LSAT 141 | Section 4 | Logical Reasoning: Q7

LR Question 7 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: Critic: The perennial image of the “city on a hill”…

QUESTION TYPE: Principle

CONCLUSION: The concert hall can’t fulfill the purpose of a civic building.

REASONING: The concert hall is far from the city center. Therefore it doesn’t make the city feel alive or promote social cohesion.

ANALYSIS: The author never tells us what the purpose of a civic building is. Given the example of the art museum, the author seems to be assuming that the purpose of a civic building is encouraging social cohesion. It would be best to state that explicitly – this question could be viewed as a necessary assumption question.

We’re looking for the principle on which the author bases their argument. The principle seems to be that the purpose of a civic building is to encourage social cohesion and make the city feel alive.

Several of the wrong answers talk about the wrong thing. The argument is about what makes a good civic building, if you build one. The argument is not talking about whether we should have civic buildings, what downtown should look like, etc.

___________

1. This contradicts the argument. The author says the concert hall can’t be a good civic building because it’s located on a hill. The author thinks civic buildings should be in dense downtown areas.
2. The author actually didn’t say that cities need civic buildings. The argument is about what makes a civic building good. That’s a different question from whether we need civic buildings.
3. This contradicts the argument. The author says the new concert hall is a bad civic building precisely because it’s located on a spectacular hill, rather than in a dense downtown area.
4. The argument is not about designing downtowns. It’s about what makes civic buildings good.
5. CORRECT. This is consistent with the idea that the concert hall is a bad civic building and the art museum is fulfilling the purpose. We know the concert hall doesn’t do these things, and the art museum does.