Clay Tokens

Answer choices

1. A

   No Impact2% picked this

   The more than 100 clay envelopes discovered at archaeological sites along the Jordan come in many different dimensions,

   This is the classic, wishy-washy answer we see on Strengthen / Weaken questions: - things occur - things fluctuate - things differ - some of the envelopes were heavy, some were light The fact that these envelopes came in a wide variety of shapes and thicknesses doesn't make any difference to whether or not the inscriptions are connected to temple-based tallies of villagers contributions.

   2%
2. B

   Correct52% picked this

   It was customary for villagers who performed services for another person to receive in return a record of a promise of agricultural

   Why this is right

   This provides an Alternate Explanation for the clay envelopes: maybe the envelopes were sort of a payment contract. I clean out your gutters, you promise me some meat in the fall and give me an envelope with an inscription of the agricultural product (meat) you're promising me? We know that LSAT's preferred move when weakening a causal hypothesis is to provide an alternate explanation, but this is a very thinly suggested alternate explanation. Pretty tough to hear what they were going for. It's very important that we are listening charitably for a possible alternate way to explain these envelopes, so that "a record of a promise of agricultural products" sticks out as LSAT vaguely alluding to the envelopes.

   Skill tested: Weaken · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

   52%
3. C

   Too Weak23% picked this

   The tablets marked in cuneiform dating after 3000 B.C. do not seem to function as records of villagers’ contributions to

   This sticks out as a contender, because it seems to just contradict S-B's theory, but they wouldn't write a correct answer that obvious would they? How is this not just contradicting her theory? Ahhh ... in the 2nd paragraph we're before 4000 B. C., whereas this answer is talking about after 3000 B.C. So this answer is saying that "what people used clay tablets for more than 1000 years later does not seem to be the same". That weakens a smidge, but we expect the world to change a lot in 1000 years, so pointing out a disconnect has very little logical force. By 1000 years later, there might be a more centralized government that is pooling together and tallying up communal resources. So, the temple might not need to do it anymore, and thus tablets from that era would not seem to be related to temple-based pools of goods.

   23%
4. D

   Too Weak18% picked this

   There is no archaeological evidence suggesting that the tokens in use from about 4000 B.C. to 3100 B.C. were necessarily meant to

   This drifts a little from the operative time frame. We're trying to diagnose the function of envelopes that existed prior to 4000 B.C., and this is referring to the 900 year period that follows. It's also just really weak to say that "Tokens were not necessarily meant to be placed in clay envelopes". This just means that at least one token wasn't meant to be placed in a clay envelope. That would only hurt S-B's theory if her theory was assuming that "every single token was meant for an envelope", which it wasn't.

   18%
5. E

   Strengthens5% picked this

   Villagers were required not only to contribute goods to central pools but also to contribute labor, which

   This actually increases the plausibility of the story S-B is telling, in which the community is expected to contribute to a temple-organized pool of grain and livestock.

   5%