Until recently it was widely believed that only a limited number of species could reproduce through parthenogenesis, ...

Ravi on August 16, 2019

@Sidra,

Happy to help. Let's look a (C).

We're looking for the answer choice that tells us why the argument is
most vulnerable to criticism.

(C) says, "takes ignorance of the occurrence of something as
conclusive evidence that it did not occur"

(C) sounds convoluted, but it's correctly describing the flaw in the
argument. The argument is assuming that when humans were ignorant
about certain species being able to do parthogenesis, that this meant
that those species did not possess the ability to partake in it. (C)
points out the fact that the author was equating scientists' knowledge
about which species would or would not do parthogenesis with those
species actually having the ability, or lack thereof. Just because we
didn't know a certain species to partake in parthogenesis doesn't mean
that they didn't have the ability to do it or actually partake in it.
Perhaps the number of species we're documenting to do parthogenesis is
increasing merely because we are getting more interested in it and
paying more attention. Thus, (C) is the correct answer choice.

Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any other questions!