LSAT 106 – Section 2 – Question 18

LSAT 106 - Section 2 - Question 18

June 1999

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT106 S2 Q18
+LR
+Exp
Flaw or descriptive weakening +Flaw
Lack of Support v. False Conclusion +LSvFC
A
73%
167
B
8%
158
C
4%
159
D
13%
161
E
2%
158
146
155
165
 +Harder 147.566 +SubsectionMedium

J.Y.’s explanation

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Dobson: Some historians claim that the people who built a ring of stones thousands of years ago in Britain were knowledgeable about celestial events. The ground for this claim is that two of the stones determine a line pointing directly to the position of the sun at sunrise at the spring equinox. There are many stones in the ring, however, so the chance that one pair will point in a celestially significant direction is large. Therefore, the people who built the ring were not knowledgeable about celestial events.

Summarize Argument: Counter-Position
Dobson concludes that the people who built the ring of stones in Britain were not knowledgeable about celestial events. He supports this by saying that, because there are many stones in the ring, there’s a good chance that one pair of stones would point in a celestially significant direction.

Identify and Describe Flaw
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of confusing a rejection of someone’s argument with a rejection of their conclusion. Dobson concludes that the historians’ conclusion is false, simply because their evidence doesn’t establish their conclusion. But just because someone’s evidence is insufficient doesn’t mean you can assume that the opposite of their conclusion is true.

A
The failure of cited evidence to establish a statement is taken as evidence that that statement is false.
Dobson concludes that the people who built the stone ring didn’t understand celestial events, just because the historians’ evidence fails to establish their conclusion. But a lack of evidence doesn’t mean you can automatically assume the opposite of someone’s conclusion.
B
Dobson’s conclusion logically contradicts some of the evidence presented in support of it.
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of internal contradiction. Dobson doesn’t make this mistake. His argument is flawed, but it isn’t contradictory.
C
Statements that absolutely establish Dobson’s conclusion are treated as if they merely give some support to that conclusion.
Actually, Dobson treats his evidence as if it absolutely establishes his conclusion, even though it doesn’t establish it at all.
D
Something that is merely a matter of opinion is treated as if it were subject to verification as a matter of fact.
The builders of the ring were either knowledgeable about celestial events or they were not; this isn’t a matter of opinion. It may be Dobson’s opinion that there’s a high chance that a pair of stones would point to something significant, but this isn’t the flaw in his argument.
E
Dobson’s drawing the conclusion relies on interpreting a key term in two different ways.
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of equivocation. Dobson never makes this mistake in his argument.

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LSAT PrepTest 106 Explanations

Section 1 - Logical Reasoning

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Reading Comprehension

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