Q15 - Literary critic: The meaning of

[debbie.d.park]

I thought the hidden assumption was:
if the writer's intentions are not considered -> interpretation tells more about the critic

I was looking for an answer choice that included "critic" in order to close the gap. Only D mentions "critic", but the logic stem was in reverse. Now I am totally lost.

Can you please explain how to tackle this question? Thanks!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Your answer choice would be the correct answer to a sufficient assumption, but won't always work so neatly on necessary assumptions.

For almost all sufficient assumption questions, we're simply asked to bridge a gap in the argument.

For necessary assumption questions, sometimes we want to bridge that gap and sometimes we just need to find something else that is necessary to the establishment of the conclusion. Thinking the correct answer as protecting the argument from something that would ruin the conclusion.

This is a necessary assumption, and since no answer bridges the gap, we turn to plan B and try and protect the argument. Answer choice (B) protects the argument from the possibility that a meaning imposed on a literary work does not reflect facts about the interpreter. If that were true, then the conclusion in the argument that interpretations (which are meanings imposed on a literary work) of a literary work tell us more about the critic than the writer. In this case the critic would be the interpreter.

(A) is not necessary to the argument. There could be criteria for distinguishing the validity of interpretations and the conclusion could still be true.
(C) is off track and not discussing whether we can learn about the critic or the writer from imposed meanings.
(D) is not necessary. We could still know something about the writer and yet still know more about the critic.
(E) undermines the conclusion, that an interpretation of a literary work can tell us more about the critic than the writer.

I hope this helps! Good luck with your prep, and please post more questions!

[debbie.d.park]

That clears up all the confusion. I totally missed on the point that the interpreter in choice C refers to the critic.

Thanks for the clarification!

[ramneet.sierra]

Okay, I'm still confused about this question. I was not confused about the assumption type. I knew this was necessary but here's my train of thought for this q and why I picked D.

So interpretations impose meaning, instead of discovering meaning and they don't NEED to consider the writer's intentions.

Thus, any interpretation of a lit work tells more about the critic than about the writer.

TO come to the conclusion doesn't it mean that the critics don't consider the writer's intentions..hence D would be the best match.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Ha! I was just working on this question with another student earlier today! and he went for the same answer choice...

TO come to the conclusion doesn't it mean that the critics don't consider the writer's intentions..hence D would be the best match.

Notice the difference between your question there and the answer choice. You say that the critic's don't consider the writer's intentions, but the answer choice says that the writer's intentions can never be known to the critic - bit different. It doesn't need to be true that the true intentions of a writer can never be known to a critic. Couldn't it be the case that the critic was aware of the writer's intentions and simply ignored them in the critic's interpretation? The interpretation would then simply reflect the critic and not the author, even though the critic was aware of the author's intentions.

What do you think?

[tzyc]

I'm confused by the stimulus and still not sure how (B) is the assumption required...could you put in different words?

Thank you

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

The "critic" mentioned in the conclusion is described as the "interpreter" in answer choice (B). It needs to be true that "a meaning imposed on a literary work reflects facts about the interpreter." Suppose it didn't, and such a meaning imposed on a literary work reflected nothing about the interpreter, then how could an interpretation of a literary work tell us anything about the critic?

The conclusion requires that we learn something about the critic from the meaning imposed by the critic...

Does that clear it up?

[WaltGrace1983]

What is the role of the first sentence? Could that have been a gap to attack?

[maryadkins]

The first sentence is background that the second sentence builds on. The argument is:

meaning is fluid, there are different interpretations.

CORE [because this is the meat of the argument]:

but interpreting means imposing meaning so doesn't require considering the writer's intention

-->

any interpretation is more about critic than writer

The first sentence just sets up the premise on which the conclusion relies.

[kfitz]

I’m seeking to further convince myself of why (D) is wrong. Any help?

I selected (B) and understand that this is indeed a necessary assumption of the argument.

I also understand that (D) seems too strong of wording with ‘never’ for a necessary assumption question.

But… I still think the negation of (D) has the potential to attack the conclusion. C: ‘Any interpretation of a literary work tells more about the critic than about the writer’. If a critic does know the writer’s intentions, then he/she may interpret based on them. Thereby, that critic’s interpretation may tell more about the writer than the critic.

EVEN despite the fact that interpretations ‘primarily’ involve imposing meaning AND despite the fact that some critics might know the writer’s intentions and not factor them into an interpretation AND despite the fact that some critics may use the writer’s intentions in their interpretation but still add some of their own flare…..
would there not exist a critic whose knowledge of the true intentions of the writer leads him/her to an interpretation based only on this knowledge?
and in which case… The interpretation would show more about the writer than about the critic.

[smsotolongo]

Initially I thought B was a restatement of the conclusion. I didn't scratch it off as I wasn't 100% sure. As I went through the other answers, it was pretty evident they were incorrect as I couldn't eliminate B for any other reason, but all the others didn't seem to help explain the assumption. Can you tell me why it's not a restatement of the conclusion? Seems as it's switching the words but the same thing. The conclusion says "interpretation" and B says "meaning imposed" but according to the argument an interpretation is imposing meaning. Thanks.