Q15 - Trustee: The recent exhibit

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

The problem with this argument is that the evidence merely establishes that the media coverage was enough to keep the museum open. The argument then concludes that nothing else could have kept the museum open.

(A) has the relationship backwards. Had it said that the argument mistakes a condition that is sufficient for one that is necessary, this would have been a better answer.
(B) is not discussed. It is not mentioned nor is it important to the argument whether previous exhibits had received extensive media coverage.
(C) is incorrect. It is not assumed that most people who read the articles attended the exhibit.
(D) is the correct answer. We know the media coverage was sufficient to keep the museum open, but that does not mean that something else wouldn’t work just as well.
(E) is not true. This argument is not circular as the answer choice suggests.

[didi0504]

Just a general question,
I am confused with the wording of A "confuses a necessary condition for the museum's remaining open with a sufficient condition for the museum's remaining open"
what exactly is it saying?

[jenndg100380]

a sufficient condition is something that [i]could[i] cause the result...ie the media coverage could have caused the record-breaking attendance which resulted in the museum being able to remain open.

a necessary condition is one that must happen for the result.

By saying that the"museum could not have remained open had it not been for the coverage", the argument has the media coverage as a necessary condition...regardless of any other factors, that had to occur for the museum to remain open.

The flaw here is that there are many other factors that could have occurred to keep the museum open... ie the exhibit, itself, drew enough visitor even without media coverage.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

I agree with jenndg380 completely, great work! And just to make sure everyone else sees it...

Answer choice (A) would have the evidence establishing that media coverage is sufficient for the museum's remaining open and would have the conclusion of the argument claiming that media coverage is necessary for the museum's remaining open.

This answer choice is close, in that the conclusion does claim that media coverage is necessary for the museum's remaining open. However, the evidence in the stimulus does not imply that media coverage is sufficient for the museum's remaining open. Instead, the stimulus states that it contributed to the museum's remaining open.

Contributed to ≠ Sufficient

Sufficient would mean that "by itself, media coverage would guarantee that the museum would stay open." This didn't happen.

Does that help clear this one up?

[mcrittell]

Could you please diagram this so I can visualize this passage? I'm still trying to get a handle on how A actually switches the concepts.

[timmydoeslsat]

Stimulus:

Art exhibit covered by media


Art exhibit covered by media seemed to cause the record attendance


The attendance was low ---> Museum gone bankrupt and closed permanently

____________________________________________________

So Museum could not have stayed open without media coverage

This conclusion can be diagrammed as

Museum stayed open ---> Media Coverage


The argument is assuming that media coverage was necessary for the museum not closing.

We know that the media coverage was sufficient but we do not know that it was necessary.

Perhaps Bill Gates could have donated a billion dollars. Perhaps someone could have started a lemonade stand to save the museum.

[mcrittell]

The argument is assuming that media coverage was necessary for the museum not closing.

We know that the media coverage was sufficient but we do not know that it was necessary.

How's this so? I understand the first statement--that the arg assumes media coverage=necessary as per the conclusion--but doesn't your 2nd statement contradict that? How is it, now, sufficient? I'm assuming we're looking at the first sent in the stim.

[timmydoeslsat]

Was the media coverage good enough to keep the museum from closing and going bankrupt? Yes it was.

The contradiction is that my point is the second statement. The second statement is not what the argument is saying.

I am saying that media coverage was most definitely good enough to keep the museum from closing and going bankrupt.

However, the evidence does not suggest that it was necessary.

The author concludes it was necessary however, which is a problem.

[mcrittell]

Perfect! I understand it perfectly now (although I realize that wasn't the big issue w the stim).

[jamesross25]

(A) has the relationship backwards. Had it said that the argument mistakes a condition that is sufficient for one that is necessary, this would have been a better answer.

Are you claiming that the following two statements are inequivalent?

"confuses a necessary condition for the museum's remaining open with a sufficient condition for the museum's remaining open"

"confuses a sufficient condition for the museum's remaining open with a necessary condition for the museum's remaining open"

[nflamel69]

The two sentences are equivalent in a sense it is talking about the same two things, but when you are looking for flaws in an argument, you also need to take in account of the order of the 2 conditions. It would be a false representation of the flaw if you reverse the 2 conditions.

[dandrew]

There seems to be conflicting advice in this thread. Some folks are claiming that the first sentence of the passage implies that the local media's coverage of the museum was sufficient to keep it open. Others are saying that the statement "seems to have contributed" in no way means that the coverage was sufficient but that it merely helped.

