Q20 - Critic: Poltical utility determines

[mleeker]

I picked (C) on this one. I would think that if nonauthoritarian societies used the same metaphor (the human body) as authoritarian societies did, it would weaken the critics conclusion that the 'human body' metaphor encourages greater acceptance of authoritarian repression. But as I'm typing this, I'm beginning to see why I am wrong.
Let me guess: Just because a nonauthoritarian society uses the 'human body' metaphor does not mean that that society encourages authoritarian repression. I think the critics conclusion is simply stating that the 'human body' metaphor symbolizes authoritarian repression more than other metaphors do, but not that it always by itself encourages authoritarian repression. Am I on the right track here?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Tough question.

Let's start by addressing answer choice (C) and then go on to look at the argument in general.

Answer choice (C) is simply not strong enough to counter the conclusion. That the metaphor of society as a human body is sometimes used in nonauthoritarian societies is not strong enough to show that it is popular in those societies. The first line of the argument states that the political utility determines the popularity of a metaphor. So if we cannot establish that it is popular in nonauthoritarian societies, then we cannot weaken the conclusion.

The conclusion is that the metaphor of the human body promotes greater acceptance of authoritarian repression than do other metaphors. The evidence for this is that the political utility determines the popularity of a metaphor. Well if there is another metaphor just as popular as the human body, then we couldn't say that the human body promotes greater acceptance than any other metaphor. Best expressed in answer choice (A).

(B) doesn't address whether there are other potentially more potent metaphors than the human body.
(C) is too weak to undermine the conclusion since it will not establish that the metaphor is popular in nonauthoritarian societies.
(D) is irrelevant.
(E) is irrelevant, but does make answer choice (C) all the more tempting by striking at nonauthoritarian and then liberal societies. It's the opposite of answer choice (C) making you think that if it's incorrect then answer choice (C) must be correct.

Does that help clear this one up?

[haeaznboiyoung]

I admit I still have a hard time understanding what this argument is saying but...

If C said "the metaphor of society is ALWAYS used in nonauthoritarian societies" it would weaken it because it would show that the metaphor is not truly promoting greater acceptance of authoritarian repression if the society itself is nonauthoritarian?

[mrudula_2005]

Interesting hypothetical. But I don't think it would be that great a weakener even then. Remember that the conclusion is: "Therefore, the society-as-body metaphor, with its connection between society's proper functioning and governance by a head, promotes greater acceptance of authoritarian repression than do other metaphors, such as likening society to a family."

the conclusion is relative - so without any idea of how effective or ineffective the other metaphors are, it's a pretty uphill battle in weakening the argument, in my opinion.

Even with your revamped (C), so what? perhaps the society as a human body metaphor isn't perfect in terms of promoting greater acceptance of authoritarian repression, but it could very well (even though it is sucky) be BETTER than any other metaphor at promoting acceptance of authoritarian repression. you know, maybe it's just really hard to create metaphors that promote acceptance of authoritarian repression and even though with your revamped (C) we see how how the society-as-body metaphor isn't so perfect, it could still very well be better than the rest and in that way it does not directly weaken the conclusion.

I know my counter to your revamped (C) is a bit of a stretch, but I think it demonstrates that (C) doesn't really get to the heart of the argument (then again, if there was no better answer, maybe it'd work)

[geverett]

I got this question right, but I've been trying to really get under the hood of these questions so I will try out an explanation as well.

So in the first sentence the author tells us that "the more useful a metaphor is for political purposes the more popular that metaphor will be." This is a general principle the author cites, and then he goes on to bolster the truth of the principle by citing an example in the case of authoritarian regimes.

The author goes on to say that a particular metaphor - of society as a body governed by a head - is well known in authoritarian societies. From this he concludes that the fact this metaphor is so well known promotes a greater amount acceptance of repression than does any other metaphor. Notice what the author is doing. He is concluding that a metaphor is the best at achieving a particular result based on the fact that it is pervasive or well known.

Prephrase: What if there was another metaphor that was just as well known or more well known than the "society-as-a-body" metaphor? If that was the case then you could not use that as the sole reason that the society-as-a-body metaphor is the best at achieving the result mentioned (promoting greater acceptance of repression). Perhaps the correct answer choice could also provide an example of a regime where a metaphor was not pervasive, but somehow was the best metaphor at a achieving a desired result in the interest of the regime (this is less likely). I go to the answers with this in mind.

