Q12 - Navigation in animals is defined

[lorraineogan]

I understand why A, , D, and E are incorrect.

A would support the argument.
D support the argument.
E is irrelevant since it mentions their senses and not factors related to navigation ability.

But B and C are a bit more difficult to distinguish to me.

If B were correct, wouldn't that only support the argument, since a migration route implies that the polar bear will be incorporating its navigational ability? I just don't get it.

Thanks!

[fmuirhea]

The credited response hinges on the definition of "navigation" as provided in the argument. Here's how I'd break it down:


background: navigation = ability to get from unfamiliar to familiar territory beyond immediate range of senses

premise: one polar bear found his way home after being released 500+ km away

conclusion: polar bears can navigate over considerable distances


Since you're looking to weaken, you want to find the flaw(s) in the argument and attack it (them) somehow. The first flaw that jumps out at me is a sampling flaw, as the conclusion is based on evidence about a single polar bear; perhaps this particular polar bear is not representative of the skills of polar bears in general (maybe he's a ringer!). Alas, nothing in the answer choices gets at this potential error in reasoning.

Looking more closely at the explicitly defined term "navigation," we see that it specifies getting from unfamiliar to familiar territory. So, in order for the given example to hold up as a demonstration of navigation ability, it would have to be true that the polar bear was in fact released into unfamiliar territory. Sure, it was 500+ km away, but does that necessarily guarantee that it was unknown?

If you dropped me in Montreal, and I found my way back home to London (in Ontario, not the cool one in the UK), would it be impressive? Not really, because I already know how to get from Montreal to London. (It's actually stupidly easy - you just hop on the 401 and drive until you're there. This is probably quite irrelevant and boring for American readers - sorry.)

So, it's the same idea for the polar bear - if you drop him off at a spot from which he knows how to get home (i.e., somewhere that's on his annual migration route), all of a sudden his 500+ km trek isn't that astounding. So, the credited response, (B), attacks the assumption that he was actually starting in unfamiliar territory.

I'm not really sure how (C) could weaken - perhaps the drifting ice would carry him safely to his destination, so his arrival wouldn't be credited to his own navigational ability? This would involve making a tenuous assumption, and it doesn't get at the heart of the issue like (B) does.

I hope this helps!

[lorraineogan]

That articulated what I was thinking as a possibility.

For C, I was thinking that maybe polar bears are attracted to colder climates. It's still stupid answer choice though. I don't know why I chose a stupid answer over a more intelligent sounding answer, even if I didn't have time to think through it. The only thing that was causing me to cast doubt on B was, again, the fact that a migration route seems to utilize an animals navigation ability...for example, birds are able to migrate given their navigation ability, even if they've never been South before...I am assuming.

[jonathanthegrey]

Hey,

I've been stuck between (B) and (E).

Navigation, as defined in prompt: "[T]he animal's ability to find its way from unfamiliar territory to points familiar to the animal but beyond the range of the animal's senses."

If what choice (E) states is true, then it would mean that polar bears sometimes do not go beyond their "range of senses" when seeking familiar territory. Does this not cast some serious doubt on the proposal put forward in the stimulus?

Thanks!

[joshringu]

Hi!

I know I'm a few years late but for your question about E, I crossed it out because it needed an extra assumption that where the naturalist dropped off the polar bear was within the range of its extremely sensitive smell. I know this might not help now but I hope it helps someone in the future looking at this!

[ohthatpatrick]

Exactly.

In order to weaken this argument and show that this polar bear's journey was NOT a genuine instance of navigation, we have to either show

1. the polar bear was in FAMILIAR territory
or
2. the polar bear was headed to a destination WITHIN the immediate range of the animal's senses

(B) and (E) are definitely meant to be the down to two here ... (B) seems to give us #1, (E) seems to give us #2.

Ask yourself, which is the more conservative, better supported inference:

(B) a bear is in FAMILIAR territory if it's on its annual migration route
or
(E) a destination 300 miles away is WITHIN the immediate range of the animal's senses

I don't care how sensitive your sense of smell is ... it's not a 300 mile range (to think that a polar bear COULD smell something 300 miles away qualifies as one of the "superfluous, implausible, or incompatible" assumptions LSAT warns us against at the beginning of every LR section).

[WaltGrace1983]

Couldn't we also just eliminate (E) because we not only (1) do not care how they "scent out" familiar territory, but (2) we don't even know if such a territory described in the stimulus is familiar! It seems that (E) just gives us a little bit more info on how the polar bears use their senses.

[christine.defenbaugh]

Couldn't we also just eliminate (E) because we not only (1) do not care how they "scent out" familiar territory, but (2) we don't even know if such a territory described in the stimulus is familiar! It seems that (E) just gives us a little bit more info on how the polar bears use their senses.

