LR Question 26 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Editorial: It has been suggested that private…
QUESTION TYPE: Principle
CONCLUSION: We shouldn’t let private companies supply water.
REASONING: We need clean water for health. Private companies exist for profit, not health.
ANALYSIS: This isn’t a good argument. It’s possible that a company might seek profits yet also promote health. We need a principle that shows that a company can’t promote health if it seeks profit.
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- I can see how this is tempting. Governments aren’t supplying clean water in the areas of the world we’re talking about. So this answer proves we shouldn’t let private companies do it either.
But, we’re trying to support the reasoning in this argument. The conclusion was that private companies should never supply water, because their purpose is profit. This answer only proves the conclusion on a technicality. And further, it allows that private companies could supply water if governments did too. The stimulus is more strict: private companies should never supply water. - Private companies are willing to supply water, so this explanation doesn’t apply.
- The stimulus never said that private companies are unable to supply water. The worry is that private companies might skimp on water delivery even if they are “able” to provide clean water.
- This is completely off base. Here’s a situation where it would apply:
“John punched James in the mouth. This knocked out a diseased tooth, thus improving James’ health”
The principle in this answer shows that even though John did improve James’ health, he didn’t necessarily intend to do it.
The principle is true, but it has nothing at all to do with the situation in the stimulus. - CORRECT. Water is necessary for health. So this answer tells us not to let someone supply water unless health is their main purpose. And private companies don’t have health as their main purpose.
Recap: The question begins with “Editorial: It has been suggested that private”. It is a Principle question. To practice more Principle questions, have a look at the LSAT Questions by Type page.
More Resources for Principle Questions
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Principle questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers principle questions.
Could a rationale for A being incorrect be that nowhere is government mentioned?
It’s true that correct answers on principle questions often rely on ideas that directly appear in the stimulus, but what that looks like could vary depending on the context. So what really matters is whether the principle matches the stimulus’ reasoning and leads to the same outcome.
Sometimes an “outside” concept (like government agencies here) can be acceptable if it’s a natural extension of the context. After all, water is typically supplied by governments, and the stimulus explicitly refers to areas “where it is unavailable now”, implying the governments there aren’t supplying it. So the government angle isn’t automatically irrelevant. And since the question asks which principle most helps to justify the reasoning, the correct answer doesn’t always need to track the stimulus word-for-word.
The real flaw with A is that it’s too permissive. It says private companies may supply water if governments also do, while the stimulus’ conclusion is categorical: private companies should not supply water at all.
Hope that helps! It’s a little bit of a gray area, but as a general rule of thumb: don’t rule answers out unless the “outside” concept (i.e. term that isn’t mentioned in the stimulus) is completely irrelevant. Rely on the actual reasoning and outcome instead.
How does (E) rule out private companies also supplying water? It only implies that water should be provided by an organization whose primary purpose is the promotion of health, but not that one whose primary purpose is something else shouldn’t — and that’s exactly what we need to support the argument. It would only do that if (E) said “water should ONLY be provided by an organization whose primary purpose is the promotion of health.”
Although A) provides an unnecessarily narrow explanation for the circumstances under which a private company shouldn’t provide water, it at least bars them from doing so, something I don’t think E does.
You can only have one primary purpose. Primary = of chief importance; principal. It comes from primus, which means first. These very specific word details matter a lot on the LSAT.
But you didn’t actually have to know this definition. The passage explicitly says in the final sentence that private companies’ primary purpose is NOT health. LSAC likes to make these things unambiguous. The vocabulary helps, but they try to make it so you could work it out even if you didn’t know the definition.
This is a principle justify question, so there’s no issue with a narrow justification. The only issue is whether a justification fits. Here, the water is currently unavailble, meaning there is no govt agency supplying water. So, according to A, no private company should supply water. It’s kind of dumb when you spell it out that way (will people just have no water?!), but it tells you what not to do, which is what we’re looking for.
Note: This is an old comment but I wanted to clarify the point.