Q21 - Editorial: The government claims

[b91302310]

I'm quite confused by the structure of this argument. I can see the Editorial's main point is that the public's fear, therefore, is well founded, which conflicts with the point made by the government. However, I'm not sure how the Editorial reaches such conclusion.

So, could anyone help?
Thanks.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Let me try using similar reasoning but with a different topic to highlight the reasoning structure underlying this argument.

If it snows, the roads will be closed. If the roads are closed, then Mary cannot go to school. It snowed. Therefore, Mary cannot go to school.

Snow ---> Roads closed
Roads closed ---> ~School
Snow
---------------------------
~School

more generically...

A ---> B
B ---> C
A
---------
C

In the case of the editorial's argument...

If unlimited liability poses a threat, then injury claims can be sustained. If injury claims can be sustained, then injuries must result from nuclear accidents. Unlimited liability poses a threat. Therefore, injuries must result from nuclear accidents.

Let me know if you still have a hard time seeing the nature of the conditional relationships that serve as the core of this argument.

[b91302310]

So, the conclusion is that there must be a nuclear accident. As the government claims that the country's nuclear power plants are entirely safe, why (A) is wrong? Is it because that even though the reasoning of the government is with a contradiction, it is still possible that in fact, as claimed by the government, the country's nuclear power plant is entirely safe?

Could anyone explain it?

Thanks.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Not exactly. Think about it this way... First the government claims that the nuclear power plants are safe and then goes on to offer claims that would suggest the nuclear power plants are not safe. The claim that the nuclear power plants are not safe is not made but implied.

These statements in essence contradict each other. But the tricky thing about a contradiction is that when two claims cannot both be true, we cannot be certain which of the two claims are false. So, it could be that the government's claims about the safety of the nuclear power plants are true, and that it is the other claims that imply that the nuclear power plants are not safe are false. Or it could in fact be that the nuclear power plants are not safe. Based in the information in the stimulus we cannot say.

Does that answer your question?

[mcrittell]

I don't think I'm diagramming correctly because I'm failing to fig out the answer:

NS-->~FG
LFL-->NPB
UL-->ICSI-->~NS
FG

[key: NS=nuke pp=safe, FG=fears grounded, LFL=limit nuke financial liability, NPB=need to protect from bankruptcy, UL=unlimited liability=threat, ICSI=injury sustained against industry]

So basically

A-->~B
C-->D-->E-->F-->~A
B

Assumption: B-->(C-->D-->E-->F-->)~A

Not really sure how to answer this one, lol.

[esnanees]

With ans "B", i can understand how its correct but since its a must be true question, i was hoping to an a more specific ans as " The gov't position on the country's nuclear power plant is inconsistent". I did not choose it because it omitted "the country nuclear power plant". I thought the ans was too broad for a must be true question, that's why i chose A though i was weary of A.

Could someone please tell me whether my reasoning is correct or i have to be flexible with Must be true qts.

Another confusing ans choice!

[hychu3]

The editorial shows that government's position on the safety of nuclear power plant is inconsistent as follows:

1. The government says that nuclear power plants are entirely safe (= no risk of nuclear accident).

2. Then the government limits financial liability of those nuclear plants in case of nuclear accidents. The editorial shows through series of deductions that this makes sense only if the government actually feels not so safe about nuclear power plants.

So, according to the editorial, these two things cannot go together.

The conclusion is that the public has good reasons to fear nuclear accidents.

(A) This answer is attractive; after all the editorial does argue that the government is saying two different things about how safe the government perceives nuclear power plants to be.

But this answer choice is incorrect because the editorial does not go so far as to say the government's assertion is "false"; that is, the editorial does not say the nuclear power plants are not entirely safe. It's just one of the two conflicting things that may or may not be true (but not both).

Remember, the editorial merely says that the public has reasons to fear about the safety of nuclear power plants.

(B) This is the correct answer that paraphrases what I said above.

(C) This is an attractive incorrect answer choice only because of its choice of vocabulary. Yes, the editorial does argue that the government "misrepresented" something (either how safe nuclear plants are or how financially risky they are). And that misrepresentation is related to "the nuclear industry's liability."

However, the gist of this answer choice is that the government is lying about its reasons to limit nuclear power plants' financial liability in case of nuclear accidents. Actually, the editorial's argument depends on the assumption that the government's reasons for limiting the financial liability of nuclear power plants is at least possibly honest. Again, it is one of the two conflicting things that may or may not be true.

(D) Again, we do not necessarily know this statement, as I said in (A) and (C).

(E) This is a false statement. The only reason the editorial is writing this is there is more to "fear" and more "threat" than just the financial security of nuclear power plant. This answer choices contradicts the implicit assumption of the editorial.

[ohthatpatrick]

Great explanation!
A quick touch-up ... the wording of the conclusion doesn't actually matter to this question.

The question stem is an Inference question stem, and we're to accept everything LEADING UP the last sentence as facts (i.e., all the ideas offered in support of the conclusion).

[redcobra21]

Thanks for the great explanations guys. This clarified a lot.

Just a question going off Patrick's last post. He said that the "wording of the conclusion doesn't actually matter to THIS question." Would it be fair to say that for ALL inference/must be true questions, an answer choice that restates the conclusion is always incorrect? (because the conclusion is an opinion based on the facts and not a fact itself) Or are there cases where something from the conclusion can serve as a basis for the correct answer?

