LSAT 132 – Section 2 – Question 15

LSAT 132 - Section 2 - Question 15

December 2010

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT132 S2 Q15
+LR
Sufficient assumption +SA
Conditional Reasoning +CondR
Link Assumption +LinkA
A
2%
153
B
78%
165
C
5%
159
D
9%
157
E
6%
156
137
148
160
 +Medium 148.345 +SubsectionMedium

Speaker: Like many contemporary critics, Smith argues that the true meaning of an author’s statements can be understood only through insight into the author’s social circumstances. But this same line of analysis can be applied to Smith’s own words. Thus, if she is right we should be able, at least in part, to discern from Smith’s social circumstances the “true meaning” of Smith’s statements. This, in turn, suggests that Smith herself is not aware of the true meaning of her own words.

Summary
The speaker concludes that Smith doesn’t understand the true meaning of her own words, because according to Smith (who we are allowed to assume is correct), understanding true meaning requires insight into social circumstance.

Missing Connection
The conclusion is Smith’s failure to understand, and we have a conditional describing what is necessary to understand. We need to know that Smith has failed this requirement to conclude that she does not understand.

A
Insight into the intended meaning of an author’s work is not as important as insight into its true meaning.
We are not trying to compare importance of anything. We need airtight support that Smith doesn’t understand her own words. Also, we cannot use information about intended meaning to validly support any conclusion here.
B
Smith lacks insight into her own social circumstances.
If this is true, then Smith has failed the requirement for true understanding. We can validly draw the conclusion that she doesn’t truly understand her own words.
C
There is just one meaning that Smith intends her work to have.
Having more than one meaning doesn’t affect this argument for better or worse. We are trying to conclude that Smith doesn’t understand her own words.
D
Smith’s theory about the relation of social circumstances to the understanding of meaning lacks insight.
This is attempting to undermine Smith’s theory, but the speaker’s argument actually hinges on Smith being correct. He has also given us permission to treat it as true, i.e. “Thus, if she is right...”
E
The intended meaning of an author’s work is not always good evidence of its true meaning.
We cannot use this to validly draw any kind of conclusion. Like (A), this answer is introducing intended meaning, but there is no information about intended meaning in the argument.

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LSAT PrepTest 132 Explanations

Section 1 - Reading Comprehension

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Reading Comprehension

Section 4 - Logical Reasoning

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