LSAT 113 – Section 2 – Question 04

LSAT 113 - Section 2 - Question 04

June 2002

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT113 S2 Q04
+LR
Weaken +Weak
Link Assumption +LinkA
A
1%
149
B
84%
160
C
9%
153
D
1%
153
E
6%
153
127
139
151
 +Easier 147.106 +SubsectionMedium

J.Y.’s explanation

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Compared to us, people who lived a century ago had very few diversions to amuse them. Therefore, they likely read much more than we do today.

Summarize Argument
The author concludes that people who lived a century ago probably read a lot more than we read today. As support for this theory, the author cites the fact that those who lived a century ago had very few diversions to amuse them.

Notable Assumptions
The author is assuming that a lack of diversions would lead to people choosing to read more, as opposed to some other activity that could provide amusement. The author is also assuming that enough people were literate a century ago to read “much more” than people read today. Additionally, the author is assuming that people had enough free time to read at a similar level to the amount of time that people spend reading today.

A
Many of the books published a century ago were of low literary quality.
Just because books are of low literary quality does not mean that people won’t be reading them. Also, (A) does not compare literary quality of books a century ago with literary quality of books today. It could be that many books published today are also of low literary quality.
B
On average, people who lived a century ago had considerably less leisure time than we do today.
(B) gives a reason that, even though people a century ago had fewer sources of diversion, they may not have read much more than we do today. Even if people today have more options for diversion, if we have more time to fill, we could be reading more than people a century ago.
C
The number of books sold today is larger than it was a century ago.
More total book sales does not necessarily indicate more time spent reading per capita. Also, the population today is much higher than it was a century ago, which would account for the increase in book sales without an increase in time that people spend reading.
D
On the average, books today cost slightly less in relation to other goods than they did a century ago.
The argument connects available diversions to time spent reading, so book cost is out of the scope of the argument. Also, (D) compares book costs with the cost of goods in general, not the cost of other sources of amusement. Books could have been a cheap source of amusement.
E
One of the popular diversions of a century ago was horse racing.
The author only claims that there were fewer diversions a century ago, not that reading was the only diversion. Also, (E) does not make a comparison between conditions a century ago and conditions today.

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LSAT PrepTest 113 Explanations

Section 1 - Reading Comprehension

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Logical Reasoning

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