LSAT 108 – Section 3 – Question 10

LSAT 108 - Section 3 - Question 10

February 2000

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT108 S3 Q10
+LR
Weaken +Weak
A
1%
165
B
5%
160
C
92%
166
D
1%
160
E
1%
161
120
128
144
 +Easiest 147.273 +SubsectionMedium

Many people joke about Friday the thirteenth being an unlucky day, but a study showed that in one year approximately 17 percent of people scheduled to fly canceled or did not show up for their flights on Friday the thirteenth—a rate higher than that on any other day and date in that year. This shows that a significant percentage of the population would rather disrupt their travel plans than risk flying on a supposedly unlucky day.

Summarize Argument: Phenomenon-Hypothesis
The author hypothesizes that a significant proportion of the population are willing to disrupt their plans to avoid flying on an “unlucky” Friday the thirteenth. This hypothesis is based on the observation that during a particular year, more people cancelled or didn’t show up to their flights on Friday the thirteenth than on any other day that year.

Notable Assumptions
The author assumes that the reason people didn’t show up for their flights on Friday the thirteenth was the unlucky date, and not some other reason. There aren’t that many Fridays the thirteenth in a single year, so maybe some other significant factor just happened to arise on one or more Fridays the thirteenth that year.

A
People who fly tend to be professionals who as a group are less superstitious than the general public.
This does not weaken the argument. Even if people who fly are less superstitious, that doesn’t mean they’re not superstitious at all—maybe it’s just that even more of the general public would have skipped their flights. This still doesn’t explain the observed phenomenon.
B
Surveys show that less than 5 percent of the population report that they believe that Friday the thirteenth is an unlucky day.
This does not weaken the argument. Firstly, this is just trying to undermine the premise that people skip their flights more often on Friday the thirteenth. Secondly, it doesn’t succeed: someone might claim not to be superstitious but still not want to fly on an “unlucky” day.
C
Weather conditions at several major airports were severe on the Fridays that fell on the thirteenth in the year of the study.
This weakens the argument by providing an alternative explanation for why more people missed their flights on Friday the thirteenth. If there happened to be severe weather those days, it makes sense that people would miss their flights even without superstition being involved.
D
In the year of the study, automobile traffic was no lighter on Friday the thirteenth than on other Fridays.
This does not weaken the argument, because the domain of the argument is specific to flights. It would be perfectly reasonable for people to fear flying on an unlucky day but not fear driving, because driving is a much more routine activity.
E
The absentee rate among airline workers was not significantly higher than normal on the Fridays that fell on the thirteenth in the year of the study.
This does not weaken the argument, because there are other factors that explain why airline workers might show up to work on an “unlucky” day. So this doesn’t really contradict the observed data about passengers, and still doesn’t explain the phenomenon.

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LSAT PrepTest 108 Explanations

Section 1 - Reading Comprehension

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Reading Comprehension

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