LR Question 11 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: A group of citizens opposes developing a nearby…
QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning
CONCLUSION: We should develop the trail.
REASONING: One group that opposes the trail has a bad argument.
ANALYSIS: The author’s argument against the citizen’s group is actually pretty good. If most trail users will care for nature, then it doesn’t sound like littering is a big worry.
But that doesn’t prove we should develop the trail. There might be other reasons not to develop. Maybe the trail will be too costly to maintain. Maybe not many people will use it. Maybe we’ll put a train line back in someday.
You can’t say that a conclusion is true just because a criticism of the conclusion is wrong.
___________
- CORRECT. The author hasn’t given any evidence for why we should build the trail. They’ve just shown that one argument for why not to build the trail is flawed.
- This is a different error.
Example of flaw: No individual hiker can harm nature. So the whole group of hikers can’t harm nature. - This is a different flaw: circular reasoning.
Example of flaw: It’s a good idea to develop the trail, because trail development is good. - This is a different flaw. The author gave evidence about a majority, not about a few.
- This is a different flaw: an ad hominem attack.
Example of flaw: A citizen’s group opposes the trail. But they smell bad. So we shouldn’t listen to them.
More Resources for Flaw Questions
- Flaw drills: Use these to practice making examples of abstract flaws.
- Intro Course lesson: This intro course lesson covers Flaw questions.
- Mastery Seminar lesson: This LR Mastery seminar lesson covers flaw questions.
I was tripped up by this question. The stimulus provides the contention that trail users will likely litter as the ONLY reason provided for the group’s opposition to the trail. The basis of the objection being groundless, then, is satisfied by showing that contention to be in error. We’re not given any other reasons for opposition and so we’re not meant to assume them. I am constantly told I have to be very narrow in approaching LR stimuli; use only the data provided.
I was able to eventually get the correct answer by eliminating the other answer choices, but it took way too long.
I’m not sure I understand this line of reasoning. The argument’s error is quite simple: proving someone mistaken doesn’t mean we should do the opposite.
Let’s say someone says “You should go to law school because lawyers all get to wear cool wigs”. Then someone says “Lawyers don’t wear wigs in America. So, you should NOT go to law school”.
I doubt you’d find that argument very persuasive in deciding your career. Someone on your side having a stupid line of reasoning doesn’t make your side wrong.
There’s no need to gather outside info here. We instead just have to examine the structure of what the argument is doing.
Note: This is an old comment but I wanted to clarify the point.
Thank you for your great explanation, Graeme. I got this question right, but I have one question regarding one part of this question. Here, we know that they care for nature, and that is why we assume that they won’t litter the trail area with trashes. However, I wonder if we can safely assume “care for nature” means “NOT littering the area” because there are numerous LSAT questions that test our ability whether we can distinguish between “people’s intentions and realities.” and I believe that “care for nature” is regarded as “people’s intentions” as well. Please correct me if I am wrong. Thank you!
Hi Amy!
You are right – assuming that care for nature = not littering is a relatively logical assumption, but it is still an assumption, and it’s something to look out for. Imagine a different question:
“The town council doesn’t want to allow hikers in the wildlife reserve because they will litter, and the council can’t allow any litter on the reserve. But all hikers have great care for the environment, so they should be allowed on the wildlife reserve.”
Which of the following allows the argument to be inferred properly?
(X) All those who care for the environment would not litter.
So yes, it’s logical to assume this (though it’s possible that many people care about the environment in theory, but litter anyway.) That said, the LSAT sometimes asks you exactly what assumptions you need to make to arrive at a given conclusion, so you need to be able to identify it.
Keeping an eye out for assumptions in the stimulus will help you to understand the flaws in the argument – just make sure you know what the question is asking for! It’s easy to get caught up looking for a flaw and miss the actual conclusion entirely.