LSAT 131 | Section 2 | Logical Reasoning: Q17

LR Question 17 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: Teachers should not do anything to cause their students to

QUESTION TYPE: Sufficient Assumption

CONCLUSION: Teachers shouldn’t pretend to know answers when they don’t.

REASONING: Students can sense if you are hiding your ignorance. And you should try to avoid losing the respect of your students.

ANALYSIS: This argument is missing a connection between “students sense ignorance” and “lose respect”. Here’s the full thing drawn out with the gap filled:

Pretend → students sense → lose respect

Since teachers should avoid losing respect, that means they should avoid pretending. If we didn’t have “students sense → lose respect” then we’d have no reason to think pretending had negative consequences.

___________

1. This adds a new element, effectiveness. It doesn’t help prove the original conclusion.
2. The stimulus wasn’t saying you should try to gain respect. It’s saying you should avoid doing something that might lose respect.
3. This supports the argument by showing that teachers can be honest without losing respect. But it doesn’t prove the argument.
4. That’s nice – teachers can feel respected. But this doesn’t prove anything about whether teachers should lie.
5. CORRECT. See the analysis above. This fills the gap in the argument.