(A) This is the first gap I mentioned in my prephrase. It mentions an alternative metaphor that is just as well known as the "society-as-a-body metaphor". This weakens the line of reasoning used by the author who draws a conclusion that a metaphor is the best at achieving a result based on the fact that it is "pervasive". If there is another metaphor that is just as pervasive then the "pervasiveness" of a metaphor would not be sufficient evidence to draw a comparative conclusion of that metaphor promoting "greater acceptance . . . than other metaphors . . ."
(B) Whether or not societies use or do not use metaphors and the purposes they employ them for are irrelevant to this argument. We need to attack the author's line of reasoning which is "A metaphor being pervasive is sufficient to justify a conclusion about it being the best metaphor for achieving a certain result."
(C) Even if this metaphor is used in non-authoritarian societies this does nothing to the line of reasoning employed by the author which is whether a metaphor being pervasive is sufficient to justify a conclusion about that metaphor being the best metaphor at achieving a desired result. Perhaps if the answer choice had said "A certain metaphor in a nonauthoritarian society is the most pervasive metaphor in that society yet does not achieve any desired results better than any other metaphor" would this answer choice work. Alas, it does not say that. It is wrong. Get rid of it.
(D) This does not affect our line of reasoning at all. Whether or not they are searching for new metaphors is irrelevant. We need to attack the authors reasoning which is that "a metaphor being pervasive is sufficient to draw a conclusion about it being the best at achieving a particular result."
(E) Who cares? We need to attack the line of reasoning employed by the author. The frequency or infrequency of a metaphor being employed tells us nothing about whether or not the pervasiveness of a metaphor is sufficient to justify it's being the best at achieving a certain result.

[Mab6q]

Out of curiosity, would E strengthen, if by a bit, by showing that countries that are not authoritarian don't use this metaphor?

[ohthatpatrick]

I want to agree, because you're only asking if it strengthens "a bit", but I'm pretty hesitant to say it does.

It feels more like a premise booster that's "consistent" with the facts but not getting us any closer to the conclusion.

The truth value of the conclusion hinges on whether "body metaphor" promotes authoritarian goals better than do other metaphors.

(C) and (E) are non-starters to me because they don't compare metaphor to metaphor.

Since the premise tells us that the popularity of a metaphor is determined by its political utility, then I guess, according to the premise, societies that don't use the body metaphor (i.e. it's not popular) are societies in which there's little political utility to using that metaphor.

But learning "there's little political utility in using the Body-metaphor in liberal societies" doesn't seem to take us any closer to "there's MORE political utility in using Body-metaphor than other metaphors in authoritarian societies".

But even though I don't think (E) technically strengthens, it's the type of answer that I think of as "fuzzy strengthens". By that I mean, if we gave it a really close read, it's technically irrelevant, but why would we even bother. The fuzzy gist of it agrees with the author, so there's no need to consider it on a Weaken question.

So in that sense, I wholeheartedly agree.

[jwms]

I took an awfully long time on this Q for a silly reason: I dismissed all the other answer choices, but kept staring at (A), thinking: what if this authoritarian society used the society-as-a-family metaphor to denigrate other societies? There is political utility in this, after all.

I couldn't get around that. I wound up taking 3 minutes (!) and finally still selected (A). I suppose it felt too easy at Q 20.

[jeff.wongkachi]

Premise: Political utility determines popularity of metaphor.

Premise 2: In Authoritarian societies, the society-as-body metaphor is pervasive (popular).

Conclusion: Society-as-body metaphor promotes greater acceptance of authoritarian repression than other metaphors such as likening society to family.

Key is to identify the point at issue since most of the other answers are irrelevant, which is: the society as body metaphor. (SBM)

B) Does not affect the SBM.

C) Too weak. Sometimes can be be a wide array of options, not to mention 'used' can mean anything. It doesn't tie in with the idea of pervasiveness/popularity. For example, I can use the metaphor right now as an example for something and it means diddly squat. Something being used sometimes doesn't in any way imply pervasiveness. Also, What if non-authoritarian societies sometimes use the SBM... as an example of one way authoritarian regimes promote greater acceptance of authoritarian repression?

Honestly, the more I look at C, the more I find wrong with it. IT NEVER ENDS!

D) We don't care about new metaphors in general, only the SBM.

E) This has no affect on the argument but I can see why people think it might kind of strengthen it. But remember, just because liberal societies don't often use the SBM it doesn't necessarily mean anything without you personally adding additional assumptions about what a liberal democracy is.

---

A) Honestly, this answer isn't amazing either, but at least it nullifies an element of the critic's argument by saying that his example of metaphor isn't relevant, so this COULD mean that the SBM does not promote a greater acceptance of authoritarian repression AT LEAST compared to the Society as Family metaphor.

Based on my own studying for the LSAT, I have to say that for the average test taker, there are definitely going to be practical instances where your best weapon is PoE. From what I've read, even for people who score exceptionally well on the LSAT have to utilize PoE for some of the harder questions. In this one, I had A as a Contender and eventually crossed out the other choices because I had clear reasons why they wouldn't weaken.

[phoebster21]

I picked (C) on this one. I would think that if nonauthoritarian societies used the same metaphor (the human body) as authoritarian societies did, it would weaken the critics conclusion that the 'human body' metaphor encourages greater acceptance of authoritarian repression. But as I'm typing this, I'm beginning to see why I am wrong.
Let me guess: Just because a nonauthoritarian society uses the 'human body' metaphor does not mean that that society encourages authoritarian repression. I think the critics conclusion is simply stating that the 'human body' metaphor symbolizes authoritarian repression more than other metaphors do, but not that it always by itself encourages authoritarian repression. Am I on the right track here?

