Letter to the editor: Sites are needed for disposal of contaminated dredge spoils from the local harbor. However, t...

Mehran on December 2, 2016

@krys the conclusion here is, ". . . the approach you propose would damage commercial fishing operations."

The support provided for this conclusion?

". . . over 20,000 people have signed petitions opposing your approach and favoring instead the use of sand-capped pits in another area."

Who are these people? And how do we know that they are opposing this approach because it would damage commercial fishing operations?

(D) points out this flaw, i.e. "The argument's conclusion is based on the testimony of people who have not been shown to have appropriate expertise."

So (D) would be the correct answer.

Hope this helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.

LH44 on August 4, 2019

I get tripped up by sometimes thinking the LSAT is trying to 'trick' me. For example, I prephrased the answer prior to looking at the answer choices and recognized a potential issue was the lack of expertise of the people who signed the petition. However, the word testimony confused me. How is signing a petition the same thing as testimony? This made me lean toward answer C purely because I didn't fully understand it and therefore could not properly evaluate it. But because I was skeptical of D I chose C. Can you help me refine the correct approach for this type of issue? It's not the first time I have had this problem. Thank you!!!

LH44 on August 4, 2019

And to add to my previous comment, I thought C did make sense because I wouldn't say that people signing the petition is evidence that they are concerned for commercial fishing necessarily. Couldn't it be true that the 20,000 were concerned for some other reason and the author of the letter is simply using their objection to enhance his own stance (even if that was not the true reason for peoples' objection)? Thanks!