LSAT－4－1－15 (附yale jd，native speaker的英文解释)

M: It is almost impossible to find a person between the ages of 85 an 90 who primarily uses the left hand.

Q: Seventy to ninety years ago, however, children were punished for using their left hands to eat or to write and were forced to use their right hands.

Q’s response serves to counter any use by M of the evidence about 85 to 90 year olds in supports of which one of the following hypotheses?

(A) Being born right-handed confers a survival advantage.

(B) Societal attitudes toward handedness differ at different times.

(C) Forcing a person to switch from a preferred hand is harmless.

(D) Handedness is a product of both genetic predisposition and social pressures.

(E) Physical habits learned in school often persist in old age.

这个题，大家众说纷纭，我也对究竟题目问的是M的假设还是Q的假设很犯难。

请教了一个老美，此人是耶鲁大学的JD，native speaker, 现在美国做教授。我想他的解答或许对各位有用吧！

以下我就把我和他往来的邮件发在这里。为了保护个人隐私，内容做了点技术上的处理。

我的问题：

The answer is A.
I chose D.

It is hard to tell the real meaning of the question.

I am not clear, whether the sentence means,

1: Q, in support of which one of the following hypotheses, has a response serve to counter M's use of the evidence?
= Q has a response to M, using which of the following hypotheses?

2: Q, has a response to M's evidence. Which following hypotheses is used by M to support his idea?

The answer is in favor of the second understanding. I just can't tell the 1st from the 2nd.

Would you please explain to me?
Thanks a lot!

老美的解答：

Thanks a lot 蓝色的心, very good sharing !

To put thing short, this is a question asking for an inference strengthened by Q and weakened by M, whatever the assumption is, no bearing at all, and one of the approach to this, is to pick up the one that M against, among those inferences (yes, there are many) Q support.

不知道对大家有没有用，用google输入题干搜索到的。。。

This one requires careful analysis of the question stem. Here’s what it’s getting at: M presents evidence that could be used to support some unspoken hypothesis. We are to take it that, without even hearing that hypothesis, Q rebuts it by presenting counter-evidence. We’re asked to locate the disputed hypothesis. In sum, we want an answer choice that would be supported by M’s statement and rebutted by Q’s statement, and that’s answer choice (A). M’s statement that virtually no one who has lived past 85 is left-handed could be used to argue that right-handed people have a survival advantage over—i.e., live longer than—left-handers. It could, that is, but for Q’s reply that most people born left-handers who are now age 85 were forced to use their right hands as children. That would mean that many right-handed 85-year-olds may have been born left-handed and forced to switch. The fact that you can’t find old southpaws doesn’t mean that they die earlier, but merely that they don’t behave like southpaws. And that’s how answer choice (A) is supported by M but rebutted by Q.

(B) speaks about the societal attitudes towards handedness. This is an issue that Q raised and used to rebut M, but we want an issue that M raises that is contradicted by Q.

(C) This answer choice speaks of forcing people to switch from a preferred hand. Again, this is merely an issue raised by Q in his rebuttal of M’s likely hypothesis. This is not complete enough for us to select it as the answer.

(D) Nothing in M’s remarks indicates M is interested in the origins of handedness. Eliminate this choice.

(E) M couldn’t use (E) as evidence under any circumstances, since M merely attempts to correlate handedness and longevity, though (E) does go along well enough with Q’s position.

• One of the chief difficulties is keeping the statements clearly separated in your mind. M doesn’t say anything about social attitudes or pressures—answer choices (B), (C), and (D); M discusses left-handedness and age. Q brings up social pressure to attack M’s point about age.

• Don’t be alarmed at an unusual question stem such as this, but do take the necessary time to work it out. (Even if it means skipping the question temporarily until the easier ones have been attempted.) Unusual question stems need to be read with extra care; as a matter of fact, figuring out the stem is often the only really difficult part of the entire question.