Logical reasoning PrepTest 106 · Section 3 · Question 23

Question prompt

Ethicist: It is widely Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: D

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Argument or Facts

Facts

Valid or Flawed

NA

Question Type

Illustration Questions / Principle Questions

Stimulus Summary

Truth reasonably expected to cause considerable harm to others → Lying is morally right

Answer Anticipation

Principle (Must be True) questions generally present 1-2 conditional statements (principles). The goal is to get the “judgment” in the necessary condition, and then find the answer that reaches that necessary condition as a conclusion after establishing the sufficient condition is present.
Here, despite there being multiple statements, there’s really only a single principle. The first line is what is widely believed, but the Ethicist immediately pivots to say that the belief is followed by almost no one. That’s not a principle that can be applied to situations!
She then goes on to say that lying is “often” morally right - again, too weak to be a principle.
Finally, in the last statement, we get a conditional statement that can thus be applied to other situations (“when” is the conditional indicator, serving the same role as “if,” introducing a sufficient condition). Diagramming it out, we see that when the truth would harm others, then it’s morally right to lie. Whether or not an action is morally right is a judgment, so our principle is already in the correct form - there’s no need to take the contrapositive.
With that diagrammed, let’s find an answer establishing that the truth would do harm to others before concluding that a lie is morally right. (And we can immediately eliminate any answer that says a lie isn’t morally right, since we don’t have a sufficient condition to reach that judgment).

Answer choices

  1. A
    When Juan asked Judy Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    Missing an aesthetically pleasing experience can’t be said to be considerable psychological harm, so this answer fails to meet the sufficient condition of the principle.
  2. B
    A daughter asked her Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    The father lied here so he didn’t have to talk with his daughter. While he sounds like a real peach, that doesn’t mean discussing politics with him is likely to cause considerable psychological harm.
  3. C
    A husband told his Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    The lie here is to avoid an inconvenience, which falls short of considerable psychological or physical harm.
  4. D
    A young boy asked Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem
    Telling one child you love them more (or less) than another definitely carries the potential to cause considerable psychological harm to the child who is loved less, so the mother’s lie here is justified based on the principle in the stimulus. This answer is therefore correct.
  5. E
    A friend invited Jamal Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    Note that the principle is about harm to others, so this answer where Jamal lied to avoid psychological harm to himself doesn’t meet that condition.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 9%
  2. B 2%
  3. C 4%
  4. D Credited 72%
  5. E 13%

Deeper help

Ask follow-ups on any step

Optional AI tutor mode will let you interrogate assumptions, compare answers, and drill weak patterns without leaving the page.

Human-written explanations stay primary; AI is an add-on when you want it.

Discussion

View all discussions Start a discussion