LSAT 150 – Section 2 – Question 17

LSAT 150 - Section 2 - Question 17

June 2018

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Question
QuickView		 Type Tags Answer
Choices		 Curve Question
Difficulty		 Psg/Game/S
Difficulty		 Explanation
PT150 S2 Q17
+LR
Flaw or descriptive weakening +Flaw
Causal Reasoning +CausR
Sampling +Smpl
A
1%
157
B
2%
153
C
3%
149
D
8%
155
E
86%
163
139
146
154
 +Medium 145.632 +SubsectionMedium

Advocate: A study of people who had recently recovered from colds found that people who took cold medicine for their colds reported more severe symptoms than those people who did not take cold medicine. Therefore, taking cold medicine is clearly counterproductive.

Summarize Argument: Phenomenon-Hypothesis
The advocate argues that taking cold medicine is counterproductive. She supports this claim by citing a study wherein people who took cold medicine reported more severe symptoms than did those who didn’t take cold medicine.

Identify and Describe Flaw
This is a “correlation doesn’t imply causation” flaw, where the advocate sees a correlation and concludes that one thing caused the other without ruling out alternative hypotheses. Specifically, she overlooks two key alternatives:
(1) The causal relationship could be reversed—maybe people with more severe symptoms are more likely to take cold medicine!
(2) Some other factor could be causing the correlation—for example, maybe in parts of the world where colds tend to be more severe, cold medicine also happens to be more widely available.

A
treats something as true simply because most people believe it to be true
The advocate’s premise is a study, not a general belief. Furthermore, we have no reason to think that most people believe her conclusion or her premise to be true.
B
treats some people as experts in an area in which there is no reason to take them to be reliable sources of information
The advocate doesn’t arbitrarily treat anyone as an expert. Rather, she cites the results of a study wherein people reported on their own symptoms—a subject in which people do have some expertise!
C
takes something to be true in one case just because it is true in most cases
The advocate’s conclusion is extremely general; she does not mention any specific cases.
D
rests on a confusion between what is required for a particular outcome and what is sufficient to cause that outcome
The advocate’s argument doesn’t mistake sufficiency for necessity. She doesn’t claim in either the premise or the conclusion that cold medicine is sufficient or necessary to cause severe cold symptoms.
E
confuses what is likely the cause of something for an effect of that thing
This is the cookie-cutter flaw of confusing correlation and causation. The advocate’s argument forgets that the causal relationship could be reversed—maybe people with more severe symptoms are more likely to take cold medicine!

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LSAT PrepTest 150 Explanations

Section 1 - Reading Comprehension

Section 2 - Logical Reasoning

Section 3 - Logical Reasoning

Section 4 - Reading Comprehension

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