LSAT 9 | Section 2 | Logical Reasoning: Q19

LR Question 19 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: A university should not be entitled to patent the inventions of …

QUESTION TYPE: Necessary Assumption

CONCLUSION: Universities should not be allowed to patent their faculty members’ inventions.

REASONING: Universities are supposed to promote free flow of knowledge. But if they have patent rights, they have a reason to suppress discoveries for financial interests. Suppressing discoveries is incompatible with promoting knowledge.

ANALYSIS: There’s a leap in the argument. It jumps from having a motive to suppress information to the claim that patent rights are incompatible with academic freedom.

Having a motive doesn’t automatically mean they act on it. So, for this argument to work, we must assume that universities will act on their motive.

___________

1. Whether other institutions have similar obligations is irrelevant. We’re only concerned with universities.
2. The argument just needs some inventions to be valuable enough to motivate suppression. It doesn’t require that most be profitable.
3. Even if there are other ways to share discoveries, the point is about suppression of any information, not just published reports.
4. CORRECT. This fills the gap. If universities never acted on the motive, the argument would fall apart.
5. Whether the faculty member patents it doesn’t matter. The argument is that the university’s right to patent leads to suppression of knowledge.