December 2013 LSAT Section 3 Question 21

Prolonged exposure to sulfur fumes permanently damages one's sense of smell. In one important study, 100 workers from...

tomgbean on January 9, 2020

Why is A better than C?

I thought C was irrelevent to the argument so I chose it. What does previous studies have to do with the current studies? A I thought weakened because the scents were not perfect so they could have been mistaken. It does not necessarily have to be their sense of smell that is off, but some other factor such as them not knowing exactly what they were smelling.

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Annie on January 10, 2020

Hi @tomgbean,

This question asks you to find the answer choice which does not weaken the argument. This requires you to carefully go through each answer choice and eliminate the ones which don't work.

(A) does not weaken the argument because it is irrelevant. Even if the chemicals were not perfect, they were being given to both sets of groups. So, the group from the sulfur-emitting factory would still be worse at identifying the non-perfect chemicals then the control group. This doesn't change or hurt the argument.

(C) weakens the argument because it suggests that most members of the control group may have had a special skill for identifying scents given that they've had the opportunity to practice in different studies. If this were true, it would through off the accuracy of the study because the control group is no longer objective.