WaltGrace1983, I like the way you're thinking, but be careful not to become overzealous in your eliminations. You're right that we don't know if the territory the polar bears are released IN was familiar, but the idea is that the bears would start in UNfamiliar territory and sniff our familiar territory.

The trap here is that one might think that since polar bears have this extreme sensitivity to smell, perhaps they can smell familiar territory from a lot farther away than we might first expect! If (E) had said that polar bears often use their extreme sensitivity to sniff out things 300 miles away from them, then it would be a fabulous weakener.

Essentially, what's significant in this answer choice is not how they scent out the familiar territory, but the fact that they have an extremely sensitive sense of smell. The problem is that it's not specific enough to support any real likelihood that a polar bear can smell home from 300 miles.

Thoughts?

[WaltGrace1983]

The trap here is that one might think that since polar bears have this extreme sensitivity to smell, perhaps they can smell familiar territory from a lot farther away than we might first expect! If (E) had said that polar bears often use their extreme sensitivity to sniff out things 300 miles away from them, then it would be a fabulous weakener.

And that would be because the idea of "navigation" is that the polar bears DON'T use their senses to "navigate" because "navigation" is all about finding the familiar beyond their senses. By saying that these polar bears often rely on their smell to sniff out things 300 miles away, this would show that they DO use their senses and thus they DON'T navigate (thereby weakening the argument).

Essentially, what's significant in this answer choice is not how they scent out the familiar territory, but the fact that they have an extremely sensitive sense of smell. The problem is that it's not specific enough to support any real likelihood that a polar bear can smell home from 300 miles.

Thoughts?

I gotcha! So "scenting out" can totally be relevant. Why? Because we know "navigation" excludes the senses. I missed that piece of information - good thing that I wasn't tested on it but I'll have to understand definitions better next time. I totally get it now! Thanks, Christine!

[christine.defenbaugh]

The trap here is that one might think that since polar bears have this extreme sensitivity to smell, perhaps they can smell familiar territory from a lot farther away than we might first expect! If (E) had said that polar bears often use their extreme sensitivity to sniff out things 300 miles away from them, then it would be a fabulous weakener.

And that would be because the idea of "navigation" is that the polar bears DON'T use their senses to "navigate" because "navigation" is all about finding the familiar beyond their senses. By saying that these polar bears often rely on their smell to sniff out things 300 miles away, this would show that they DO use their senses and thus they DON'T navigate (thereby weakening the argument).

Essentially, what's significant in this answer choice is not how they scent out the familiar territory, but the fact that they have an extremely sensitive sense of smell. The problem is that it's not specific enough to support any real likelihood that a polar bear can smell home from 300 miles.

Thoughts?

I gotcha! So "scenting out" can totally be relevant. Why? Because we know "navigation" excludes the senses. I missed that piece of information - good thing that I wasn't tested on it but I'll have to understand definitions better next time. I totally get it now! Thanks, Christine!

You're on it! And this is a great illustration of why it is so critical to understand why each answer choice is wrong, and what about it makes it tempting for the unwary!

[WaltGrace1983]

Thanks!

[andrewgong01]

I understand "B" meets one of the conditions ("unfamiliar territory" --> migration route is a familiar route) but when I was doing it I chose "A" because "A" seems to suggest the "navigation" may have been random/ by luck because the bear kept changing courses, which, to me, sounded like the bear was lost and just kept changing courses until it found its home.

The strategy guide indicates "A" is wrong because nothing in the passage prohibited changing courses but I was thinking "A" was like a defender assumption where it is now saying it could have been luck because the bear kept changing courses ; i.e. we need to rule out that this was due to "ability to find its way" and not "luck"

Thank you

[ohthatpatrick]

I see what you're saying. There's not NOTHING there, but it's almost nothing.

Stopping and changing course CAN suggest that someone is lost.
But stopping and changing course CAN ALSO suggest that someone is simply resting and deciding to take a different path.

Maybe it left a valley path in favor of a more mountainous path because it wanted a change in temperature / visibility / foliage, etc.

We're stretching a lot to get from
"about 3 or 4 times, on a 300 mile journey from where it was released to its home territory, the polar bear stopped and changed course"
to
"the polar bear was disoriented and was not navigating ... rather it correctly found its home territory 300 miles away by random luck"

It sounds like you're using your own mental definition of 'navigation', as though it means 'to know the right way to go and not get lost while trying to get there'.

But they defined navigation specifically for us, so we have to use THEIR definition of navigation in order to argue with these naturalists' claim.

Hope this helps.