Logical Reasoning

PT5 · S1 · Q15 M: It is almost impossible

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M: It is almost impossible to find a person between the ages of 85 and 90 who primarily uses the left hand.

Evaluate

Neither person provides an argument. Each person just provides one idea.

The question stem, meanwhile, is probably the most confusing task I've ever seen on a logical reasoning question stem.

The answer is supposed to be a hypothesis (causal explanation) someone might offer on the basis of M's fact.

The word "hypothesis" almost always means causal explanation, in the Explain Curious Fact sense of the word.

Q's claim is supposet to counter / weaken this hypothesis. We know that when we are weakening an Explain Curious Fact style argument, we usually do so by offering an alternate explanation for the curious fact, and sometimes do so by undermining the possibility of the hypothesis that the author is selling.

So let's pretend that we are an LSAT author, and come up with some causal explanation conclusion for M's premise.

The curious fact that M presents is,

This is essentially a correlation between being very old and being right handed. An LSAT author would typically assume that one of those things is causing the other. So someone might jump to the hypothesis that "being right handed makes you live longer", that would explain why the really old people are right handed.

Would Q's response sound like an alternate explanation for why super-old people are right handed, or would it undermine the possibility that right handedness causes you to live longer?

Yes! Q's response would sound like an alternate explanation. She would be saying,

In other words, a lot of of these 85 to 90-year-olds who primarily use their left hand are actually left-handed! They were just trained/shamed as children into learning how to do everything with their right hand.

Goal

We want an answer that makes it sound like left-handedness causes you to die earlier or right handedness causes you to live longer, so that Q's response can feel like an alternate explanation for the curious fact.

15.

Q’s response serves to counter any use by M of the evidence about 85 to 90 year olds in support of which one of the following hypotheses?

  1. Correct

    Being born right-handed confers a

    Why this is right

    This stimulus has an Explain a Curious Fact pattern. Curious Fact: How come there aren't any lefties from ages 85-90? Potential Silly LSAT Explanation: The genes for lefties include genes for early deaths This answer is actually matches the silly explanation we came up with. Right-handedness giving a survival advantage is the same idea as being a lefty making you less likely to survive. Q could say some of those people have left-handed genes, they were just taught to use their right hand and still survived. Q's response could counter this hypothesis by offering an alternate explanation for super-old people almost exclusively use their right hand more.

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

    39% picked this

  2. Societal attitudes toward handedness differ

    Opposite

    Q's response would actually strengthen this conclusion, not counter it.

    18% picked this

  3. Forcing a person to switch

    No Impact

    Would Q's response help us argue that "forcing a person to switch from their preferred hand is harmful?" No, we don't know if it was harmful or not. We know that not-switching was harmful, because they would get punished. But we don't know from Q's claim that switching was harmful, so Q's claim would counter this idea. This claim would also be very unrelated to M's claim. There's no way to think that M's claim would be a premise for this answer, whereas M's claim could be a premise supporting the correct answer.

    2% picked this

  4. Handedness is a product of

    Opposite

    Q's argument would strengthen this argument, because it highlights the social pressure component. It increases the plausibility of this hypothesis, whereas we want an answer where's Q's comment would seem to weaken it.

    26% picked this

  5. Physical habits learned in school

    Opposite

    This seems to be aligned with Q's claim. Nothing Q said would get us away to argue that physical habits learned in school don't persistent old age. Also, this claim has no connection to M's evidence. M's claim could not be seen as supporting this claim in (E).

    14% picked this

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