Q19 - Without information that could

[jade.harry1]

i'm having trouble understanding why A is the right answer to this question. i don't understand how the evidence points to a competing conclusion as well. is it that the aide clearly wasn't 'trusted' after all, and he/she was in fact among the minister's political enemies? any help you could throw my way would definitely be appreciated!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Let's start by asking, "how many people were present at the meeting?" The answer is three: the minister, the minister's aide, and the leader of the opposition party.

Let me shift the subject with an easier example.

Were a restaurant to offer only two options: pork or beef. If I tell you that I ordered dinner at this restaurant but didn't order pork, you could infer that I ordered beef.

If however, we change the game and now the restaurant offers three items: pork, beef, and fish. Now if I tell you that I ordered dinner from this restaurant but didn't order pork, you couldn't infer that I ordered beef, because I could have ordered fish.

In the case of this question, we can't establish that it was the minister's aide, because it could have been the leader of the opposition party (who'd be a more likely suspect anyway, since it's the leader of the opposition party). That's why answer choice (A) is correct.

If you need any more help with this one let me know!

[jade.harry1]

wow do i ever feel like a dummy. i completely missed the fact that the secret meeting was with the leader of the opposition party. maybe i need to be spending more time on my RC skills haha. thanks for your help!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

No worries! Sometimes when we misread something the first time, our misunderstanding can persist even after we review the information slowly and carefully.

We've all been there

[slimjimsquinn]

Thanks so much for clearing that up! It completely flew over my head. Your analogy really broke it down.

Thanks, OP, for posting this question. Could not for the life of me figure out why A) was the correct answer.

[soyeonjeon]

Why would E be incorrect?
How about B?

[tzyc]

Could anyone rephrase what (A) and (E) say..?
Thank you.

[justindebouvier7]

Sure, I'd be glad to.

As Matt mentioned earlier in the stimulus, we first need to identify what the flaw is in the argument.

Premise:
1.)Three people in attendance at the meeting:
minister, minister's aide, and opposition leader.
2.) Information must have come from secret meeting.
Conclusion:
Finance minister brought down by his own trusted aide instead of someone from opposition party.

WOW!!! You should notice the huge NECESSARY ASSUMPTION in the argument that the opposition party didn't release the information. Because, if he did then the argument would be completely destroyed. But who is to say that he didn't release the information? After all, there was three people in the secret meeting! With that in mind, we can take a look at the answer choices.

A: The author did use evidence that could have supported another conclusion. He/she uses the information that since only three people were there, the minister's aide was the one that did it. However, we simply can't say that the aide did it because, based on the evidence, the leader of the opposition party could have been the one to leak the information also. The competing conclusion is simply another way to say that based on the evidence, there could have been an alternative conclusion.
E: We don't know if the aide CONTRIBUTED to the information spill or not.

[zjce]

thanks all for your explanations, helps a lot. i was strugling between a and E), and trying to think what s wrong with E).

just to add something on the incorrectness of E):
it refers to an action, where the main conclusion is for a person rather than action.

[uhdang]

I thought wording of Incorrect answer choices were interesting to dissect, so let me give a shot at a full analysis. Here is the core:

Newspaper story that forced the finance minister to resign could only have been written with information that could only have been acquired in the presence of the meeting between finance minister and the leader of the opposition party. + No one except for the minister’s aide witnessed the meeting.
==>
Minister’s aid is the one who brought down the minister, indicating not by political enemies, but own trusted aide brought him down.

@ mattsherman already pointed out the crucial point in this question. The author is concluding that minister’s aide is the culprit because he was in the meeting between finance minister and the leader of the opposite party. Assuming that the minister would not want to force himself to step down, there are TWO possible culprits, not ONE. And the other one of two is Opposite party leader. We are not given any information about consequential effect on him, so we don’t know revelation of that meeting and information would have affected him in any negative ways. Considering "incentives", it's rather more likely that Opposite party leader would have done something about this. Thus, while there are two possible culprits, the author is concluding that there is only one and makes certain of it. He/she disregards a possible Alternate Explanation

===== Here are answer analyses =====

A) Exactly what we have discussed above. "evidence for equally strong support (an opposition party leader one of the people present in the meeting) for a competing conclusion (An opposition party leader is the culprit)"

B) Simply stated, this is what B) is saying.
1st conditional: If "another thing's already having occurred", then "one thing occur."
2nd conditional: If "later thing occur, then earlier thing occur."
So, this is claiming for a bi-conditional relationship between earlier event (already occurred) and later event. (earlier <=> later). No bi-conditional relationship is found here. Applying this relationship to this argument would be something like, Financial minister was brought down if and only if he/she was brought down by own aide.

C) This is saying while A brings outcome of B, the author confuses A to be C because C also brings the outcome of B. The argument does not even state other possibility (the opposite leader's being the culprit) but focuses directly on one possibility (aide's being the culprit). So, this is inapplicable.

D) Given information is not irrelevant, but rather very relevant. The author just missed the point to conclude insufficiently.

E) This answer choice is pointing out a flaw of Error in usage of evidence where a weakening / strengthening contributing fact is exaggerated to be a guaranteeing, or sufficient, fact. For example, concluding that "Jim did not eat the chocolate on the desk" from a given premise "Jim does not like something sweet." would be committing this flaw. Who knows maybe Jim needed to hype up from a little sugar? Here, this would be true, if we ACTUALLY have the evidence that shows aide's betrayal that could be a strengthening factor for the conclusion, but we are not given such evidence.

just to add something on the incorrectness of E):
it refers to an action, where the main conclusion is for a person rather than action.

I don't think this is a valid reason to eliminate the answer choice. "given action" could just as well be interpreted as "act of being there." And I understood it that way when doing this question.