If we attack answer choice "A" using the former approach, it's wrong because the passage confuses a sufficient condition in the premise with a necessary condition in the conclusion, not the other way around.

If we attack the same answer choice use the latter approach, it's wrong simply because there is no sufficient condition on the grounds that "seems to have contributed" is in no way enough to keep the museum open.

Which view is correct or are both valid?

[Alvanith]

I have some problems with this...

I don't see the media coverage would be sufficient to keep the museum open.

Here is the reasoning:

The second sentence says: low attendance -> ~remain open.

As a contrapositive, it says: remain open -> ~low attendance. So it looks like "~low attendance" is necessary for the museum to remain open.

The first sentence says: media coverage contributes to ~low attendance. IMHO, however, "contributes to" is not equivalent as "lead to." There might be a bunch of factors together to make a ~low attendance and every of them just "contributes to." So media coverage is not sufficient to bring out ~low attendance.

So far, based on the two sentences, we have:

remain open -> ~low attendance

&

media coverage is not sufficient to bring ~low attendance (contribute to)

How can we conclude from these that the media coverage is sufficient for the museum to remain open?

Am I missing something?

[dhlim3]

Was the media coverage good enough to keep the museum from closing and going bankrupt? Yes it was.

The contradiction is that my point is the second statement. The second statement is not what the argument is saying.

I am saying that media coverage was most definitely good enough to keep the museum from closing and going bankrupt.

However, the evidence does not suggest that it was necessary.

The author concludes it was necessary however, which is a problem.

I don't understand how the stimulus shows that media coverage is a sufficient condition for Museum staying open. In order for it to be sufficient, the argument should be set up in one of three ways:

1. Media Coverage ==> Museum Open ==> NOT low attendance (or you can alternatively use "high attendance")
2. Media Coverage ==> NOT low attendance ==> Museum Open
3. NOT low attendance ==> Media Coverage ==> Museum Open


But none of these reflect how the argument is set up. Instead it is set up like this:

P: Media Coverage ==> NOT low attendance
P: Museum Open ==> NOT low attendance (contrapositive of Low Attendance ==> ~Museum Open)
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
C: Museum Open ==> Media Coverage

The flaw is that the Trustee incorrectly infers that media coverage is a necessary condition of museum staying open when the argument shows no logical relationship between the two. So the correct answer will point out something about one of two things: 1) How media coverage is not necessary (not required) for museum staying open, or 2) how media coverage is not required for high attendance.

Answer D does this very thing. The stimulus states the necessary condition for museum's staying open, that NOT low attendance is required. But there is no necessary condition stated for NOT low attendance, so it leaves options open for what is required to fulfill the attendance requirement.


Also, I noticed some people saying that answer choice A could have been correct if they had reversed the necessary and sufficient conditions in the answer, but I disagree with their reasons. The real reason why I think it's wrong is because there is no logical connection between the two. In order to make answer choice A valid, we need to change two things: 1) reverse the necessary and sufficient condition, and 2) change "museum's remaining open" to "high attendance". The argument's conclusion relies on the assumption that Media Coverage is the necessary condition of "NOT low attendance", when it's really the sufficient condition of it.

The correct version of Answer A would be, "the argument confuses a sufficient condition for the high attendance with a necessary condition for the high attendance."

[hanhansummer]

I just have a general question...

What role does "contribute to" play? I always interpret it as "cause", but doesn't "cause" means being sufficient to result in something?

This question puzzles me for a long time. Please, help!

[kkate]

If (C) was written in a "fail to consider" format to say "fails to consider that most people who read articles about the exhibit also attended the exhibit", can this be a correct answer? or must it say "all" instead of "most" to be correct?

[JosephV]

If (C) was written in a "fail to consider" format to say "fails to consider that most people who read articles about the exhibit also attended the exhibit", can this be a correct answer? or must it say "all" instead of "most" to be correct?

It does not matter what it says about the people who read articles about the exhibit. Consider the extremes:

(a) no one who read articles about the exhibit attended the exhibit. What are the ramifications? Maybe they did not go but each one of those people who read the articles told all their friends and all of those friends went to the exhibit.
(b) all people who read articles about the exhibit attended the exhibit. Ok, what if the "extensive coverage by the local media" were primarily TV/radio and only few newspaper articles were publish? Or, what if only very few people read the local newspapers? Then even if all who "read articles" went to the exhibit you still might be talking about a handful of people (a small number).

Either way, the point I am trying to make here is that any which way you look at it, knowing that "most" or "all" people who read articles went to the exhibit will not help straighten out the argument.