Recent anthropological research found that creation myths with virtual

Question

Recent anthropological research found that creation myths with virtually identical narratives appear in the cultures of several remote Polynesian islands. Because of the distance and lack of navigation techniques, it is unlikely that most of the inhabitants of these islands were able to maintain ongoing bidirectional cultural contacts across the archipelago. Nonetheless, the researchers now assume that all of the creation myths share a common origin.

Which of the following would be most useful to establish in order to evaluate the anthropologists' assumption?

(A) Whether some of the early inhabitants of the Polynesian archipelago were able to sail to remote islands.
(B) Whether sailing between Polynesian islands would have been primarily by fast sail boats.
(C) Whether narratives of creation were spread on each island by designated storytellers.
(D) Whether the creation stories of the inhabitants of Polynesia were different in the remote past.
(E) Whether the creation myths that were discovered by anthropologists in Polynesia differed from each other only by insignificant parts of their narratives.

KrishnanTN · Accepted Answer

Initial Analysis  - Several Islands that were far enough from each other so as to make navigation between these islands a challenge still shared virtual identical narratives about creation. Now researchers are assuming that these myths originated from a single source. 
How can this be true - despite the distance ? 
Look at the wordings in the question that give us clues - 
Because of the distance and lack of navigation techniques, 
it is unlikely that most of the inhabitants of these islands 
were able to maintain ongoing bidirectional cultural contacts across the archipelago.

Key words being - Lack of navigational Techniques and distance are making it impossible for MOST of the inhabitants to maintain bidirectional cultural contact.

Inference - At least some of the inhabitants were able to establish mono-directional contact. They must have spread the stories by somehow moving from 1 island to another.

Answer choice analysis.

(A) Whether some of the early inhabitants of the Polynesian archipelago were able to sail to remote islands.
At least 1 or 2 guys moved around the archipelago spreading the stories.
If YES - Stories were spread by this method.
If NO - Stories were not spread by this method
RIGHT ANSWER

(B) Whether sailing between Polynesian islands would have been primarily by fast sail boats.
Primary mode of transportation does not matter - as we know the stories were not spread by this mode.
Whether the answer to this question is YES or NO - the outcome does not change. REJECTED.

(C) Whether narratives of creation were spread on each island by designated storytellers.
Narratives of creation can spread - whether the narratives are spread by designated storytellers or simple travelers.
Whether the answer to this question is YES or NO - the outcome does not change. REJECTED.

(D) Whether the creation stories of the inhabitants of Polynesia were different in the remote past.
Differences between stories during the different periods do not have any bearing on how these stories are spread.
Whether the answer to this question is YES or NO - the outcome does not change. REJECTED.

(E) Whether the creation myths that were discovered by anthropologists in Polynesia differed from each other only by insignificant parts of their narratives.
Significant or insignificant differences have no bearing in explaining how the stories spread.
Whether the answer to this question is YES or NO - the outcome does not change. REJECTED.

Pragya9s · Answer

I don't understand this Question.

(A) Whether some of the early inhabitants of the Polynesian archipelago were able to sail to remote islands.

This does not clear the Assumption that if some of the inhabitants were to sail to remote islands, that firstly those inhabitants must originate from a single remote island in order to spread their respective culture. And from then further the story spread. However, with Option (E) if we go with the belief of Anthropologist and establish that there were in fact only few indifferences, then we can establish that the myth spread through the same origin. And if there were significant few differences then the whole theory falls apart.

The spread of myth can be through storytellers or people who sailed. Too many flaws, who is to say that they all shared same language in order to spread.

What are we Evaluating here? It is not clear. Someone please explain.

JuniqueLid · Answer

This unofficial questions deserve experts attention and clarification.  MartyMurray  Would you mind sharing your thoughts as you often have very good balanced insights into ambiguous questions like this one.

B and C are easy to rule out. Not so easy to choose from A, D and E.

OA is A. It could be justified but it has serious flaws.

In the stem, the anthropologists assume that the myths have a common origin despite the physical constraints (distance and lack of navigation techniques), which make  BIDIRECTIONAL  connections unlikely. To evaluate this:
- If A is true, meaning that early inhabitants were physically able to sail across the islands, then the transmission of myths (possibly through mono-directional movements) becomes plausible;
- If A is false, no cultural contact, then no possible common origin.
Option A makese sense so far.

However, the fact that the stem described it as "UNLIKELY" for "MOST" implies that it is already implicitly acknowledging that long-distance sailing is possible. Therefore, Option A adds nothing new and is not something that we need to establish. Furthermore, even if it’s established that they could sail, it doesn’t address whether they actually did and how that links to spread of similar myths.
Option A now seems a much weaker choice.

D and E are possible contenders.
(D) asks: Were the myths different in the remote past? → If so, the current similarity could be the result of convergence, not a shared origin. If not, current similarities could be inherited and have a shared origin.
(E) asks: Are the differences between myths only insignificant? → If so, suggests strong common origin; if not, undermines the assumption. If is true that the stem already suggests the stories across the different islands are "virtually identical", so this may be seen as repeating the passage. However, the one or two differences can be so significant that one may deny the shared origin concept.  For example, the great flood myths. The myths are similar in many aspects across different cultures: a god sends a flood to wipe out humanity because humanity is sinful. One righteous person/family is saved in a boat. Humanity is "reborn" after the flood. However, in some of them God warned Noah, in some others, Vishnu warned Manu .

rishabh1105 · Answer

Recent anthropological research found that creation myths with virtually identical narratives appear in the cultures of several remote Polynesian islands. Because of the distance and lack of navigation techniques, it is unlikely that most of the inhabitants of these islands were able to maintain ongoing bidirectional cultural contacts across the archipelago. Nonetheless, the researchers now assume that all of the creation myths share a common origin.

Which of the following would be most useful to establish in order to evaluate the anthropologists' assumption?

Break the argument:
Background: Recent anthropological research has found creation myths to have virtually identical narratives in cultures of remote Polynesian islands
Conclusion: Assumption by researchers that creation myths share common origin
Premise: Due to lack of navigation techniques and distance there must not be bidirectional cultural contact.

Question is about "Evaluate the argument" which means we need to identify a choice the answer of which will help us either strengthen or weaken the argument

(A) Whether some of the early inhabitants of the Polynesian archipelago were able to sail to remote islands.
If the answer is Yes, then we notice that there was atleast some movement between the islands. Which supports/strengthen the argument 
If the answer is No, then it weakens the support and questions the conclusion to have common origin

(B) Whether sailing between Polynesian islands would have been primarily by fast sail boats.
Whether the answer is Yes/No does it matter if they sailed they used fast sail boats, slow sail boats. No right?

(C) Whether narratives of creation were spread on each island by designated storytellers.
Whether the answer is Yes/No does it matter if they had designed storytellers? Even if that had designed story tellers doesn't help us strengthen/weaken if stories had common origin

(D) Whether the creation stories of the inhabitants of Polynesia were different in the remote past.
Our argument talks about that the research has found that creation stories were identical. Background information/Premise in the argument is considered to always be true.

(E) Whether the creation myths that were discovered by anthropologists in Polynesia differed from each other only by insignificant parts of their narratives
Our argument talks about that the research has found that creation stories were identical. Background information/Premise in the argument is considered to always be true.

Recent anthropological research found that creation myths with virtual

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