LSAT 154 | Section 1 | Logical Reasoning: Q26

LR Question 26 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: Philosopher: A person is morally responsible for…

QUESTION TYPE: Must be True

FACTS:

Morally responsible ➞ act freely performed ➞ alternative genuinely open ➞ alternative not morally wrong

ANALYSIS: Basically all of the statements in the stimulus link together as I’ve drawn above. You can also make the contrapositive by reversing and negating everything:

Alternative not morally wrong ➞ Alternative genuinely open ➞ act freely performed ➞ Morally responsible

You can only prove stuff by going from left to right on either the diagram or its contrapositive.

Note that this is a reasonably straightforward conditional question. If you found it hard, you should drill and repeat conditional reasoning questions until the kind of linkage above is easy to do quickly. It’s actually better to get this type of question wrong than a less clear cut type: This question type is hard at first, but among the easier question types to master, so this gives you an easy area of improvement.

___________

1. This is going backwards. Morally responsible is the first statement, alternative open is the third. You can only go from first to third, not the other way.
2. We don’t know. We’re never told how common it is to have alternatives.
3. This would have been right if it had said someone is morally responsible “only if”. I thought it did say that and almost picked it.
   This is wrong because “morally responsible” is a sufficient condition, and we can never prove a sufficient condition. We can only prove necessary conditions, on the right of the diagram.
4. This contradicts the stimulus. We could only say that if it is morally wrong to do an alternative then that alternative is not open.
5. CORRECT. This follows. I bolded the relevant sections of the diagram: “Morally responsible ➞ act freely performed ➞ alternative genuinely open ➞ alternative not morally wrong“

Recap: The question begins with “Philosopher: A person is morally responsible for”. It is a Must be True question. Learn more about LSAT MBT questions in our guide to LSAT Logical Reasoning question types.