There are 1.3 billion cows

A free, expert breakdown of this official LSAT Logical Reasoning question.

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Stimulus

There are 1.3 billion cows worldwide, and this population is growing to keep pace with the demand for meat and milk. These cows produce trillions of liters of methane gas yearly, and this methane contributes to global warming. The majority of the world's cows are given relatively low-quality diets even though cows cows could be kept in check if cows were given better-quality diets.

What this question is testing

Strengthen

Conclusion

The author thinks switching cows to better diets would keep total methane production from getting out of control.

Evidence

Two pieces. Per-cow methane goes down on a better diet — that's helpful. But the stimulus also tells us the cow population is growing because people want more meat and milk.

Evaluate

Here's the catch. Total methane = methane per cow × number of cows. Better diets cut the first number. But if demand keeps pushing the second number up, per-cow gains can be wiped out by sheer cow count growth.

So the argument needs something that either keeps the cow population in check or makes the per-cow gains big enough to overwhelm population growth.

Goal

Find an answer that closes the gap — ideally by reducing the need for so many additional cows.

Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.

The question

24.

Which one of the following, if true, adds the most support for the conclusion

Answer choices

Correct67% picked this
Cows given good-quality diets produce much more meat and milk than they
Why this is right
This closes the gap. The stimulus says the cow population is growing to meet demand for meat and milk. If cows on good-quality diets produce much more meat and milk per cow, then the same demand can be satisfied with fewer cows. That keeps the population from ballooning, which directly helps keep total methane in check. Per-cow methane drops AND fewer cows are needed — both factors push total methane down.
Skill tested: Strengthen · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
67%
No Impact9% picked this
Carbon and hydrogen, the elements that make up methane, are found in abundance in the components of all
This is a chemistry fact about feed composition — the elements that make up methane are present in any feed. That does not bear on whether better-quality diets in particular reduce methane (the stimulus already tells us they do per cow), and it does not address whether per-cow gains will translate into overall reductions. No connection to the argument's gap.
9%
Out of Scope10% picked this
Most farmers would be willing to give their cows high-quality feed if the cost of
This concerns farmer willingness conditional on cheaper feed — a question about feasibility or adoption, not about whether better diets, if adopted, would actually keep methane in check. The conclusion is about what would happen if cows were given better diets, not about what farmers will or won't do. Adoption-side concerns don't affect the if-then conclusion.
10%
No Impact3% picked this
Worldwide, more methane is produced by cows raised for meat production than by those raised
The breakdown of methane production between meat-cows and milk-cows tells us where the methane comes from but does not address whether better diets reduce overall methane. Both groups would presumably benefit from better diets. This redistributes the existing methane across categories rather than affecting the diet-vs-methane argument.
3%
No Impact11% picked this
Per liter, methane contributes more to global warming than does carbon dioxide, a gas that is thought to be the most
This compares methane's warming potential to carbon dioxide's. It tells us methane is bad — which the argument already implicitly grants — but it does not say anything about whether better cow diets would reduce methane production. The argument is about reducing methane, not about how harmful methane is relative to other gases.
11%

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