A recent national study of

Answer choices

1. A

   No Impact10% picked this

   A given weight of paper product may increase in volume after manufacture and before being

   The premise we have about the environmental impact of trash says that "whether we measure the trash by weight or volume, the damage is roughly the same". At this point, the phenomenon being described in this answer choice has already occurred. We can't pick this answer by saying, "check it out, the paper trash is even worse than you think --- it actually grows over time." It grows over time before being discarded as trash, so this doesn't impact our current assessment of paper trash.

   10%
2. B

   No Impact: popular opinion3% picked this

   According to popular opinion, volume is a more important consideration than weight in predicting the impact of a given quantity

   LSAT does not put any factual weight behind public opinion. If an argument is discussing how the public feels about something than public opinion can be relevant, but if an argument is discussing what is factually the case, then public opinion is pretty meaningless, unless it's somehow established that the public is accurate on this matter. Beyond that easy/quick way to disqualify this answer, the idea itself makes no difference. Since the argument said "whether you measure by volume or by weight", the argument is totally indifferent to which one we do. So introducing public opinion that thinks "doesn't volume matter more?" is almost going against what we were presented with so far.

   3%
3. C

   No Impact: comparison to other trash3% picked this

   The sum of damage caused to the environment by paper trash and by plastic trash is greater than that caused by any other

   The conclusion is a comparative claim about "use of plastic vs. use of paper". It doesn't make a difference whether plastic and paper are the top 2 threats to the environment or the 99th and 100th worst threat. All we're analyzing to judge this conclusion is a head-to-head comparison between plastic and paper. Any other sort of trash has no bearing on who wins/loses between plastic and paper.

   3%
4. D

   Correct83% picked this

   The production of any paper product is more harmful to the environment than is the production of an equal weight

   Why this is right

   This establishes that plastic wins in a 2nd category of its overall use. We already knew that plastic trash was doing less environmental harm than paper trash. This answer adds on that plastic manufacturing is also doing less environmental harm than is paper manufacturing. Had the reverse been true, this would have been a great objection. We could have said, "Sure, plastic trash does less harm than paper trash. But we can't say the current use of plastics does less environmental harm since the production of plastic is so much worse for the environment than is the production of paper."

   Skill tested: Strengthen · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

   83%
5. E

   Wishy-Washy / No Impact1% picked this

   The proportion of plastic trash to paper trash varies from one part of the

   We need a fun nickname for this common type of Strengthen / Weaken answer choice: - things vary - things fluctuate - there are differences here and there Cool? This muddy, nonspecific type of idea doesn't have any clear impact. In the case of this argument, we certainly don't care whether proportions vary from one part of the country to another (we certainly would have assumed that's the case). The argument relies on a national study of several representative areas, so it should give us an accurate picture of the aggregate national picture of plastic trash vs. paper trash. We trust national polls to give us an accurate picture of the national electorate, even though the proportion of liberal voters to conservative voters varies quite a bit from one part of the country to another. That's because we trust that qualified pollsters are using representative samples to reflect this variety.

   1%