LSAT 146 – Section 3 – Question 02

LSAT 146 - Section 3 - Question 02

June 2016

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Question QuickView	Type	Tags	Answer Choices	Curve	Question Difficulty	Psg/Game/S Difficulty	Explanation
PT146 S3 Q02	+LR	Strengthen +Streng Causal Reasoning +CausR	A 3% 158 B 7% 162 C 4% 158 D 83% 165 E 2% 161	126 141 156	+Easier	146.758 +SubsectionMedium

An unstable climate was probably a major cause of the fall of the Roman empire. Tree-ring analysis shows that Europe’s climate underwent extreme fluctuations between 250 A.D. and 550 A.D., a period that encompasses Rome’s decline and fall. This highly variable climate surely hurt food production, which made the empire harder to rule and defend.

Summarize Argument: Phenomenon-Hypothesis

The author hypothesizes that an unstable climate was likely a major factor in the fall of the Roman empire. This is based on an observation that Europe’s climate was unstable during the time of the Roman empire’s decline and fall. The author suggests a causal link with the empire’s fall, because an unstable climate could be bad for food production, thus weakening the empire.

Notable Assumptions

The author assumes that there are not other, much more significant alternative explanations for the fall of the Roman empire. The author also assumes that any difficulty caused by lower food production was great enough to contribute to the empire’s downfall.

Political failures within the Roman empire during its last years led to conflicts that hampered agricultural production.

This weakens the author’s hypothesis by providing an alternative explanation for the fall of the Roman empire. Either way, this doesn’t support unstable climate as a major cause.

The areas of the Roman empire that had the greatest climatic instability between 250 A.D. and 550 A.D. did not experience unusual levels of unrest during that period.

This weakens the author’s assumption that an unstable climate had a negative enough effect to bring down the empire; if that were the case, we would expect the areas with more climactic instability to have higher unrest.

Poor farming practices led to depleted soil in many parts of Europe during the last years of the Roman empire.

This weakens the author’s hypothesis by providing an alternative explanation for instability due to poor food production: poor farming practices, rather than an unstable climate. In other words, the unstable climate may have only been a minor cause.

During periods when the Roman empire was thriving, Europe consistently experienced weather that was favorable for agriculture.

This strengthens the author’s hypothesis by more closely correlating climate stability with the empire’s strength, supporting the hypothesis that an unstable climate could have been a major factor in the empire’s failure.

Total food production in Europe was likely greater in the years around 550 A.D. than in the years around 250 A.D.

This is irrelevant, because it still doesn’t tell us how significant the impact of the unstable climate was on food production. Sure, production rose and fell, but how much? It also doesn’t offer any explanation of how food production impacted the Roman empire.

LSAT 146 – Section 3 – Question 02

LSAT 146 - Section 3 - Question 02

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LSAT PrepTest 146 Explanations

Section 1 - Logical Reasoning

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Reading Comprehension

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