LR Question 16 Explanation
QUESTION TEXT: Airport administrator: According to the latest figures…
QUESTION TYPE: Flawed Reasoning
CONCLUSION: The 1 in 20,000 figure from air traffic control reports is less accurate than the 1 in 2 million accident figure from pilot reports,
REASONING: A large survey of pilot’s flight reports indicates only less than 1 in 2 million flights strays off course while landing. Whereas opponents’ figures of 1 in 20,000 comes from a smaller sample of air traffic control tapes.
ANALYSIS: The first thing to be clear about here it what is in dispute. The two sides are arguing about how often airplanes stray off course when landing. A full review of pilot reports says only once every two million flights. A partial review of air traffic control reports suggests that stray landing happen much more often: 1 in 20,000 flights. The two data sources come from different groups: pilots vs air traffic controllers.
Completeness of reports sounds good, but we’re looking for a weakness. So we have to show either that the incomplete air traffic control reports are good, or that the complete pilot reports are bad. It’s important to actually imagine the situation. When an airplane strays off course that means the pilot strays off course, and the air traffic controller watches them do it. So the pilots are the ones writing the reports saying “don’t worry about pilots straying off course, this rarely happens.”
So the author ignores that air traffic controllers may have a more accurate view of the situation than pilots. Pilots can’t see their plane from the outside, and they also may have an incentive to underreport errors. Even though the sample is smaller, air traffic controllers may be right. If an effect is strong it will still show in an incomplete sample.
___________
- The author didn’t say this! They just said it would be safe to build runways closer together.
- CORRECT. Pilots are the ones making mistakes in this scenarios. So pilots may make errors without realizing it, or they may hide their errors in order to look good. This makes pilots’ 1 in 20 million figure highly suspect.
- This didn’t happen.
Example of flaw: People who oppose closer runways must be corrupt. - The author didn’t say this. Their concern is based on sample size: the pilots’ reports have been thoroughly studied. The air traffic controllers’ tapes have only been partly reviewed.
- This is a much more specific flaw, and a dumber flaw than the author made.
Example of flaw: We have proven the Theory of Gravity correct to a 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999%
chance of being right. But, since we lack conclusive, 100% certain evidence, the Theory of Gravity must be false.
I should be safe jumping from this cliff.
Recap: The question begins with “Airport administrator: According to the latest figures,”. It is a Flawed Reasoning question. To practice more Flawed Reasoning questions, have a look at the LSAT Questions by Type page.
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.
This one bugged me a ton. Felt like a reasonable assumption that flight reports are by nature objective, standardized docs + regulated & would include verifiable details (e.g., speed, heading, weather conditions).
At bottom, flight reports are written by humans. Within objective factors there is a LOT of leeway you can put into a report. And we know humans lie or fudge details. Ignoring human nature and your own knowledge of the world is not a reasonable assumption.
For example, suppose a professor wrote a year end class report and included such objective details such as class attendance, grades, number of questions asked, etc. Would you accept such reports as the be all, end all of a professor’s performance? Doubtful. There’s all kinds of things that would be useful to know which might not be put in the report by the professor, who ultimately has the professor’s interests at heart and has their own biases in thinking about their performance.
I got this question wrong because I wasn’t aware that pilot reports were compiled by the pilots themselves. Nothing in the stimulus states that and therefore I assumed that the report would be as objective as the air traffic control tapes.
I feel that the LSAT does this frequently- where you must know some background information to fully understand the argument- which is incredibly frustrating to me. I wouldn’t have gotten this right on the test because of that.
No such thing :) “Reports required of pilots” means that the airline requires the pilots to make a report. It’s passive voice, which is poor English and therefore more confusing, but the meaning is unambiguous. It *has* to refer to reports made by the pilots.
This question bothers me, because I didn’t take “but this figure is based on a partial review of air traffic control tapes and so is relatively unreliable compared to the other figure” to mean that its unreliable due to the “partialness” of the review. Calling it a “partial review” might as well be calling it a “representative sample” or a “review of a cross section.” I understood it to mean that the review of air traffic control tapes in and of themselves were the problem, making D the immediate gut-check duh answer.
Looking back over this question I am still irked because I think the wording is ambiguous at best — that the author meant to emphasize there was a quantitative flaw and not a qualitative flaw is marginally correct at best.
This brings me back to the fundamental problem with asking questions about what someone who is making an unsound or otherwise flawed argument is saying. Given that the person is, by the very premise, wrong and/or illogical, I think its a bit silly to be asking questions about a fictional wrong person’s intent when ambiguous phrasing is present.
For an Office example, I personally think that Jim and Pam’s lovemaking probably paled in comparison to that of Pam and Roy, and while you may disagree with me on that point that’s the hill I’m willing to die on, and now we can see why one shouldn’t ask stupid questions about the inner lives of fictional characters on standardized tests!
In conclusion, people who picked D should get at least half a point for not picking answers as silly as A, C, and E, is what I am saying.
I think you’re overthinking this. Partial review of tapes vs. thorough review of ALL flight reports
The first review has only reviewed a portion of the data, the second set has reviewed all data. That’s a reasonable objection on its face. The flaw is that the second set of data is worse than the first.
We don’t have to think about what they’re thinking. We’re just objectively examining the facts they gave us, and seeing how those facts have an error which doesn’t lead to the conclusion.
Note: This is an old comment but I wanted to clarify the point.