ManhattanPrepLSAT1 Wrote:So the debate described in the hypothetical example in the fourth paragraph is between two adherents of different religions. Keep in mind that these adherents firmly believe in the correctness of their position. Outsiders however, would need further investigation to determine the correctness of one adherent or the other. But the debate is between adherents, and this is an important point.
(I'm sorry if this is confusing/scattered -- I have spent wayyyyy too much time thinking about this question!)
The question asks which
debate is most analogous. I don't understand why the convictions/beliefs of the debaters are more important than the subject of/basis for/evidence centered in the debate.
I do, of course, get that the beliefs of the debaters play a major role in determining the nature of the debate (two staunch believers in different religions would have a different type of creation debate than, say, either one might have with a cosmologist). But it doesn't seem like that's the only important factor here, in my opinion.
Answer choice E says that the historians' opinions are based on
"different types of historical data." This implies that each historian is not taking the existence of the competing data into consideration. But in the case of the religious adherents, they have ACCESS to (and maybe familiarity with) each other's evidence (their respective religious texts), they just believe in their own. And these religious texts are the same TYPE of evidence, unlike the historians'.
Answer choice B makes a lot more sense to me. The jurors are comparing like and like (eyewitness accounts). Because the evidence is conflicting, there would need to be some determination of the relative credibility of the eyewitnesses, which I think is analogous to the passage's reference to "investigation of the authority of the texts themselves."
(And also, religious adherents aren't speaking from a place of professional authority, unlike historians, which I think also makes it a different kind of debate!)
I just really don't see why B isn't at least as analogous to the debate as E is. Can someone please shed some light on where I'm going wrong in my thought process on this?
Thank you in advance for your help!