Clearly, a democracy cannot thrive

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

TopicsSufficient Assumption

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Stimulus

Clearly, a democracy cannot thrive without effective news media. After all, a democracy cannot thrive without an electorate that is knowledgeable about important political issues, and an electorate can be knowledgeable in this to unbiased information about the government.

What this question is testing

Sufficient Assumption

Your task

Find the assumption that, if added, guarantees the conclusion follows.

Common trap

Answers that only partly bridge the gap, leaving the conclusion unproven.

Winning move

Identify the new term in the conclusion and pick the choice that links it to the evidence.

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

The question

24.

The argument's conclusion is properly inferred if which one of the following

Answer choices

Illegal Negation4% picked this
All societies that have effective news media are
This answer just takes the conclusion, if no effective news media, then not thriving and does an illegal negation: if effective news media, then is thriving
4%
Unrelated to Goal16% picked this
If an electorate has access to unbiased information about the government, then that electorate will be knowledgeable
Since this answer doesn't have the New Concept in the Conclusion ("effective news media"), it can't possibly be the answer. We're supposed to combine the correct answer with the premises in order to derive the conclusion. Since the premises don't ever mention "effective news media", if the answer also fails to mention "effective news media", then we can't possibly derive a conclusion about "effective news media".
16%
Unrelated to Goal9% picked this
A democracy will thrive if its electorate is knowledgeable about important
Since this answer doesn't have the New Concept in the Conclusion ("effective news media"), it can't possibly be the answer. We're supposed to combine the correct answer with the premises in order to derive the conclusion. Since the premises don't ever mention "effective news media", if the answer also fails to mention "effective news media", then we can't possibly derive a conclusion about "effective news media".
9%
Unrelated to Goal12% picked this
A democracy cannot thrive if the electorate is exposed to biased information
Since this answer doesn't have the New Concept in the Conclusion ("effective news media"), it can't possibly be the answer. We're supposed to combine the correct answer with the premises in order to derive the conclusion. Since the premises don't ever mention "effective news media", if the answer also fails to mention "effective news media", then we can't possibly derive a conclusion about "effective news media".
12%
Correct58% picked this
Without effective news media, an electorate will not have access to unbiased information
Why this is right
This is the link we predicted. If we hadn't predicted it, then we could convince ourselves that this proves the conclusion by thinking, "Okay, without effective news, the electorate can't have access to unbiased information. According to the final claim, if the electorate doesn't have access to unbiased information then they can't be knowledgeable about political issues. If they are knowledgeable about political issues then a democracy can't thrive. So, yes, we've proven that without effective news a democracy can't thrive."
Skill tested: Sufficient Assumption · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
58%

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