LR Question 12 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Political scientist: It is not uncommon for a…
QUESTION TYPE: Identify the Conclusion
CONCLUSION: The criticism is insincere. (note: “the criticism” is that ideas are muddled)
REASONING: Any successful political idea must be clear.
ANALYSIS: This is actually a really bad argument. The author ignores the possibility that many political ideas are really unclear and thus will never be realized.
But our job is to find the conclusion, not critique the argument. Look to the word “however”. It almost always indicates the conclusion. The second sentence says “such criticism, however, is misguided”.
So the conclusion is that the criticism is wrong. You just to read the first sentence to see what “the criticism” is. The author is concluding that it’s wrong to say that political ideas are muddled.
___________
- Read more carefully. The author said that people who criticize political agendas for being incomprehensible are insincere.
- The second sentence is the conclusion, it says “however”. Furthermore, the ideas described in this answer simply doesn’t appear in the argument, even as premises. This is a total nonsense answer.
- What rubbish is this? The argument didn’t say any of this. It can’t be the conclusion. If you can find this in the argument, I’ll pay you $1000.
Answers have to prove they’re right. Don’t give nonsense answers the time of day. - CORRECT. The second sentence is the conclusion. It says “such criticism” is insincere. “The criticism” is criticism of ideas for being incomprehensible.
- This isn’t even true. This answer mixes up the last sentence. The last sentence says that political agendas must be able to be understood. But this answer says that political agendas must be impossible to misunderstand. That’s crazy.
Recap: The question begins with “Political scientist: It is not uncommon”. It is a Identify the Conclusion question. To practice more Identify the Conclusion questions, have a look at the LSAT Questions by Type page.
More Resources for Identify the Conclusion Questions
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Identify the Conclusion questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers identify the conclusion questions.
I got this question correct, however drilling this problem I wrote down the reasoning as “Political Agenda can’t be understood by large #” instead of your explanation. Is this okay or should I be thinking of reasoning in the same way as you explained?
Should be fine. “Political Agenda can’t be understood by large #” is a pretty similar idea to “any successful political idea must be clear” (“understood” = “clear”). The important part here is that you understand where to find the conclusion (“however”) and how it results from the premises. There’s often more than one way to conceptualize or solve a question. LR has a lot of depth.