Thank you

[ohthatpatrick]

No, we don't want to make that generalization about Inference questions.

First of all, most Inference questions give us a set of facts, not an argument. Furthermore, the ones that DO resemble arguments (i.e. they actually use a conclusion-y type word) can still be treated as sets of facts.

The normal Inference question stem says something like:
"If the statements above are true, then which of the following must be true"
or
"Which of the following is best supported by the passage above"

Normal Inference question stems allow us to base our answer on the ENTIRE stimulus.

This Q21 had a very unique question stem that said, "If all of the statements offered in support of the editorial's conclusion correctly describe the government's position, which must be true on the basis of those statements?"

So it was just a weird question stem that specifically narrowed our set of facts to the premises.

[aznriceboi17]

I think follow the fact that the government has taken two conflicting positions: the first one (Pos1) is its stance that nuclear power plants are safe and the second one (Pos2) is the stance that there are risks, implied by their need to limit financial liability.

However, I was thrown off by the last sentence which concludes that the public's fear (of nuclear accidents), is well founded. Since B is the correct answer, does this mean that the public's fear is well founded simply because Pos1 could be true? That seemed like a stretch to me, which is why I chose Choice A.

[ohthatpatrick]

Remember, for this weirdly worded question stem, the last sentence is completely irrelevant to us. It's not there. It doesn't exist.

The question stem is asking us, "if you read everything UP TO the last sentence, what can you infer?"

As you said, everything leading up to the last sentence is essentially saying that the government is claiming Pos. 1 and Pos. 2, and those two positions are contradictory.

(A) is wrong because it arbitrarily assumes that Pos. 2 is the true idea and Pos. 1 is the false idea. But we don't know that. As you suggested, maybe Pos. 1 is the true idea and Pos. 2 is the false one.

(B) is right because it MUST BE TRUE that Pos. 1 and Pos. 2 are contradictory.

It sounds to me like you're mixed up about what your task is on this problem, so you might be viewing these answer choices through the wrong lens. We're not trying to support the conclusion (the last sentence); we're not even supposed to READ/CONSIDER the last sentence for the sake of this question ... ONLY read/consider everything leading up to the last sentence.

Here's a quick analogy ...

Doug: I think Betty is the prettiest girl at our school. I asked the prettiest girl at our school to the prom. I did not ask Betty to the prom.

There's clearly some contradiction there, but what can we infer?

We don't know which parts of Doug's statements are true and which are false. We only know that they can't ALL be true, because he contradicted himself.

That's what (B) is expressing.

Hope this helps.

[daijob]

Hi,

Actually I do not understand what these sentences mean: starting The government also contends that....against the industry;"
Why limiting financial liability will imply the government feels the threat of accident? I thought if they are worrying they will increase it instead of limiting it...sorry if I know it's kind of off-topic.
I will appreciate if anyone could paraphrase the sentences...

[maryadkins]

The sentences you asked about mean:

The government argues (contends) that the reason it limited liability for the nuclear industry is because it needs to protect the industry from bankruptcy. But even the government says that if it HADN'T done that, it wouldn't have mattered. It only would have mattered if the industry had harmed people.

While these sentences are, to be fair, difficult, I'm concerned about your English skills in approaching this test—I encourage you to continue working on advanced English and vocabulary-building. A very strong working knowledge of English is critical for the LSAT, even with a strong logical sensibility. So keep the English-building up as well!

[hayleychen12]

Remember, for this weirdly worded question stem, the last sentence is completely irrelevant to us. It's not there. It doesn't exist.

The question stem is asking us, "if you read everything UP TO the last sentence, what can you infer?"

As you said, everything leading up to the last sentence is essentially saying that the government is claiming Pos. 1 and Pos. 2, and those two positions are contradictory.

(A) is wrong because it arbitrarily assumes that Pos. 2 is the true idea and Pos. 1 is the false idea. But we don't know that. As you suggested, maybe Pos. 1 is the true idea and Pos. 2 is the false one.

Hi!
I understand why B is right. But I'm still kinda confused by A, I want to clarify my thought here. Please check for me if it is right.

I assume by Pos.1 you mean the claim that "the country's nuclear power plants are entirely safe", and by Pos.2 you mean the series of conditional reasoning starting from " But even.." and end with "injury must result from a nuclear accident."

At the beginning, I think from the wording of the stimulus, it's pretty sure that the government's direct claim about the nuclear power is "it's safe." And from Pos.2, as the government is now taking actions to protect the industry from the bankruptcy, we know that there is a possibility of nuclear accident = (not safe).
Then I notice the words" But even the government says", which makes Pos.2 also just an assertion the government makes, not an actually fact.
So we actually have two claims made by the government, and it is wrong to assume that any of them is false.
Am I right?

What if we change the "but even the government says" into "It's universally acknowledged"? It will make the mere assertion of the government into a fact. Will this make Answer A also correct?

Any help will be sooooooo appreciated!!!

[ohthatpatrick]

Yup you've got it.

The government claims ....
The government also contends ...
Even the government says ....
the government admits ...

The ideas we're working with are all just things the govt. said. We can't assume factual truth is behind any of them.