Q13 - Rhonda: As long as the cost is not too great you

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Principle-Strengthen (two arguments at once?!)

Stimulus Breakdown:
R's conc: If it's not too costly, you should help others.
R's Evid: People who do active charity have richer lives than even rich hermits.
B's conc: Help people you know, not strangers.
B's evid: Only people you know will be able to return the favor later.

Answer Anticipation:
Both authors are concluding we should help, but Brad specifically wants us to help people we know. Rhonda's motive for helping is "leading a richer life", while Brad's is "having a kindness-debt that can be repayed later". It's tough to predict a principle that would help both of them, but we could maybe say "If something will potentially enrich or your life or make people owe you a favor, do it".

Correct Answer:
C

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Neither person is dealing with the idea of "most people".

(B) The Golden Rule? That's not specifically directed at being generous to friends. It would apply equally to strangers.

(C) This does seem to work for both … both R and B wanted us to be generous because they thought it would return to us in some beneficial form (richer lives, or people who will return kindness later).

(D) This only applies to Brad.

(E) "Pride" is out of scope.

Takeaway/Pattern: Since Rhonda and Brad's arguments were fairly different, we had to look for a more vague overlap. They were both advocating some form of charitable giving, both on the basis of how it could benefit the giver.

#officialexplanation

[kyuya]

Weird question, we don't see these often.

I'll first breakdown Rhonda and Brad's arguments (paraphrasing)

Rhonda:

- you should use your time, energy and money to help others because it will make your life better

Brad:

- You should focus your generosity on relatives and close friends because they will return the favour to you when you need it

(A) This doesn't help justify Brad's argument too well because he doesn't necessarily care about giving the greatest benefit for the most people because he is primarily concerned with giving benefits to people he knows and family because he wants to gain later benefits for himself.

Furthermore, it doesn't necessarily go with Rhonda's either. She states, "as long as the cost is not too great", but (A) states you should ALWAYS do what produces the most happiness. Rhonda has a constraint, while (A) does not. Contradiction.

(B) Neither of Rhonda or Brad speak about how they would like to be treated and use this is a measure to treat others. So this is eliminated.

(C) Here is the right answer.

Rhonda:
- claims it will benefit oneself because people who are active in charitable causes have richer lives (a benefit)

Brad:

- ...these people will return the kindness (this is the reason he suggests helping close friends and relatives)

One should act in a way that benefits oneself fits perfectly with both of these, with both suggestion acts that confer benefits on oneself.

(D) This doesn't go with Rhonda's argument, she makes no such suggestion. She never claims to do it for future help - she actually seems a lot more altruistic than Brad does.

(E) Neither of them mention pride or any similar emotion that could be the impetus for the actions they suggest. This is a strange answer choice because our LSAT logic and real life thinking may conflict. We may presume that pride would necessarily follow these charitable acts, but since this is not claimed in the stimulus we cannot infer that and use it as a basis to apply a principle.