Q11 - Carrots are known to be one of the best...

[dababbott]

Kind of nitpicking, but how does A help us resolve the discrepancy? I can assume that old people are more vitamin deficient in general, but isn't that an assumption? Is it OK to make these kinds of assumptions on paradox questions?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Yes it is. It's not that you have unlimited freedom on Explain a Result questions, but you do have tremendously more freedom than say on a Necessary Assumption or Inference question.

In this case, answer choice (A) wouldn't actually explain the result, but, as the question stem asks, it would "help" to.

We need to explain why the demand for carrots (a food high in vitamin A) has gone up and yet the vitamin A deficiency rate of diagnosis has also increased.

Each of the incorrect answers will "help explain" the apparent discrepancy. The correct answer (C) in this case seems to actually make matters all the more confusing. If consumption of carrots and vegetables is up, why is there a vitamin A deficiency?

(A) offers a potential reason - an aging population - for the increased vitamin A deficiency in spite of an increased demand for carrots.
(B) offers a potential reason - not eating the peels of carrots - for the increased vitamin A deficiency in spite of an increased demand for carrots.
(D) limits any positive impact of increased carrot consumption to those people who are already diagnosed with vitamin A deficiency. The claim in the stimulus was about people being diagnosed with the deficiency - previously diagnosed individuals would not affect the diagnosis rate.
(E) offers a potential reason - decreased carrot availability - for the increased vitamin A deficiency in spite of an increased demand for carrots.

Hope that helps!

[daniel.g.winter]

I eliminated A because if the population has gone up, then naturally the number of people with vitamin A deficiency could also go up, just because of the sheer amount people. Even if carrots were in demand and people had access to them, if the population has gone up significantly, the carrots could still be effective while also, the overall number of cases of Vitamin A deficiency could still be going up.

Does that make sense?

[sadisticera]

I don't really understand this. (C) seems to have the same problem as (D) in that it could limit carrot consumption to a sub-group of people (those buying the cuisine, which definitely wouldn't be most people especially given that the AC says "certain cuisines", not most). Meanwhile, I don't understand how (E) can possibly resolve the discrepancy. Basic economics tells us that a decrease in supply leads to a decrease in the quantity demanded (leftward shift of the supply curve). And we know that it's the quantity demanded that the farmers are reporting because there's no other way for them to report increasing demand. In what world does decreased supply lead to increased demand? I understand that you can come up with an example of some consumers hoarding carrots because of the continuing decrease in supply, but that is an incredible reach, and such an incredible reach can be made about (C) as well. This one has really got me flustered.

[legalrabbithole]

I don't really understand this. (C) seems to have the same problem as (D) in that it could limit carrot consumption to a sub-group of people (those buying the cuisine, which definitely wouldn't be most people especially given that the AC says "certain cuisines", not most).

(C) is the right answer because it doesn't address the increase in vitamin A deficiency. It's focused on the demand part and just implies that people are eating more carrots or cooking with them.

(D) is weird, but it could explain the paradox. There's a community of people that can't absorb vitamin A. They're the ONLY ones to increase their consumption of carrots. Nowhere else has the demand increased. This community of carrot-chompers explains the mysterious increase in demand for carrots. Elsewhere, people are not eating enough carrots so there's an increase in vitamin A deficiency. Very strange, but that's what it says.

Meanwhile, I don't understand how (E) can possibly resolve the discrepancy.

Perhaps you're reading too much into the answer choice. It's not denying that there's huge demand for carrots. Let's say grocery stores in a community have a high demand for carrots. There's a hurricane in the area where the stores are located so carrots can't get reach that population. This population is not getting their carrots, so their source of vitamin A is gone, leading to increased vitamin A deficiency.

[erikwoodward10]

I still don't understand how answer choice D provides an explanation for the increase in vitamin A deficiency. If anything, we can only assume that the rate will be the same, because it would be an unwarranted inference to assume that the rate among the rest of the general population has gone up. We're given no evidence that suggests that an increase has happened. Thus, this provides a partial explanation for the discrepancy because it only addresses half of the argument.

[nibs7985]

I still don't understand how answer choice D provides an explanation for the increase in vitamin A deficiency. If anything, we can only assume that the rate will be the same, because it would be an unwarranted inference to assume that the rate among the rest of the general population has gone up. We're given no evidence that suggests that an increase has happened. Thus, this provides a partial explanation for the discrepancy because it only addresses half of the argument.

You're right, it doesn't solve the paradox, but it doesn't need to because the question stem specifically asks for what "helps to resolve the apparent discrepancy EXCEPT"

Hope this helps others that might have been puzzled as to why D was wrong.