Q2

[kimjy89]

Thanks.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

This one is pretty straight forward. We're asked to find something the author would agree with. If at all possible, try not to feel tempted into going back and re-reading. It'd be better to read through the answer choices and if it doesn't sound like what the passage was saying, cross it off.

(A) is not accurate. The author never claims that the standard of living will go up for one set of nations at the expense of another.
(B) is not accurate. The author thinks that with an ideal industrial ecosystem, standards of living do not need to fall, even when population increases to 10 billion people by 2030.
(C) is not accurate. The author believes that the standard of living can be maintained if an ideal industrial ecosystem can be developed.
(D) summarizes the author's main point. The author does believe that an industrial ecosystem can allow people to increase in population and still maintain the standard of living they want, without excessively depleting natural resources.
(E) is not accurate. The author does not believe that we must reduce our standard of living, but rather we must learn to manage our resources more wisely, if the standard of living is going to be maintained.

I hope this helps clear things up! If not, let me know where...

[sbuzzetto10]

Are we supposed to infer that the author feels the high standard of living can be maintained if an ideal industrial ecosystem? I didn't see that he expressly stated that anywhere. In paragraph 1 he says that ideally, all would enjoy standards of living equivalent, but unless something is done this ideal would not last. So can we infer that he thinks if we do employ this ideal industrial ecosystem all countries could enjoy a high standard of living? I understood his statements to mean without it, no--but didn't necessarily infer that he felt that with it, yes.

Is it because D says all countries COULD and not all countries WILL?

Thanks!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

A couple of points. This question requires us to synthesize information from various points in the passage and I think the best places to derive answer choice (D) would come from (lines 22-28, read it without all the mumbo jumbo between the hyphens) and (lines 50-55).

Also, remember that the question never asks us to find an answer choice we can infer. It asks for an answer choice the author would most probably agree with. Think of the difference between Inference questions in LR that ask you to find "what must be true" vs those that ask you to find "what is most strongly supported."

That difference means that a hypothetical example that would disprove the absolute truth of the answer choice would disqualify that answer choice on a "must be true" question, but would not on a "most strongly supported question."

Does that answer your question?

[sbuzzetto10]

Yes, that clears it up. The author never implies that any country's standard of living must be reduced, he does imply that implementing an ideal industrial ecosystem would have positive benefits in regards to natural resources and environmental issues (pollution, excess wastes, etc.). It can reasonably said that he would agree that implementing an ideal industrial ecosystem would allow all countries to enjoy high standard of living b/c there's no evidence that contradicts this, and as mentioned, there is evidence that pretty much support it.

thanks!

[slimjimsquinn]

I ended up choosing B) because I thought "If technology is inadequate for the task, and these changes would only decrease and not eliminate waste, it is likely that the standard of living cannot be contained."

Thinking on it again, this reads wrong because the text is more optimistic than this statement.

Still, I'm not fully convinced with D) because the introduction said there are 2 problems needed to overcome to maintain population with that level of living: 1. Replacement of substitutes or consumption decreases and 2. Waste.

I eliminated D) because industrial ecosystem seems to eliminate the second problem but not the first. Please tell me where I went wrong!

Thank you!
---------

The conditional I thought of was:

10 billion consume critical natural resources OR
new resources not discovered

-------> SOL last less than a decade


SOL > decade ---> -consumption or resources discovered

[Crogati]

In reference to slimjimsquinn's question, do conditionals apply here? This question requires us to synthesize information (i.e. make an induction about standard of living), thinking small to big. I was totally caught off guard by it. Obviously I was taking a surface level stock of the text. How do we prepare for questions like this. More specially, how do we make logical inductions while reading? I think my PEAR process needs work. I notated a lot about the details on this one...

[deedubbew]

What about lines 46-57? The passage says that the ideal system is not going to be attained soon and that even if we aim for it, we will probably have a more sustainable system, but not necessarily with an equal or better standard of living. That's why I didn't choose D and chose B instead. If 10 billion people consume resources at the current rate, then resources will be depleted by 2040. However, this doesn't take into account the cumulative resources depleted up until 2030. So it's possible that resources could be substantially decreased by 2030.

[christine.defenbaugh]

What about lines 46-57? The passage says that the ideal system is not going to be attained soon and that even if we aim for it, we will probably have a more sustainable system, but not necessarily with an equal or better standard of living. That's why I didn't choose D and chose B instead. If 10 billion people consume resources at the current rate, then resources will be depleted by 2040. However, this doesn't take into account the cumulative resources depleted up until 2030. So it's possible that resources could be substantially decreased by 2030.

deedubbew, great question!

You're right that the final paragraph begins by telling us that the ideal industrial ecosystem won't be attained soon. However, notice that answer choice (D) does not say that author would agree that we will attain the ideal industrial ecosystem... it simply says what would happen IF everyone implemented one!

(D) says IF everyone implements an ideal ecosystem, everyone could enjoy a high SOL. To evaluate this, we need to look for what the author says about that ideal industrial ecosystem (not what happens when we don't have it!). Also note that the statement in the answer choice is not tied to any particular year - it's simply a very general statement that if we could all do the ideal industrial ecosystem, thinks would be pretty rosy for standard of living.

Lines 22-28 tell us that such a system optimizes the consumption of energy and materials, minimizes wastes and pollution, etc. Lines 29-31 underscores this by suggesting that in the ideal industrial ecosystem "materials ... would not be depleted any more than are materials in a biological ecosystem". If that were true, then the human population would not be consuming/depleting resources much at all! And since consumption/depletion of resources was the primary issue raised for why we might not all be able to achieve a high SOL, removing that issue would support the idea that we could enjoy a high SOL!

As for (B), while the author does think it's unlikely we'll achieve the ideal industrial ecosystem immediately, what you point out in the final paragraph suggests that we can nevertheless make substantial progress. Maybe we aren't likely to have a situation where everyone has a high SOL by 2030, but that doesn't mean that everyone's SOL will decrease - and it certainly doesn't mean it will decrease substantially. Maybe everyone's SOL just stays exactly the same as it is now! Remember that right now, developing countries do not have the same high SOL that industrial nations do, so even if everything stayed exactly the way it is right this second, we would not achieve "high SOL for everyone".

Does that help a bit?

More specially, how do we make logical inductions while reading? I think my PEAR process needs work. I notated a lot about the details on this one...

It's very common to be overfocused on details at the start of the Reading Comp journey. When you hit the 'pause' step in PEAR, be sure that you are focused on the prior paragraph as a whole! Your passage map should give you the general shape and structure of the passage (the forest!) and not a laundry list of small facts (the trees!).

Also, answers to questions like this cannot be predicted, so don't try! You should be focused on eliminating answers that are not supported by the general structure and purpose of the passage.

Still, I'm not fully convinced with D) because the introduction said there are 2 problems needed to overcome to maintain population with that level of living: 1. Replacement of substitutes or consumption decreases and 2. Waste.

I eliminated D) because industrial ecosystem seems to eliminate the second problem but not the first. Please tell me where I went wrong!

The ideal industrial ecosystem would help with both! Remember that the ideal industrial ecosystem would both optimize the consumption of materials AND minimize waste and pollution! (Lines 22-24).



I hope this helps clear up some issues on a sticky RC question!