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Some anthropologists study modern-day societies of foragers in an effort to learn about our ancient ancestors who were also foragers. A flaw in this strategy is that forager societies are extremely varied. Indeed, any forager society with which anthropologists are familiar has had considerable contact with modern nonforager societies.
Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the criticism made above of the anthropologists' strategy?
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
| Some anthropologists study modern-day societies of foragers in an effort to learn about our ancient ancestors who were also foragers. |
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| A flaw in this strategy is that forager societies are extremely varied. |
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| Indeed, any forager society with which anthropologists are familiar has had considerable contact with modern nonforager societies. |
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The passage starts by presenting the anthropologists' research strategy, then immediately attacks it with two related criticisms that build on each other to show why the strategy is flawed.
The anthropologists' strategy of studying modern foragers to learn about ancient ancestors has serious flaws.
The author uses a two-pronged attack: first showing that modern forager societies vary too much to draw reliable conclusions, then strengthening this by pointing out that all these societies have been contaminated by contact with modern non-forager groups, making them poor representatives of ancient foragers.
Weaken - We need to find information that would make the criticism of the anthropologists' strategy less convincing or show that their approach might actually work despite the stated problems.
The criticism has two specific parts: (1) forager societies are extremely varied from each other, and (2) all modern forager societies have had considerable contact with non-forager societies. We need to attack one or both of these criticisms.
To weaken this criticism, we need to show that either: 1) The variation between forager societies doesn't actually matter for learning about ancient ancestors, 2) The contact with modern non-forager societies doesn't prevent us from learning about ancient foraging, or 3) There's something about forager societies that makes them still useful for studying ancient ancestors despite these problems. We're looking for information that makes the anthropologists' strategy seem more valid and reliable.