Q5 - Montgomery, a biologist who

[tzyc]

I chose (E) because I thought it refer to the view of some professional archaeologists...why would (A) be the answer instead of (E)?

Thank you

[tommywallach]

Hey Strawberry,

Let's take this one apart the old-fashioned way:

Conclusion: Montgomery's views don't deserve to be dissed for begin too extreme.
Premise: His views are no more extreme than some other views.

The big error in this argument is that maybe all of the extreme views (both Montgomery's and the other extreme folks mentioned in the last sentence) deserve to be dissed.

(A) CORRECT. This correctly notes that maybe the other extreme folks deserve to be dissed, in which case Montgomery does too.

(B) Nothing in this argument suggests that anyone is unqualified to have an opinion, merely that those opinions might be too extreme.

(C) This is not an error the argument makes. We don't care how many archaeologists do or don't know about his works; only whether his opinions are too extreme.

(D) The argument provides as much evidence as it needs, namely it states definitively (which means it's a fact, on the LSAT): "This book...has been severely criticized by many professional archaeologists for being too extreme." That's all we need.

(E) This is totally out-of-scope. Nothing in the passages questions anybody's motives. Not sure where you'd get that. For this to be the case, the passage would need something like: "But any professional archaeologist who criticizes Montgomery is clearly doing it so protect their own career/published books/etc."

Hope that helps!

-t