LR Question 20 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: One should not play a practical joke on someone…
QUESTION TYPE: Principle
FACTS: You shouldn’t play a practical joke under two conditions: if it will show contempt for the person you’re playing the joke on, or if you think the joke will hurt the person.
Harm OR Contempt for subject of joke ➞ Don’t do it
ANALYSIS: We have information to conclude when not to play a practical joke: if one of the two conditions is true then you shouldn’t play the joke.
We have no information to tell us when a joke is a good idea. Even if there’s no contempt and no one will be hurt, a joke might still be a bad idea.
___________
- This says the person should have known the joke would cause harm. The stimulus only talked about actually knowing. “Should have known” isn’t good enough for us to say a joke was wrong. Also, the stimulus didn’t talk about harm to “someone”. It only warned against causing harm to the person the joke was being played on.
- It’s true that the two conditions for proving a joke wrong are missing. But there might be other reasons not to do a practical joke. Maybe the joke is rude, or not funny, etc. We can never prove it’s right to play a joke.
- CORRECT. The person believes the joke might cause harm, so they’re correct that it would be wrong to play the joke.
- It’s not necessarily wrong to play a joke that shows contempt for “someone”. It’s only wrong to play a joke that shows contempt for the person the joke is being played on.
- We don’t know whether the joker believed the joke would cause harm. It’s the belief in harm that’s important.
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.
I think the issue in B is actually that it doesn’t mention significant harm and that seems to be crucial element of the second premise. C, on the other hand, does mention significant harm.
Is there not a contrapositive to this? I fell for B thinking it was the contrapositive and therefore logically sound.
Yes, certainly there’s a contrapositive for the principle.
Principle: Contempt or significant harm –> Should not play practical joke
Contrapositive: Should play practical joke –> No contempt and no significant harm
As for B, it concludes not wrong. The principle doesn’t let us prove when you *should* play a practical joke. It only lets you prove when you shouldn’t. You can never prove a sufficient condition, and further, “should play” is not the same as “not wrong to play”.
Note: This is an old comment but I wanted to clarify the point.
Hi, I was thrown off by the word “wrong” in B,C, and D. I over thought it. The principle does not explicitly say what is right and what is wrong. It had just stated something you “should not” do. Do you perhaps have anything to say on this mistake? I thought the answer was C but then I realized, am I judging what should vs should not or what “should not” is wrong.
My incorrect thinking pattern/mental example was “you should not go to the bathroom until after the end of this quarter”. It would not be wrong to go to the bathroom but whoever is going “should not” for doing so would entail him missing out on the game-winning shot if there is one . As you can tell, I over thought this one out but I definitely do this habitually which is a problem.
I see your point. I think LSAC would counter that, in common sense usage, “should” and “should not” often serve as imperatives for things that we consider morally “right” or “wrong” to do, i.e. you should do that because it’s right, or you should not do that because it’s wrong.
It’s great that you chose (C), since it shows that your conditional reasoning was otherwise correct. To avoid facing this kind of difficulty on future tests, I’d say that it’s important to be aware that LSAC does expect you to make common sense assumptions, even if those assumptions wouldn’t hold up to an examination of the finer distinctions between words or ideas.
Graeme,
Is it also possible to say that (D) is incorrect because “thinking” that the joke would cause contempt for someone is not equivalent to the joke’s potential to actually show contempt for someone? I was focusing on the wrong key-words as I was grammar parsing, but ended up eliminating (B) and (D) in similar ways. Would this work too, or is it beyond the trickery of the LSAT writers?
Daina
Sure, but the main reason D is incorrect is because we’re not concerned about the joke showing contempt to “someone” or bringing harm to “someone” rather, we’re concerned about it showing contempt or bringing harm to the person the joke is played on.
Bingo