We are first told that there is widespread belief that people can predict impending earthquakes from unusual animal behavior. However, skeptics say this belief is purely based on selective coincidence, since those people whose dogs did act oddly before an earthquake were more likely to remember this fact. Further, the skeptics add that at any given time, some of the world's dogs will be behaving oddly.
Our correct answer will help us evaluate the validity of the skeptics' position. So what is the skeptics' position? The widespread belief that people can predict impending earthquakes from unusual animal behavior is wrong.
Answer choice (C) does not help us evaluate the skeptics' position. Whether there are animals whose behavior people know too little to be able to distinguish unusual from everyday behavior does not help us evaluate the skeptics' claim that the widespread belief mentioned is not correct. We know that we can distinguish between odd and normal dog behavior. That alone is sufficient.
Answer choice (E), i.e. "Is the animal behavior supposedly predictive of earthquakes specific to impending earthquakes or can it be any kind of unusual behavior?" is the correct answer. If we knew that the odd behavior was specific to impending earthquakes, then the skeptics' claim would be weakened, because then that specific behavior would probably be a good predictor of the forthcoming earthquakes. If, on the other hand, the animal behavior predictive of earthquakes consisted of any kind of unusual behavior, then the skeptics' claim would be strengthened.
Thus, knowing whether an animal behaved in an odd way that is specific to an impending earthquake would help evaluate the skeptics' position that the widespread belief that people can predict impending earthquakes from unusual animal behavior is wrong.
Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.
