Q1

[uhdang]

This is Main Idea question.

The main idea of this passage is something like this:

New evidence regarding canary songs refutes the previous belief on neurogenesis for vertebrates, and this shows a possibility for application to human brains.

Now, let's go to the answer choice.

B), C), and E) can be easily eliminated. Let's go through them first.

B) Canaries are used as representing vertebrates. It's not a target to be distinguished from vertebrates.
C) “not likely to”? Considering the passage, the author seems positive with new evidence and the future.
E) "clarifies the importance of the yearly cycle in learning process" gets too detail, and future speculation is not covered in E).

It took a bit more time choosing between A) and D).

For D), the first half of D) is close, but it's too general. Canary research only gives up results related to vertebrates, not general neurogenesis. Also, regarding the other half, the research was not directly about mammals, so we can’t say that it “provides new information about adult human brain” It showed the potential lead to human application and research. Thus, D) is wrong.

A) correctly describes the Main Idea. This is Correct.

[klinepk]

Hello,

Regarding answer choice A. I ultimately dismissed answer choice A because I felt like the passage was suggesting that a mechanism might be found which would allow us to work on enabling the human brain to repair itself through neurogenesis. I think over-thinking problems has been a problem of mine on the RC section in particular, but I'm sort of at a loss regarding how to proceed with these kind of errors.

My reasoning was that, to me, "these findings might help uncover a mechanism that would enable the human brain to repair itself through neurogenesis" sounded more like we would find something which would then allow us to make these changes and alterations ourselves. At the same time, the word uncover doesn't sound particularly active and nothing is mentioned about humans doing anything.

By contrast, part of Answer choice A says that "suggests the possibility that human brains may repair themselves."

If we are uncovering a mechanism which would enable the human brain to repair itself through neurogenesis, it strikes me that uncovering a mechanism would be insufficient to enable something to do something else without first applying input of our own. Following that reasoning, I assumed that what the passage was saying was that we first uncover the mechanism and then apply what we've learned to then make it so the brain can repair itself through neurogenesis. Answer choice A stated that the human brain may repair itself but said nothing about human input of any kind. As a result, I moved on.

Writing all this out makes it all seem pretty ridiculous, but how is it I go about avoiding this kind of problem with passages and answer choices on the LSAT (and the RC section in particular) in the future? It strikes me that I could do all the RC practice, setup, timed tests and sections that I want but it's not necessarily going to help me avoid these types of errors.

I chose D. I feel like this was more a case of not being satisfied with any answer rather than being drawn to anything particular about answer choice D.

Thanks

[phoebster21]

I think, correct me if I'm wrong, that there are a few issues with D.
1) It uses "brain" cells as opposed to "nerve" cells
2) When it says that it "provides new information about neurogenesis in the adult human brain" this seems to be a little too strong since the passage seemed fairly uncertain about the impact of these findings in regards to its acceptance in the scientific community. The passage states, "although the idea of neurogenesis in the adult mammalian brain is still not generally accepted... these findings might help uncover..." Further, it uses phrases like "is not known..."