Q7 - Legislator: To keep our food safe,

[LSAT-Chang]

I picked (A) for this, but now that I read (B), it makes total sense. However, I still don't see how (A) would not weaken the commentator's argument. Is it because it is out of scope? Is it because the legislator doesn't ever talk about children vs. adults?

[timmydoeslsat]

I would not say that A is out of scope. It is covered in the stimulus.

The last sentence of the commentator's argument is that "...somewhat below the level at which the substance has been shown to lead to cancer but above zero."

This allows for (A) not to weaken the argument because even though children may be susceptible to amounts that are half that of adults, the stimulus states that the acceptable level would be less than that showed to lead to cancer.

[jgallorealestate]

@Timmydoeslsat-Thank you for all of you posts on this site. Your wisdom has been a tremendous stress reliever.

Are you saying that "A" is not a weakener because the argument would allow the manufacturers to add an amount below that of children in addition to adults?

[mbelenky71]

I had this down between A and B, and chose B.

What I dislike about answer choice A is that we're not given any indication of what the acceptable level would be for adults or children. As timmydoeslsat said, we just know that OVERALL, the maximum acceptable level will be set somewhat below the level at which you get cancer. Thus, A doesn't really weaken the argument.

Does B weaken it because the argument neglects to consider what happens if you consume a bunch of these chemicals, separately? One alone might not suffice, but a bunch of them would.

[christine.defenbaugh]

Great work mbelenky71!

For the sake of future readers, I'm going to break this one down from the top!

First, the question is asking us for a logical counter to the commentator. Since the proposals from the legislator and the commentator are directly opposed, we can think of this as an answer that weakens the commentator's argument (and therefore supports the legislator's proposal).

PREMISE: There are amounts of cancer-causing substances we can consume without increasing the risk of getting cancer from that substance.
CONCLUSION: An absolute prohibition is excessive (we can just set a max level between zero and the 'cancer causing level')

The commentator is assuming that there's no additional benefit to safety that we could achieve by going for the all-out ban! If there were, then the absolute prohibition would not necessarily be "excessive"!

(B) hits this idea squarely on the head. If it were true that tiny amounts of various substances wouldn't cause cancer individually (because the amounts are too small), but when eaten all together WOULD cause cancer, then an absolute prohibition on all the substances would make the food a lot safer than a 'max level'!

Perhaps the tiny bit of X-chemical in your soda is safe by itself, and the tiny bit of Y-chemical in your burger is safe by itself, but if you eat them both, you'll get cancer! If that were true, it would be safer to ban ALL amounts of both of them!

The Incorrect Answers
(A) If the 'safe level' for kids is a lot lower than the 'safe level' for adults, that just means that any 'max level' that we allow should be safe for either group. The commentator would say "fine, just set the 'max level' below what's safe for kids! Easy! We still don't need a full ban!"

(C) If the law only targets deliberate additions of the substance, the 'natural foods' might be unsafe with either proposal. And the 'deliberate foods' wouldn't be any safer with a full ban than they are with a 'maximum level ban'!

(D) Who cares about benefits? Even if this were true, the commentator's proposal would set the max level below the cancer-causing level. The fact that then the substance doesn't have any real benefit for anyone doesn't really matter. It's now an inert no-benefit, no-cancer substance. A full ban wouldn't be any safer.

(E)So what? The fact that we can use substitutes for food additives isn't an argument that we should. The ability to substitute doesn't make a full ban safer than a 'max level'.

Keep up the great work!