Exam LSAT Topic 3 Question 83 Discussion

What if someone told you about a kind of grass that grows as tall as the tallest trees? Agrass that can be made as strong as steel? A grass from which houses, furniture, boats, andhundreds of other useful things can be made? A grass that you would even enjoy eating?Would you believe that person? You should, for that grass is bamboo, the ''wood'' of1,001 uses.Bamboo may look like wood, but it is part of the family of plants that includes wheat,oats, and barley. It is a kind of grass. This grass is not just a material for making usefulproducts. Young bamboo is eaten, often mixed with other vegetables, in many Asianfoods.Bamboo grows in many parts of the world. In the United States it grows in an area fromVirginia west to Indiana and south to Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. Most bamboo,however, is found in warm, wet climates, especially in Asia and on the islands of theSouth Pacific Ocean.In most Asian countries, bamboo is nearly as important as rice. Many Asians live inbamboo houses. They sit on bamboo chairs and sleep on bamboo mats. They fence theirland with bamboo and use the wood for cages for chickens and pigs.Bamboo is used to build large buildings as well as homes. When it is glued in layers, itbecomes as strong as steel. On some islands in the South Pacific, bamboo is even used forwater pipes. This extraordinary material has many other uses. It is used to make musicalinstruments, such as flutes and recorders. Paper made from bamboo has been highlyprized by artists for thousands of years.Bamboo is light and strong, and it bends without breaking. It is cheap, floats on water,almost never wears out, and is easy to grow. Nothing else on earth grows quite so fast asbamboo. At times you can even see it grow! Botanists have recorded growths of morethan three feet in just twenty-four hours! Bamboo is hollow and has a strong root systemthat almost never stops growing and spreading. In fact, only after it flowers, an event thatmay happen only once every thirty years, will bamboo die.There are more than a thousand kinds of bamboo. The smallest is only three inches tall andone-tenth of an inch across. The largest reaches more than two hundred feet in height andseven inches in diameter. No wonder, then, that the lives of nearly half the people on earthwould change enormously if there were no longer any bamboo. No wonder, too, that tomany people bamboo is a symbol of happiness and good fortune.What is the main idea of this passage?