Q21 - Medieval Arabs had manuscripts

[ldanny24]

This one's pretty tough to crack,

So is it that having access to translated versions of Homer a necessary condition for Arab Poets to have an interest in the Poetics? And since that necessary condition was not met (since Homer has not been translated until modern times) we can conclude that Arab poets did not have an interest?

I'm not sure how (A) would strengthen this argument since it would seem irrelevant for medieval Arab translators possessing manuscripts of Homer. Even though they were translators, having the manuscripts in Greek would still not allow access for Arab poets who would have wanted to read them. Please help.

[giladedelman]

You're right, this is a tricky one!

Let's start by identifying the conclusion: medieval Arab poets were not interested in Aristotle's Poetics.

What is this conclusion based on? I see three relevant pieces of information:

- Medieval Arabs had manuscripts of many Greek texts, which they translated when there was demand.
- If Arab poets were interested in the Poetics, they would have wanted to read Homer.
- Homer was not translated into Arabic until modern times.

It looks sensible enough: if the poets were interested in the Poetics, they would have wanted to read Homer, but Homer wasn't translated into Arabic. Since we're told that the Greek texts were translated when there was demand, this seems to suggest that there wasn't demand, right? In other words, if the poets had been into the Poetics, they would have wanted to read Homer, and if they had wanted to read Homer, Homer would have been translated into Arabic.

But wait. What if Medieval Arabs didn't have any copies of Homer's epics? We're told that they had many manuscripts of Greek texts, which were translated when there was demand, but that doesn't mean they had every text. Maybe the poets did want to read Homer, but no one had a copy of it! The argument assumes that this was not the case; it assumes that the Arabs had copies of Homer and just didn't care enough to translate it.

That's why (A) is correct: it strengthens the argument by making this assumption explicit. If they had Greek manuscripts of Homer's epics, and they didn't translate them, it must have been because no one, including the poets, demanded it.

(B) is irrelevant to the question of whether the poets were interested in the poetics.

(C) is likewise out of scope.

(D) only tells us about modern Arab poets; we're interested in the medieval ones.

(E) tells us merely that there was some overlap between Aristotle's interests and medieval Arabs' interests.

Does that clear this one up for you?

[ldanny24]

Yeah, that does clear it up for me. I guess the problem was that I wasn't able to fully recognize the conclusion and piece in all the relevant information together. They kinda throw you off a little with the whole Arab Poets not liking the Poetics.

Thanks a bunch!

[WaltGrace1983]

This one totally threw me off. I knew that (B) - (E) were not good but I couldn't figure out why (A) worked. It through me off because, in many ways, the first sentence is the most critical part to understand! I thought that the first sentence was merely background information and, upon reading the rest of the argument, I was thinking that this was the strangest LSAT argument ever.

P: Demand → Translated
P: ~Translated

C: ~Demand (no interest)

We have to assume, as mentioned above, that the text was available to be translated. In other words, we have to show that the "many ancient Greek texts" includes Homer.

[keane.xavier]

While Giladedelman posted a beautiful explanation of this question, I'd like to post the way I approached this question. Perhaps it will help someone; perhaps it won't. However, here it is:

There is one glaring hole in this argument. There are two ways to explain why Homer was not translated into Arabic until modern times: (1) lack of demand or (2) lack of supply (in this case, lack of manuscript). In arguing that poets weren’t interested in Poetics, the author assumes that there was a lack of demand rather than a lack of supply. In other words, the author assumes that medieval Arabs had a manuscript of Homer, but poets simply weren’t interested in having it translated. Remember, in the first premise, the author said only that they "had manuscripts of many Greek texts.” Although they had many manuscripts, perhaps they didn’t have a copy of Homer.

Thus, to strengthen this argument, we must affirm that they, indeed, had a copy of the Homer manuscript. If they did have a copy of Homer and simply didn’t want it translated, they’d presumably not have an interest in Poetics, either, as poets interested in Poetics would’ve wanted to read Homer because Poetics refers often to Homer. If they did have an interest in Poetics, they’d have wanted to translate Homer.