Logical reasoning PrepTest 119 · Section 4 · Question 10

Incorrect. Olaf's response treats the use of microorganisms as at least a key part of environmental cleanup, so there's no misinterpretation over the term "relies."

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument/Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed/Flawed

Question Type:
Misinterpretation

Stimulus Summary:
C: Microbes that eat pollution are less active in a region when temperatures drop below normal, so there are limits to their use.

O: CO2 output of oil-digesting microbes is about the same in hot and cold regions, so I think you're wrong.

Answer Anticipation:
In this kind of Misinterpretation question, it's natural to want to identify the specific word that is being misinterpreted—after all, that's what the question is asking here! However, it's most likely going to be better to identify the concept that the second speaker is messing up, and then work backwards to the individual term.

Here, Charlene brings up a limitation of a strategy—specifically, microbes are "less active" when a region's temperature is "below normal." That's a lot of comparative language, and the LSAT loves asking about comparisons, so it's likely that that is going to play into the misinterpretation. In short, Charlene compares the activity of microbes in the same region as temperatures go down.

Looking at Olaf's response, he brings up a different comparison—looking at two different regions that have different temperatures, and showing that activity is fairly equivalent. As such, his comparison doesn't really address Charlene's, so the correct answer should reflect this difference. It'll need to have something to do with the different regions and temperature comparison—so any word representing those ideas should be considered.

Answer Explanation:
This answer deals with a term that was used to describe temperature, so we should check to see if there's a misinterpretation here. Charlene compares a region's "normal" temperature to what happens to microorganism activity when it drops below that. Olaf doesn't deal with that comparison—he deals with the comparison between regions, and he discusses the average activity there. As such, he's misinterpreting what she means when she says "normal" temperature—she means the average for one region, and he compares the normal temperatures of two different regions. This is therefore the correct answer.

Key Takeaway:
For many Misinterpretation questions that ask you to identify a single word that's misinterpreted, focus instead on ideas/concepts. That'll make it a lot easier to not have to go through each term in the argument to see if it's off. Frequently, the specific word that the LSAT provides in the correct answer isn't necessarily the one that you'd focus on when identifying the discrepancy! When you have the misinterpreted concept identified, you can usually find the answer that is brought up in relation to that concept, even if you didn't identify that specific word as the point of misinterpretation.

Incorrect. Both speakers are talking about breaking down pollutants, so there's no misinterpretation here.

Incorrect. Both are talking about whether the strategy of using microbes can't be applied in all situations, so even if Olaf believes that Charlene is wrong in determining there are limitations, that doesn't mean that he disagrees with the meaning of the word.

Incorrect. While Olaf brings up a specific way to measure activity (CO2 output), they both are using "active" to mean working to break down pollutants, so this isn't a misinterpreted word.