Mature white pines intercept almost all the sunlight that shines on them. They leave a deep litter that dries readily, and they grow to prodigious height so that, even when there are large gaps in a stand of such trees, little light reaches the forest floor. For this reason white pines cannot regenerate in their own shade. Thus, when in a dense forest a stand of trees consists of nothing but mature white pines, it is a fair bet that______
Which one of the following most logically concludes the argument?
(A) the ages of the trees in the stand do not differ from each other by much more than the length of time it takes a white pine to grow to maturity - CORRECT. POE helps. This one made a conclusion about ages based on time that pines take to grow to maturity, thus leaving no doubts about the conclusion.
(B) the land on which the stand is now growing
had been cleared of all trees at the time when the first of the white pines started growing - WRONG. Not necessarily true. May or may not be true.
(C) competition among the trees in the stand for sunlight will soon
result in some trees’ dying and the stand thus becoming thinner - WRONG. We are sure about new pines not able to grow in the stand but not about whether the existing ones would die or not.
(D)
other species of trees will soon begin to colonize the stand, eventually replacing all of the white pines - WRONG. Irrelevant.
(E) any differences in the heights of the trees in the stand are attributable
solely to differences in the ages of the trees - WRONG. Age can be different for two different pines. Looks almost similar to A but it loses for solely relying on age factor.
Answer A.
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Pain + Reflection = Progress | Ray Dalio
Good Books to read prior to MBA