safely deduce that they are more likely to die. Therefore, it is not size that is determinant of a blackbird's chances of death - it is really just age, something that is correlated with size." Thus, the author makes the distinction between old birds and young birds and uses this to explain - and ultimately undermine - Y's conclusion.

However, by saying that Y was actually examining species, necessarily taking into account old and young birds. In other words, Y makes no such distinction that the author believes he makes! Y would reply to the author by saying, "okay. I see your point. But who ever said I was comparing large birds and small birds (old birds and young birds)? I was comparing species!"

So I guess my question is what I asked before. I eliminated all these answer choices and was confused by the task. How can I sharpen my skills on these "misunderstanding" questions because they seem slightly (yet distinctly) different from typical weakeners?

[ohthatpatrick]

Well, I think you crushed the explanation!

In terms of getting yourself better oriented on a "misinterpret" question, you have to first articulate to yourself what the author’s interpretation of the 1st person was ... i.e. what was the author assuming the 1st person said/meant?

As you correctly wrote the author's core:
Smaller blackbirds are generally younger than larger ones
-->
size is not really a determinant of survival chances

Cool, smaller blackbirds are GENERALLY younger than larger ones. Is that true of the birds in Y's study? Our author is assuming that the smaller ones is Y's study were younger than the big ones.

Essentially, the correct answer to a Misinterpret question points to an assumption the 2nd person made in responding to the 1st person.

Sometimes you'll see that the 2nd person's response is junk and thus be able to strongly pre-phrase where the 2nd person got confused / what he incorrectly assumed the 1st person was saying.

Other times, like here, the 2nd person's comment seems pretty sensible so the assumption he is making is one you're implicitly assuming as well.

In those cases, you're really just looking for an answer choice that drives a wedge into the conversation. It should turn what DID seem like an appropriate response by the 2nd dude into something that now seems totally INappropriate.