Bunuel wrote:
Researchers have shown that older ants, which usually spend more time gathering nourishment for the colony, tend to have larger brains than do younger ants, which usually help nurture ant larvae in the colony. Since gathering nourishment requires greater cognitive skills than does nurturing larvae, it would appear that such gathering leads to the increased brain size of older ants.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
A. Ants that have spent more time gathering nourishment do not have considerably larger brains than do ants that have spent a much shorter time gathering.
B. The brains of older ants that stop gathering nourishment to take on other tasks do not become smaller.
C. The brains of older ants that are not involved in gathering nourishment are the same size as those counterparts of the same age that do gather nourishment.
D. In many species of ants, the brains of older ants are only minimally larger than the brains of younger ants.
E. Ants that have to travel farther to gather nourishment do not have considerably larger brains than do ants that do not have to travel far.
Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the argument above?
A. Ants that have spent more time gathering nourishment do not have considerably larger brains than do ants that have spent a much shorter time gathering.
B. The brains of older ants that stop gathering nourishment to take on other tasks do not become smaller.
C. The brains of older ants that are not involved in gathering nourishment are the same size as those counterparts of the same age that do gather nourishment.
D. In many species of ants, the brains of older ants are only minimally larger than the brains of younger ants.
E. Ants that have to travel farther to gather nourishment do not have considerably larger brains than do ants that do not have to travel far.
OA is C.
Since we have to weaken the argument we have to find a way to prove that gathering does not leads to the increased brain size of older ants.
Now how can you prove this , you can easily prove this by showing that older ant who does not gather the food has same size of brain than the ant who gather the food, if somehow we prove that gathering has no relation with brain size, it will weaken the argument.
This is exactly written in C