LSAT 126 – Section 3 – Question 02

LSAT 126 - Section 3 - Question 02

October 2008

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT126 S3 Q02
+LR
Flaw or descriptive weakening +Flaw
Link Assumption +LinkA
A
0%
158
B
2%
151
C
98%
163
D
0%
147
E
0%
152
123
131
139
 +Easiest 144.364 +SubsectionEasier

The question stem reads: The reasoning in the board member’s argument is vulnerable to criticism on grounds that the argument… This is a Flaw question.

The board member begins by claiming that the J Foundation issued “you” this grant on the condition that the resulting work did not contain anything detrimental to the J Foundation’s reputation. In other words, meeting the conditions of the grant requires that “your” work not contain anything harmful to J Foundation’s reputation. However, the board member notes that the resulting work does not mention anything positive about the J Foundation. The board member concludes that “you” have failed to meet the conditions of the grant.

Here we have a very common flaw in the LSAT: assuming that negation and opposition are the same. The board member assumes that no positive information must mean the existence of negative information. However, positive information could also imply that the information in the work was simply neutral: the information was neither good nor bad for the J Foundation’s reputation. If the resulting work was neutral, then “you” would not violate the conditions of the grant. Let’s move to the answer choices.

Answer Choice (A) is incorrect. Whether or not the work has Intellectual value has nothing to do with the board member’s argument.

Answer Choice (B) is incorrect. The author does not confuse the necessary condition of “no harmful information” for being sufficient to issue the grant.

Correct Answer Choice (C) is what we discussed. The board member has assumed that failing to mention the laudable achievements of J Foundation amounts to harming the reputation of J Foundation.

Answer Choice (D) is something the argument fails to consider, but that is not why the argument is flawed.

Answer Choice (E) is also something that the argument does not consider, but (E) is not a problem for the argument. If you failed to satisfy the necessary condition of “no harmful information,” it would not matter how many other conditions were met. The problem is that we do not know if the work actually contained harmful information.

 

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LSAT PrepTest 126 Explanations

Section 1 - Logical Reasoning

Section 2 - Reading Comprehension

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Logical Reasoning

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