Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 13
April 21, 2012Cookie Cutter Review
Flaw - (E) is cause-effect confusion
(A) sample size too small / over-generalization
(B) circular reasoning
(D) equivocation
Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 14
April 21, 2012Cookie Cutter Review
Weakening question with causation argument where (B) offers counter evidence where the supposed effect precedes the supposed cause. (D) is wrong but it's wrong in a cookie cutter way. Lots of trap answer bait you to make assumptions. (D) baits us to assume that hand dexterity is important for making sophisticated tools. There is zero evidence that's true and so it is an unwarranted assumption.
Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 15
April 21, 2012Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 16
April 21, 2012Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 17
April 21, 2012Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 18
April 21, 2012Cookie Cutter Review
(E) conflation of distinct ideas. Understanding that a phenomenon has property X doesn't mean that we should use reasoning with property X to understand that phenomenon.
Supplementary explanation
This is a very silly argument that reads like it's actually reasonable.
We're presented with a thing called nature. We're told that nature has certain properties, XYZ. Therefore, we're told, that the thinking used to understand nature should also have those properties, XYZ.
This argument is insane. It escapes our insanity detector only because the LSAT writers are clever and picked out the "XYZ" so as not to raise alarm. They wrote "organic, holistic, etc", which to us are familiar properties of thinking/reasoning.
But by that logic, I can say, "Hey look at that stupid bear over there, scratching his ass on that tree cause his stupid paws can't reach. The best way to understand the bear is as a hairy beast. Therefore, use we should use our hairy beastly thinking when trying to study and analyze the bear."
Can we all say in unison: "No, dumbass. Use Biology."
See how that didn't escape our insanity detector? That's because "hairy beastly thinking" is obviously not a thing whereas "organic holistic thinking" is.
(E) calls the argument out on its absurdity. Properties of the object to be studied shouldn't be projected onto the reasoning used to study that object.
(B) is having his own conversation over in the corner of the room by himself. It's saying that the structure of nature isn't identical to the structure of how people reason about nature. Okay, sure. Let's not even argue what the overall "structure" of nature is and just concede that it's "organic". So (B) is saying that that's not always identical to the structure of how people reason about nature. In other words, people don't always reason organically about it. Again, okay sure. So what? Is that a bad thing? Should people reason organically about it?
The argument isn't terrible because sometimes the structure of a phenomenon is not identical with the structure of reasoning people use to understand that phenomenon.
Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 19
April 21, 2012Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 20
April 21, 2012Cookie Cutter Review
MSS question that uses a single line of text to support (B). Ignores most of the stimulus.
Sign up to star your favorites LSAT 49 - Section 2 - Question 21
April 21, 2012Cookie Cutter Review
(B) conditional negation, just like question 10 from this section. Also uses abstract and referential phrasing typically found in flaw questions.