PrepTest 153, Section 2, Question 7
Kevin: My barber shop sells an herbal supplement(46 more words not shown)
Sabine’s argument is most vulnerable(7 more words not shown)
- Adiscounts scientifically plausible(11 more words not shown)
- Btakes for granted(17 more words not shown)
- Crejects an explanation(5 more words not shown)
- Ddraws a conclusion(18 more words not shown)
- Erejects a claim(13 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Maybe the barber's product works.
I'd want more evidence before accepting a sales pitch about preventing baldness. But being skeptical is different from proving the claim false. Suppose the barber sells a supplement that does help customers keep their hair. The customers benefit, and the barber earns money. Those two things can happen together.
What we’re looking for
Sabine treats the second fact as if it rules out the first. Her reason for rejecting the claim is that the barber profits from selling the product. That may give us a reason to check the claim carefully, but it does not tell us whether the claimed effect occurs. For the flaw, I'd look for this jump from a financial interest to a false claim.
Working the answers
- A
Sabine does not reject the barber's claim because the barber is not a scientist. She rejects it because the barber makes money from the product. Even if we had questions about the barber's expertise, those would be our questions, not the reason Sabine gives.
- B
A product can fail to prevent baldness without harming anyone. Sabine denies that the supplement works; she does not conclude that it is dangerous. B adds a different claim about the product.
- C
Sabine would not need to discover another treatment for baldness in order to show that this treatment fails. She could, for example, offer evidence that users received no benefit. The problem is the reason she actually offers, not her failure to supply an alternative explanation or remedy.
- D
The conclusion is about whether the product works, not about the barber's motives. The financial motive is Sabine's reason for rejecting the claim. And we do have evidence that the claim was made: Kevin reports what the barber said. D gets both the role of the motive and the alleged missing information wrong.
- ECorrect
The barber stands to benefit from making the claim, so Sabine rejects the claim. But the barber could earn money selling an effective product just as readily as an ineffective one. A financial incentive does not settle which situation we have.
We don't have to trust the barber to reject Sabine's reasoning. We can leave the product's effectiveness open while recognizing that her stated reason does not prove it ineffective.
More Flaw questions
Learn the LSAT our way
Our platform drills Flaw questions at your level and adjusts as you improve.