LSAT 60, Logical Reasoning II, Q14, LSATHacks

QUESTION TEXT: Human beings can live happily only in a society where…

QUESTION TYPE: Complete the Argument

CONCLUSION: Human beings can fulfill economic needs without being happy.

REASONING: 

• Humans happy ➞ society with love and friendship
• Economic needs don’t require a society with love and friendship.

ANALYSIS: You should prephrase before looking at the answers. Think about what “economic needs” means: if you have those, can a society survive?

Yes! Economic needs means food, shelter, etc. So, you can have a working society that meets its economic needs, but isn’t happy. 

Note that the stimulus made no links between economic needs and happiness. The argument didn’t say economic needs require happiness, or that happiness requires economics, or anything like that. We have exactly one requirement, and only for happiness: it needs a society based on love and friendship.

___________

1. The argument didn’t say that economic needs destroy love. It just said that economic needs can be fulfilled even without love.
2. This just randomly combines the terms “economic needs” and “happiness”. It has nothing to do with the logic of the argument.
   The only necessary condition for happiness was a society based on love and friendship.
3. The argument didn’t say what economic needs require. It said that economic needs can be satisfied by a merchant society, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be satisfied in another way.
   e.g. you can satisfy hunger with a sandwich, but there are other ways as well.
4. CORRECT. This combines the two facts. We can satisfy economic needs in a merchant society. But since that society isn’t based on love and friendship, people won’t be happy.
5. The stimulus didn’t make any link between economic needs and happiness! This answer is like B.

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