Q17 - Legislator: University humanities departments bring in

[Laura Damone]

Question Type:
Determine the Function

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: It is a mistake for universities to cut humanities departments when facing budget shortfalls.

Counter-evidence/Opposing Point: Humanities departments bring in less tuition and grant money than science departments.

Evidence: Teaching and research cost much less in the humanities, so humanities departments, unlike science departments, bring in more money than they spend.

Intermediate Conclusion: Humanities departments don't freeload on science departments; they subsidize them.

Answer Anticipation:
The part of the argument referenced in the question stem is evidence. It's a fact that's presented with no support is offered for it. That fact supports the intermediate conclusion, which in turn supports the main conclusion.

Correct answer:
C

Answer choice analysis:
(A) No way. The alleged stereotype is that humanities departments are freeloading. The claim in question supports the opposite conclusion.

(B) No, again. The claim in question is not the stereotype. It's part of the evidence that refutes the stereotype!

(C) This sounds good. If we look at the way the evidence is presented, we're told that humanities bring in more money than they spend because teaching and research cost significantly less. The claim in question, therefore, helps explain the premise. Bingo.

(D) Nope. The intermediate conclusion is that humanities departments subsidize, rather than freeload.

(E) Hmm…we know the claim is support, and there are multiple claims that support the argument's overall conclusion. But do the claims all function independently, as answer choice E alleges? Nope. We've got an intermediate conclusion, so there's a three-link chain of support here: premise --> intermediate conclusion --> main conclusion.

Takeaway/Pattern:
Challenging Determine the Function questions found in the teens and twenties tend to include slight variations on expected argument structures. Often, "because" on the LSAT is used in this way: Because of X, we can infer Y. In this question, the structure was: Because of X, Y is true. The claim in question here wasn't offered as evidence of the next claim. Instead, it was offered as as an explanation of why the next claim was factually true. You need to be comfortable with that variation in order to like what you see in answer choice C. But even if you didn't recognize that variation and you were put off by the idea of explaining a premise in C, the other answers are simply worse! As long as you identified the claim in question as being in premise territory you can eliminate A, B and D. And as long as you recognize that there is an intermediate conclusion, you can eliminate E. That leaves you with C, whether you like it or not, and picking an answer that you don't love is a critical part of a strong LSAT performance.

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