Logical ReasoningDifficulty: Easy

PT159 S1 Q1 Explanation

Columnist: The dangers of drinking are greatly exaggerated

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

TopicsFlaw

Keep going in LSAT Lab

  • Save & drill this skill — build targeted practice sets from questions like this one

  • Video walkthroughs — watch every question solved step by step

  • 81 official LSATs — as questions, timed sections & full-length tests

Start practicing free

Free to start

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

Columnist: The dangers of drinking are greatly exaggerated in the medical press. We are always hearing about the extent to which alcohol can shorten one’s life, but my grandfather and lived to be 95.

What this question is testing

Flaw

Conclusion

The columnist says drinking is not as bad as the medical press claims.

Evidence

One person — the columnist's grandfather — drank heavily and lived to 95.

Evaluate

This is a classic move: trying to disprove a general trend with a single example. General claims like "alcohol shortens lives on average" are about populations. One long-lived heavy drinker is consistent with the trend; you'd still expect some heavy drinkers to make it to 95. To overturn the general claim you'd need broader data, not one anecdote.

Think of it like saying, Maybe true about your uncle, but it tells us nothing about smokers in general.

Goal

Find the answer that calls out the move from one example to a general claim.

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

The question
1.

The reasoning in the columnist’s argument is most vulnerable to criticism on the grounds

Answer choices

  1. Bad Objection1% picked this

    does not address moral objections to

    The columnist's argument is about whether the medical press exaggerates the dangers of drinking. Moral objections to alcohol are a separate topic. Even if the columnist also failed to address ethical concerns, that would not be the reasoning flaw — the reasoning flaw is jumping from one example to a general claim.

  2. Bad Objection4% picked this

    fails to consider factors other than alcohol consumption that can shorten

    This says the columnist fails to consider other factors that shorten life. But the argument's direction is the opposite — the columnist is trying to defend alcohol as not dangerous, and other life-shortening factors would not undermine that defense; they would be consistent with it. Even if there were many other factors, the central problem is that the columnist relies on a single example to attack a general claim.

  3. Bad Objection6% picked this

    only addresses the length of a life, and not the quality

    The argument is specifically about whether drinking shortens life, so addressing only length of life is exactly what the argument needs to address. Quality-of-life concerns are a separate issue and not the reasoning flaw being committed.

  4. Causal Flaw5% picked this

    confuses the cause of a phenomenon with an effect of

    The columnist is not confusing cause with effect. There is no causal reversal in the argument — the columnist is simply citing one long-lived heavy drinker. The flaw is the use of an anecdote to challenge a general statistical claim, not a cause-effect mix-up.

  5. Correct84% picked this

    relies merely on anecdotal evidence to challenge a

    Why this is right

    This identifies the flaw exactly. The columnist's evidence is one anecdote: my grandfather drank heavily and lived to 95. The columnist uses that single example to challenge a general claim — the medical press's claim that alcohol shortens lives. General claims about how alcohol affects health are statistical; one outlier does not refute them. That is precisely the flaw of relying on anecdotal evidence against a general claim.

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

Continue the review in LSAT Lab

Save this question, watch the video walkthrough, and drill similar questions in your LSAT Lab account.

Save and practice this skill
LSAT Lab

Turn this review into a targeted study plan.

Save this question, drill more like it, watch the video walkthrough, and track your progress in your LSAT Lab account.

Start practicing free