LSAT 145 – Section 2 – Question 22

LSAT 145 - Section 2 - Question 22

December 2015

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT145 S2 Q22
+LR
Flaw or descriptive weakening +Flaw
Conditional Reasoning +CondR
Quantifier +Quant
Link Assumption +LinkA
A
39%
166
B
57%
161
C
2%
155
D
1%
150
E
2%
155
157
168
179
 +Hardest 145.859 +SubsectionMedium

Live Commentary

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Everyone should have access to more than one newspaper, for there are at least two sides to every story. Since all sides of an important story should be covered, and no newspaper adequately covers all sides of every one of its stories, some important stories would not be adequately covered if there were only one newspaper.

Summarize Argument
The author concludes that everyone should have access to more than one newspaper. This is based on a subsidiary conclusion that, if there were only one newspaper, some important stories wouldn’t be covered. The author supports this subsidiary conclusion by noting that there are at least two sides to every story, and no single newspaper adequately covers all sides of every story.

Identify and Describe Flaw
The author overlooks the possibility that even if no newspaper adequately covers all sides of every story, they might be able to cover all sides of every important story. The statement that newspapers can’t adequately cover “all sides of every story” means only that less than 100% of stories have all sides covered. But this doesn’t mean every single story will have inadequate coverage. Some stories can have all sides covered; those stories might be the important ones.

A
The argument confuses the inability to cover all sides of every story with the inability to cover all sides of any important story.
Premises establish only that newspapers can’t cover all sides of every story. (Some stories won’t be adequately covered.) The author thought this implies newspapers can’t cover all sides of any story. (Every story, including all important ones, will not be adequately covered.)
B
The argument overlooks the possibility that two newspapers could provide the same incomplete coverage of the same important stories.
This possibility doesn’t hurt the argument, because the author never concludes that having 2 newspapers is sufficient to see all sides of important stories. Having only 1 isn’t enough. But the author never said having 2 is enough.
C
A conclusion about what newspapers should do is inferred solely from statements about what newspapers in fact do.
The conclusion is not about what newspapers should do. It’s about what people (”everyone”) should have access to. Also, one of the premises asserts that all sides of an important story “should” be covered. So the premises are not just factual statements about what newspapers do.
D
The argument takes for granted that everyone has access to all newspapers.
The author doesn’t assume that everyone can access all newspapers. What people “should” be able to access is separate from what they in fact can access.
E
The argument is concerned only with important stories and not with all stories.
There’s nothing flawed about making an argument focused only on important stories. What matters is whether the premises prove the conclusion. The choice of what kind of story to focus on in the argument is not itself a flaw.

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LSAT PrepTest 145 Explanations

Section 1 - Reading Comprehension

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Reading Comprehension

Section 4 - Logical Reasoning

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