Q16 - Moralist: Immoral Actions are those

[theonlyrij]

Hi!

I was really confused on the core of this problem. I couldn't figure out if the first sentence "immoral actions are those that harm other people" was the conclusion or if "those who act immorally do so only through ignorance of some of their actions' consequences rather than through a character defect" was the conclusion.

Also, I was able to eliminate it down to CDE and I landed up choosing C. Can you please explain to me why C is wrong and D is right.

Thanks!

[maryadkins]

The core here is:

immoral actions eventually harm the people who do them

-->

people who do immoral things are ignorant of the consequences and don't have a character defect

What's the assumption? Well, one is that doing something immoral that harms yourself means you are ignorant. (D) gets at this assumption.

(A) is incorrect because we don't have to assume that people who are ignorant cannot be held morally responsible. The argument doesn't say anything about responsibility.
(B) is incorrect because it doesn't address the gap in the core--it says nothing about an action harming oneself or ignorance.
(C) is saying that if someone knowingly performs an action that harms others, that person must have a character defect. But our core is about people who harm themselves.
(E) is about people who knowingly harm themselves, and the argument is about people who don't know what they're doing. Also, it's the opposite of what we want.

[weiwu0221]

The core here is:

immoral actions eventually harm the people who do them

-->

people who do immoral things are ignorant of the consequences and don't have a character defect

What's the assumption? Well, one is that doing something immoral that harms yourself means you are ignorant. (D) gets at this assumption.

(A) is incorrect because we don't have to assume that people who are ignorant cannot be held morally responsible. The argument doesn't say anything about responsibility.
(B) is incorrect because it doesn't address the gap in the core--it says nothing about an action harming oneself or ignorance.
(C) is saying that if someone knowingly performs an action that harms others, that person must have a character defect. But our core is about people who harm themselves.
(E) is about people who knowingly harm themselves, and the argument is about people who don't know what they're doing. Also, it's the opposite of what we want.

Thank you for your explanation.
The gap in the argument core seems like a false dilemma. It takes for granted that those who are ignorant of their actions' consequences when doing immoral things don't have a character defect. So does (E) address this problem?

[goriano]

The core here is:

immoral actions eventually harm the people who do them

-->

people who do immoral things are ignorant of the consequences and don't have a character defect

What's the assumption? Well, one is that doing something immoral that harms yourself means you are ignorant. (D) gets at this assumption.

(A) is incorrect because we don't have to assume that people who are ignorant cannot be held morally responsible. The argument doesn't say anything about responsibility.
(B) is incorrect because it doesn't address the gap in the core--it says nothing about an action harming oneself or ignorance.
(C) is saying that if someone knowingly performs an action that harms others, that person must have a character defect. But our core is about people who harm themselves.
(E) is about people who knowingly harm themselves, and the argument is about people who don't know what they're doing. Also, it's the opposite of what we want.

Thank you for your explanation.
The gap in the argument core seems like a false dilemma. It takes for granted that those who are ignorant of their actions' consequences when doing immoral things don't have a character defect. So does (E) address this problem?

I fell for (E) as well because I, too, believed that the argument was taking for granted that if you're ignorant of your action's consequences, then you don't have a character defect.

So we want something like : ~knowingly harming yourself --> ~character defect

But (E) says: knowingly harming yourself --> character defect, which is NOT what we want.

LSAT geeks: if (E) had in fact stated ~knowingly harming yourself --> ~character defect, would it have been a right answer?

[timmydoeslsat]

Interesting discussion. I believe you are stating that it is necessary to assume that ignorance is not itself a character defect.

I think that is a discussion of deep logic. I think we can separate the ideas of ignorance and character defect. I am not sure it is fair to ever equate ignorance with character defect, as they are completely different ideas.

But in the same way, it is true that ignorance cannot lead to being a character defect in this situation, as if it were able to, our argument would no longer make sense.

So I do believe it is technically correct, but it is something that the LSAT would not test.

[Mab6q]

The core here is:

immoral actions eventually harm the people who do them

-->

people who do immoral things are ignorant of the consequences and don't have a character defect

What's the assumption? Well, one is that doing something immoral that harms yourself means you are ignorant. (D) gets at this assumption.

(A) is incorrect because we don't have to assume that people who are ignorant cannot be held morally responsible. The argument doesn't say anything about responsibility.
(B) is incorrect because it doesn't address the gap in the core--it says nothing about an action harming oneself or ignorance.
(C) is saying that if someone knowingly performs an action that harms others, that person must have a character defect. But our core is about people who harm themselves.
(E) is about people who knowingly harm themselves, and the argument is about people who don't know what they're doing. Also, it's the opposite of what we want.

Thank you for your explanation.
The gap in the argument core seems like a false dilemma. It takes for granted that those who are ignorant of their actions' consequences when doing immoral things don't have a character defect. So does (E) address this problem?

I fell for (E) as well because I, too, believed that the argument was taking for granted that if you're ignorant of your action's consequences, then you don't have a character defect.

So we want something like : ~knowingly harming yourself --> ~character defect

But (E) says: knowingly harming yourself --> character defect, which is NOT what we want.

LSAT geeks: if (E) had in fact stated ~knowingly harming yourself --> ~character defect, would it have been a right answer?

I don't think so because the argument did not give us ~knowingly harming yourself