Logical ReasoningDifficulty: Easy

PT117 S3 Q2 Explanation

Leatherbacks, the largest of the

A free, expert breakdown of this official LSAT Logical Reasoning question.

TopicsParadox

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Full official LSAT questions are available through LawHub. This page provides LSAT Lab's explanation, strategy, and review tools without republishing the full official question.

Stimulus

Leatherbacks, the largest of the sea turtles, when subjected to the conditions of captivity, are susceptible to a wide variety of fatal diseases with which they would never come in contact if they lived in the wild. It is surprising, therefore, that the likelihood that a leatherback will reach its that animal is living in captivity or in the wild.

What this question is testing

Paradox

Conclusion

This is a Resolve the Paradox question, so there's no argument — just a puzzle. Captive leatherbacks are exposed to fatal diseases they'd never get in the wild, yet they live about as long (in terms of reaching their max life expectancy) as wild ones do.

Evidence

Two facts collide: (1) captive leatherbacks face an extra threat (diseases unique to captivity), but (2) the survival rates between captive and wild leatherbacks are about the same.

Evaluate

For survival to come out even despite captives facing extra disease risk, there must be some other threat the wild ones face that captives don't. That extra wild-side threat is what would cancel out captivity's disease threat.

Think of it as a balance scale: captivity's extra weight on the "dies young" side has to be matched by something on the "wild" side. The most natural candidate is predators — something wild leatherbacks face all the time and captive ones never do.

Goal

Pick the answer that names a deadly wild-only threat. Predators are the obvious one.

Reading along? Open the full official question in LawHub — we show a fragment here and keep the reasoning in our own words.

The question
2.

Which one of the following, if true, most helps to resolve the

Answer choices

  1. No Distinction5% picked this

    Fewer diseases attack leatherbacks than attack other large

    Comparing leatherbacks to other large aquatic reptiles doesn't address the paradox. The puzzle is about leatherbacks in captivity vs. leatherbacks in the wild. How leatherbacks compare to other species — disease-wise — is irrelevant to that comparison.

  2. No Distinction3% picked this

    The average life expectancy of sea turtles in general is longer than that of almost

    Comparing sea turtles to "almost all other marine animals" doesn't resolve the captive-vs-wild leatherback paradox. Whether sea turtles in general are long-lived doesn't explain why captive leatherbacks survive disease threats at the same rate as wild leatherbacks survive whatever threats they face.

  3. Correct82% picked this

    Most leatherbacks that perish in the wild are killed

    Why this is right

    This resolves the paradox cleanly. Captive leatherbacks face deadly diseases the wild ones avoid — that's captivity's mortality factor. But in the wild, most leatherbacks die from predators — that's the wild's mortality factor. The two factors balance each other out, producing similar life-expectancy odds in both environments. Without an offsetting wild-side threat, captivity's disease risk would make captive leatherbacks worse off; predation explains why they don't end up worse off.

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

  4. Restates Paradox9% picked this

    Few zoologists have sufficient knowledge to establish an artificial environment that is conducive to the

    If zoologists struggle to set up good captive environments, that would worsen captive leatherbacks' survival — making the paradox harder, not easier. Captives would be at an even bigger disadvantage, yet still match wild survival rates. This deepens the puzzle rather than resolving it.

  5. No Distinction2% picked this

    The size of a leatherback is an untrustworthy indicator of

    This is about how reliably size indicates age. It doesn't address why captive and wild leatherbacks have similar likelihoods of reaching their maximum life expectancy. The reliability of an age indicator has no bearing on actual mortality rates in the two environments.

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