Preptest 47 S3 #19. Forum

[winnatech]

Hi all,

For this question I am stuck as to why A is not a flaw of the argument. If lopoprotein raises cholesterol levels (which are associated with the development of heart diease), wouldn't that mean that there is some reason to make dietary changes?

Thanks.

[suspicious android]

Hi all,

For this question I am stuck as to why A is not a flaw of the argument. If lopoprotein raises cholesterol levels (which are associated with the development of heart diease), wouldn't that mean that there is some reason to make dietary changes?

It's not an issue of what's the cause and what's the effect, as answer choice A tries to suggest. Rather, the problem in the stimulus is that the conclusion states there is no reason to try to make any sort of dietary change for the sake of preventing heart disease. The argument tries to suggest that one reason to make such a change is a waste of time, so there is no good reason to make a dietary change. There might be other benefits for preventing heart diseases aside from lipoprotein or cholesterol levels. Even if the argument had considered the possibility that lipoprotein raises cholesterol levels the argument would not have been better, since either way the dietary changes aren't going to help either factor.

This is a pattern that appears over and over again on LR questions. Essentially it's "this thing is good/bad in at least one way, therefore it's good/bad overall". Here, we know the dietary change strategy is bad because it won't change lipoprotein, but we can't conclude it's a bad strategy overall, since we have evidence that dietary change can help control cholesterol (but not the kind of dietary change that will affect lipoprotein).