LR Question 18 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Editorialist: In all cultures, it is almost universally…
QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning
CONCLUSION: Most people would probably agree it is sometimes morally right to hinder the police from doing their jobs.
REASONING: Every culture almost universally agrees that we have a moral duty to prevent our family from being harmed. Therefore, most people would agree parents are morally correct to hide a falsely accused child from the police.
ANALYSIS: Yes, we have a duty to protect family. But, other duties might override that. For example, most people might believe “we have a duty to help the police”. In this case, many people might believe that this duty supersedes the duty to family.
[You might have wondered why the argument has “thus” and “hence”. Does it have two conclusions? Yes. The sentence after thus is an intermediate conclusion, which supports the final conclusion.]
___________
- This is tempting, but it’s different. The generalization in the stimulus says “sometimes”. You only need one case to prove that! An overbroad generalization will be different. Here’s one: “This police officer made a false accusation. Therefore, almost all police officers will make false accusations.”
- CORRECT. Many people might believe that the police are honest and there is a moral duty to help them. If so, they may also believe that this duty overrides a duty to protect family.
- The author wasn’t talking about justice. They were talking about assisting police. If you are hiding a suspect from the police you are obviously obstructing the police, even if it is morally just to hide that suspect.
- This is a trap. We don’t actually know if the law requires that parents hand over an accused child.
- This attacks a premise in the argument. The editorialist said that “if a person is known by the person’s parents” to be innocent. So in the example the parents do know the innocence is real. It’s a hypothetical situation, so the editorialist can assume whatever they want!
More Resources for Flaw Questions
- Flaw drills: Use these to practice making examples of abstract flaws.
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Flaw questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers flaw questions.
Why are we able to assume that hiding accused from the police=obstructing police work. When first reading through, I thought the loophole would be “being able to hide someone without obstructing policework”.
If something is part of the ordinary definition of words, it’s not an assumption. If the police are looking for someone, by any ordinary definition, that’s police work. And if you hide someone so the police can’t find them, that’s obstructing that work.
Like if you were looking for your LSAT prep books, and someone hid them, it would be fair to say that that person was “obstructing your LSAT prep”. We don’t need the actual words obstructing or prep in order to reach that understanding of what’s going on in the situation. Hope that helps! The LSAT uses dictionary words precisely, but you’re allowed and even required to use what words ordinarily mean to get a full view of a situation.