October 1991 LSAT Section 2 Question 11

"If the forest continues to disappear at its present pace, the koala will approach extinction," said the biologist."S...

gharibiannick on April 23, 2020

Confusion

I am really struggling to understand this question and what it is asking from me. This is how I broke it down: FD->KE Not KE->Not FD question stem is asking which statement goes with the biologists claim but not politician's I initially chose D Correct Answer B says "Deforestation is stopped and the koala becomes extinct" Can someone please break this question down ?

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HannahNg on June 25, 2020

The biologist says that if deforestation continues, the koala will approach extinction:

deforestation continues -> koala approaches extinction
Koala NOT going to extinct -> NO deforestation

The politician thinks that stopping deforestation is sufficient (that is, all that is needed) to save the koala:

NO deforestation -> Koala saved

Answer choice B provides a scenario (NO deforestation, Koala NOT saved) that is inconsistent with the politician's claim--according to the politician, if deforestation was stopped, the koala should have been saved. The biologist's claim is consistent with this scenario, because according to the biologist, "NO deforestation" is not sufficient to arrive at any conclusion.

Karen-Norris on February 3, 2022

I chose D, rather than B because I read the biologists statement to include "present pace." If deforestation was slowed, it would meet the necessary condition of not continuing to disappear at the "present pace."

Karen-Norris on February 3, 2022

I meant I chose E, not D.

Ravi on February 4, 2022

Happy to help.

(B) says, "Deforestation is stopped and the koala becomes extinct."

(B) satisfies the sufficient condition of the politician's claim, but
it denies the necessary condition of her claim, so it can't be true
according to the politician. However, (B) can still be true according
to the biologist's claim. This makes (B) the correct answer choice, as
it is consistent with biologist's claim, but not with the politician's
claim.

(D) doesn't work because the stimulus talks about deforestation in absolute language. It either stops or it continues. "Slowed" deforestation is never discussed, so we don't know if this has to be false.

lritz on June 26, 2023

Hi! I had a similar question – I took deforestation is slowed to be consistent with the biologist's claim (in that it is not at the present pace) but also that if it is slowed, then it is not stopped (so inconsistent with the politician's claim). In the future, for questions like this, do you have any recommendations for how to navigate absolutes vs. non-absolutes like these claims?

Emil-Kunkin on June 29, 2023

Hi, I think the term stopped encompasses the term slowed, although the opposite is not true. While it's a good thing to note that there is a difference between these terms, this isn't actually the reason that B is correct. The issue here is the conditional logic: the politico wrongly assumes that fixing deforestation is a sufficient condition rather than a necessary one. I think that hitting the crux of why an argument is bad is your most important job.