The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in plan

Question

The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses of study should be abandoned. The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established. Some of these students have reached their third year without declaring a major. One first-year student has failed to complete four required courses. Several others have indicated a serious indifference to grades and intellectual achievement.

A flaw in the argument is that it does which one of the following?

(A) avoids the issue by focusing on supporters of the proposal

(B) argues circularly by assuming the conclusion is true in stating the premises.

(C) fails to define the critical term "satisfied"

(D) distorts the proposal advocated by opponents

(E) users the term "student" equivocally

variablechange · Accepted Answer

Hey everyone, to preface I'm taking the LSAT in October, but I like gaining as much exposure as possible to questions. I really enjoy how the predominance of this site is organized around problems, where as the main LSAT site is focused on community. I'm currently projecting in the 99th%tile on the Logical Reasoning section of it, but still have a long way to go.

I've done my best below to answer the question, and indicate why the others are wrong/where one may see the others on different questions. I can tell you with certain that what seperates the high CR scorers from the low ones is the ability to identify why answer choices are incorrect, and why answers are correct. Certainly be in the habit of doing that.

The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses of study should be abandoned. The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established. Some of these students have reached their third year without declaring a major. One first-year student has failed to complete four required courses. Several others have indicated a serious indifference to grades and intellectual achievement.

A flaw in the argument is that it does which one of the following?

(A) avoids the issue by focusing on supporters of the proposal  Correct 
(B) argues circularly by assuming the conclusion is true in stating the premises.  A circular argument is essentially reiterating what you stated in your evidence, as your conclusion "Miami is in Florida. Therefore, Miami is in Florida." 
(C) fails to define the critical term "satisfied"  Ehh. this is a huge stretch, and isn't a flaw in the argument. 
(D) distorts the proposal advocated by opponents This doesn't occur here. However, an example would be: "GMAT takers thought the test was hard. Then, the argument will continue by making a claim along the lines of GMAT test takers said said the GMAT was the hardest most impossible test in history. 
(E) users the term "student" equivocally  This is saying that student was used in different ways. An example, which was on a few LSAT questions I've done was where the passage said "Managers want to exploit the most out of the resources they have. Then, the critic claims exploiting workers for the companys gain is unethical." Essentially, the same word is used with two different meanings.

KarishmaB · Answer

The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established. Some of these students have reached their third year without declaring a major. One first-year student has failed to complete four required courses. Several others have indicated a serious indifference to grades and intellectual achievement.

Conclusion: The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses of study should be abandoned.

Note that the premises do not talk about the proposal at all. They talk about the students who are supporting the proposal (some of these have not declared a major, one has failed to complete req courses etc). So we are judging the merit of the proposal based on who is supporting it. 
This is similar to saying we should abandon project A because people supporting it are, say uneducated or anti-social etc.

Hence (A) makes sense.

By the way, this is not GMAT type question.

nimisha · Answer

The answer should be A. Below is the explaination-
A) The author argues that the proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses should be abandoned BECAUSE the students who are supporting.......... Thus here the author is avoiding the issue and focusing more on its supporters, that is, because the supporters are so and so, the plan should be abandoned and not there is any flaw in the plan.
B) IMO, there is no circular reasoning whatsoever. The stimulus does have this stat 'The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established', and the option B has been introduced to confuse us here.

abcgroove · Answer

The conclusion is to abandon the current proposal. And the premises given are history of supporters of the proposal . So clearly the flaw is that the argument is not focusing on the cause behind the students' performance. 
My Answer is A

semwal · Answer

The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses of study should be abandoned. The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established. Some of these students have reached their third year without declaring a major. One first-year student has failed to complete four required courses. Several others have indicated a serious indifference to grades and intellectual achievement.
A flaw in the argument is that it does which one of the following?
(A) avoids the issue by focusing on supporters of the proposal.....   correct..... by focusing on supporters the conclusion is being derived.....  
(B) argues circularly by assuming the conclusion is true in stating the premises. ... incorrect 
(C) fails to define the critical term "satisfied"  .... the defining of the term not required here... 
(D) distorts the proposal advocated by opponents  ... incorrect 
(E) users the term "student" equivocally .... irrelevant

AdityaHongunti · Answer

What is circular reasoning?

Circular reasoning is a logical fallacy in which the reasoner begins with what they are trying to end with.
 
The components of a circular argument are often logically valid because if the premises are true, the conclusion must be true.

Circular reasoning is not a formal logical fallacy but a pragmatic defect in an argument whereby the premises are just as much in need of proof or evidence as the conclusion, and as a consequence the argument fails to persuade.

Other ways to express this are that there is no reason to accept the premises unless one already believes the conclusion, or that the premises provide no independent ground or evidence for the conclusion.

Circular reasoning is often of the form:
 "A is true because B is true; B is true because A is true."

Circularity can be difficult to detect if it involves a longer chain of propositions. 
Example:

Wellington is in New Zealand.
Therefore, Wellington is in New Zealand

although the argument is deductively valid, it cannot prove that Wellington is in New Zealand because it contains no evidence that is distinct from the conclusion.

The context – that of an argument – means that the proposition does not meet the requirement of proving the statement; thus, it is a fallacy.

'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because whatever is less dense than water will float' 
-sounds stupid, but 'Whatever is less dense than water will float, because such objects won't sink in water' might pass.

Posted from my mobile device

adkikani · Answer

generis   VeritasKarishma

Can you clarify the OA?

This is main conclusion of argument.

All above are premises supporting the main conclusion. Are not we strengthening the claim by supporting the views of people who think that proposal should be abolished?

Raman109 · Answer

Understanding the argument - 
The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in planning their own courses of study should be abandoned. - Conclusion. 
The students who are supporting the proposal will never be satisfied, no matter what requirements are established. - Premise using an example of the existing students to support the conclusion. 
Some of these students have reached their third year without declaring a major. - Further support. 
One first-year student has failed to complete four required courses. Several others have indicated a serious indifference to grades and intellectual achievement. - Additional supports.

A flaw in the argument is that it does which one of the following?

(A) avoids the issue by focusing on supporters of the proposal - True. The main issue here is whether the students should be given a broader choice in planning their courses. A right argument could have considered benefits, drawbacks, alternatives, etc. Rather than doing this, the argument touches on supporters of the proposal, creating a flawed and shallow argument.

(B) argues circularly by assuming the conclusion is true in stating the premises. - A circular argument means the conclusion is the restatement of the premises.

(C) fails to define the critical term "satisfied" - doesn't matter. Out of scope.

(D) distorts the proposal advocated by opponents - out of scope. No distortion.

(E) users the term "student" equivocally - equivocally means using the same terms for different meanings within the same sentence, creating confusion of meaning. Nothing of this sort happens here. Out of scope.

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The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in plan

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The current proposal to give college students a broader choice in plan

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