October 1992 LSAT Section 3 Question 16

An ancient Pavonian text describes how an army of one million enemies of Pavonia stopped to drink at a certain lake a...

Abigail-Okereke on November 15, 2022

why E

I thought the error was mistaking correlation for causation but when I didn't see that answer choice just chose A. Why is this a reversing cause-and-effect flaw?

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Emil-Kunkin on November 15, 2022

Hi,

I don't think the flaw is exactly that the author has reversed cause and effect. Rather, it is that the new evidence only proves that the effect (dry lake) happened, but says nothing about its cause. The issue here is that the author fails to consider alternative causes. A drought, earthquake, or dam bursting could have all caused the lake to dry, but the author concludes that since the lake went dry, the enemies must have drank it. This failure to consider alternative causes is roughly reflected in E. It is true the evidence only shows that the lake went dry, not what caused it to go dry,