PT36.S1.Q24 - columnist: george orwell's book

civnetn

https://7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-36-section-1-question-24/
Could someone please explain why C) is incorrect? I understand why is correct but after scouring the message boards I can't find anyone who can explain comprehensively why C) is incorrect.

What if 200,000 people read the newspaper, but the survey only accounts for 1,000 of them. Surely then, the conclusion that George Orwell's 1984 influenced a great number of the newspapers readers, would be inaccurate? I mean, isn't "a great number" simply a relative term? If I have 10 of something, 9 would be a great number of them.

alexroark5

I think the larger issue they want to focus on is that if 999 people named the bible and only 1 named orwell, then it would be that orwell didn't really influence a significant amount of people. On the other hand if 501 people named the bible and 499 named Orwell, well then that is an argument that would support he had influence on people. and so knowing the distribution of orwell, the bible, and other options across the 1000 readers is what will most help us arrive at conclusion to the argument and not whether or not 1000 readers constitutes a "a great number" of readers. "A great number" of readers doesn't have to be relative to the total number of readers. Don't think of "a great number" as meaning "a great percentage of total readers" Does that help clarify the question for you @civnetn?