LSAT 128 | Section 3 | Logical Reasoning: Q12

LR Question 12 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: Clothes dryers manufactured by Archway Appliances Inc. are …

QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning

CONCLUSION: Archway Appliances uses bad components in its dryers.

REASONING: Bolts are missing, sections are assembled in the wrong order, and there’s a shock and fire hazard.

ANALYSIS: The issues that it points to (bolts missing, sections assembled in the wrong order) indicate that the issue lies with the assembly of the dryers. But the argument concludes that the materials themselves must be bad.

A product can be poorly put together but still made of good quality components. So, the flaw is probably that it assumes that bad construction means bad components, without considering that even high-quality components can be assembled poorly.

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1. This challenges the argument’s claims about safety hazards, but the conclusion is about whether Archway uses bad components, not whether the dryers have actually caused harm. Besides, you can still reasonably say that something is a safety hazard even if it hasn’t actually caused danger yet. You don’t have to wait until something bad happens to point out that something’s dangerous.
2. This criticizes where the argument chooses to put its focus, but it doesn’t address the specific flaw in its reasoning (an unwarranted assumption that poor assembly = poor materials).
3. Even if this were true, it doesn’t actually weaken the claim that Archway uses bad components. A product can still function well despite using low-quality materials.
4. CORRECT. This directly addresses the flaw. Poor assembly doesn’t necessarily mean poor-quality materials. It’s possible to assemble high-quality parts incorrectly.
5. We don’t care about their other products. We’re only talking about their dryers.