I'm always weary of answer choices that discuss the opposite of certain groups, positions, talked about in the stimulus. Here, we're discussing Authoritarian groups, so whatever NON-authoritarian groups do is kind of irrelevant... Just like answer choice E, we don't need to know what Liberal Groups are doing.

Here's an analogy. Satan worshipers use song and loud, excited chants to get people to rally and praise satan. BUT, what if i told you that god worshipers also use song and loud, excited chants to get people to rally and praise God? Just because the latter use song and chants too doesn't weaken the idea that song and loud excited chants can serve as a vehicle to rally ppl to worship the satan.

[roflcoptersoisoi]

(C) is too weak to undermine the conclusion since it will not establish that the metaphor is popular in nonauthoritarian societies.

Why is "sometimes" the operative word in this answer choice i.e., the reason why it is wrong. Even if we omitted "sometimes" from C and instead said something along the lines of "the metaphor in nonauthoritarian societies is pervasive in nonauthoritarian societies" , how would that weaken the argument? A gap in the argument is that it presupposes the pervasiveness of the metaphor is sufficient to conclude that it promotes repression greater than other metaphors, terrible argument. However, I fail to see how the metaphor being popular in a nonauthoritarian regime would contradict this assumption and thus weaken the argument. Maybe I'm missing something here.

[ohthatpatrick]

You're right, in my eyes.

I think Matt (like me) is just conditioned to see weak language in Strengthen/Weaken answer choices and think, "That has almost no punching power. Moving on."

If the conclusion were specifically about what is true in authoritian societies, then at no strength would (C) have any effect.

But since the conclusion is actually about advancing authoritarian goals (i.e. "promoting greater acceptance of authoritarian repression"), then we can't say that (C) is 100% irrelevant. We're allowed the very common sense assumption that nonauthoritarian societies usually aren't trying to advance authoritarian goals. But it wouldn't be especially shocking if AT LEAST ONCE a nonauthoritarian society has used the human body metaphor.

Said another way, the author is only claiming that, "IF you're trying to promote greater acceptance of authoritarian repression, then society-as-body is the best metaphor you're gonna find." (that doesn't even mean it's particularly useful or effective ... just MORE SO than any alternative)

Assuming that nonauthoritarian societies are not in the game of "trying to promote greater acceptance of authoritarian repression", then what they choose to do with their metaphors has no bearing on what the conclusion is addressing.

[roflcoptersoisoi]

You're right, in my eyes.

I think Matt (like me) is just conditioned to see weak language in Strengthen/Weaken answer choices and think, "That has almost no punching power. Moving on."

If the conclusion were specifically about what is true in authoritian societies, then at no strength would (C) have any effect.

But since the conclusion is actually about advancing authoritarian goals (i.e. "promoting greater acceptance of authoritarian repression"), then we can't say that (C) is 100% irrelevant. We're allowed the very common sense assumption that nonauthoritarian societies usually aren't trying to advance authoritarian goals. But it wouldn't be especially shocking if AT LEAST ONCE a nonauthoritarian society has used the human body metaphor.

Said another way, the author is only claiming that, "IF you're trying to promote greater acceptance of authoritarian repression, then society-as-body is the best metaphor you're gonna find." (that doesn't even mean it's particularly useful or effective ... just MORE SO than any alternative)

Assuming that nonauthoritarian societies are not in the game of "trying to promote greater acceptance of authoritarian repression", then what they choose to do with their metaphors has no bearing on what the conclusion is addressing.

This clears things up a lot, thanks. I can now see why I was having so much trouble with this answer choice, I misread the stimulus. For some reason, since authoritarian regimes were mentioned in the premise, I erroneously inferred that the conclusion was referring only to authoritarian societies, not all societies. Don't know why I did this, but I'll make sure it doesn't happen again. Like you said, one can reasonably assume that the SBM is used in different societies including nonauthoritarian ones. In particular, as it pertains to nonauthoritarian societies, this is fine, as long as the metaphor is not also pervasive in that society, in which case it would weaken the support structure of the argument since we can presume that nonauthoritarian regimes do not endeavour to propagate repression . However, according to answer choice (C), the frequency with which the SBM is used in non-authoritarian regimes is ambiguous "sometimes" (i.e., at least once) and is thus too weak to make any dent in the argument.

I tend to be overly abstract when answering LSAT questions in order to avoid operating on conjecture and falling for trap answer choices which habitually pray on our prejudices. My question is when should be we abstract and when is it safe to make "common sense" presumptions about some of the subject matter presented in answer choices i.e., non-authoritarian regimes not promoting repression ?

[tommywallach]

I'd say a question like that is too abstract to have a helpful answer. I'm always loathe to try and invent big general rules when they're this vague. Everything is about the question itself. When push comes to shove, the right answer is the RIGHT ANSWER. Details of how far to let your brain go misunderstand the central tenet of the LSAT: There are 4 wrong answers and 1 right answer. It's almost never about gradations of rightness that would require this sort of subtlety of thought.

-t