PrepTest 158

[lcid:3728] Prep Test 158 LSAT — Reading Comp — S1 Reading comp

Passage

Passage A is adapted from an essay by historian Christopher Ricks; passage B is from the introduction, by historian Paulina Remaining source text redacted.
Passage walkthrough
Passage Summary Topic:
Humanities

Passage A
Paragraph 1
  • Paragraph note
    • Rosenthal: No difference between plagiarism and imitation or adaptation
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Comparison, according to Rosenthal:
      • Rosenthal questions the differences between plagiarism and other forms of imitation (first sentence)
      • Rosenthal finds that historically, there is no difference between them (last sentence)
    • Cause-and-effect relationship, according to the author (Ricks):
      • Questioning of differences between plagiarism and imitation leads to the "required postmodern answer" that there is no difference between them (last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "But…” (last sentence); "invariably leads to the required postmodern answer"(last sentence); "opprobrious” (last sentence)
Paragraph 2
  • Paragraph note
    • Author (Ricks): Rosenthal minimizes the moral dimension of plagiarism
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Author's view:
      • Although Rosenthal's book teems with a "political fervor" which is "clearly moral," Rosenthal minimizes the moral dimension of plagiarism — that it is obviously dishonest (first and last sentences)
    • Comparison, according to the author:
      • Rather than focusing on honesty and dishonesty, Rosenthal considers only the "cultural location of the text and the position of the author" (last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "clearly…" (first sentence); "What in moral terms is a matter of honesty or dishonesty…" (last sentence); "reduced to…" (last sentence)
Paragraph 3
  • Paragraph note
    • Author (Ricks): Rosenthal's approach delegitimizes valuable moral considerations
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Cause-and-effect, according to the author:
      • Rosenthal's historical approach to plagiarism leads to the idea that if a moral thought is not universal, it is not valuable (second and third sentences)
    • Author's attitude: "demeans and degrades moral thought" (first sentence); "does not itself entail…" (second sentence); "may be valuable, indispensable, worthy of respect…" (third sentence); "a sad loss to political history" (last sentence)


Passage B
Paragraph 1
  • Paragraph note
    • Author: Attitudes about plagiarism have fluctuated over time
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Comparisons, according to the author:
      • Plagiarism, like all ideas, has a history (first sentence)
      • Virtually identical acts of plagiarism have been greeted with very different responses (last sentence)
    • List of factors that have influenced attitudes about plagiarism over time, according to the author:
      • Commercial circumstances, new theories of artistic creation, developments in copyright law (third sentence)
    • Point of intersection with passage A:
      • The author of passage A wants us to consider plagiarism a moral issue, while the author of passage B affirms the ever-shifting nature of our considerations of plagiarism (last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "repeatedly complicated judgments of plagiarism" (third sentence); "an abiding sense that plagiarism is morally wrong" (last sentence); "much fluidity" (last sentence)
Paragraph 2
  • Paragraph note
    • Author: Ricks's critique of moral relativism about plagiarism is somewhat simplistic
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Cause-and-effect relationship, according to Ricks:
      • A historical approach causes an "extenuating moral relativism" that degrades the dishonest nature of plagiarism (first sentence)
    • Author's view:
      • Not all historical approaches to plagiarism discount their importance (last sentence)
    • Point of intersection with passage A:
      • The author of passage B recaps and responds directly to the author of passage A's claims
Paragraph 3
  • Paragraph note
    • Author: Documenting historical attitudes about a concept doesn't necessarily involve endorsing them
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, points of intersection, and the author's attitude
    • Author’s view:
      • Ricks is justifiably critical of anachronistic scholarship and the tendency to reduce moral standards to expressions of power (first and second sentences)
      • But historical analysis should still try to reconstruct how people felt about plagiarism in the past (fourth and last sentences)
    • Comparison, according to the author:
      • Historical and contemporary figures have different views about plagiarism, just like people today have different views about plagiarism (last sentence)
    • Point of intersection with passage A:
      • The author of passage B responds directly to the author of passage A's claim. The author of passage B claims that although the author of passage A is justified in their disdain for scholars who always associate moral standards with expressions of power, a historical relativist approach can still be valuable in understanding past points of view.
    • Author's attitude: "rightly dismissive" (first sentence); "also true" (second sentence); "historically remote" (second sentence); "bad history is no argument against history itself" (third sentence); "no necessarily to vindicate them" (fourth sentence); "hardly a consensus" (last sentence)


Main Points?
Passage A: Removing moral considerations from political histories, such as Rosenthal's book on plagiarism, is detrimental to political history.
Passage B: While Ricks is rightfully dismissive of some attempts to reduce moral considerations to mere expressions of power, historical studies on plagiarism should still attempt to try to reconstruct how people felt about plagiarism in the past.

Key Lines?

Passage A:
Paragraph 3, Sentence 1 (P1, S3) - Author's issue with Rosenthal's book
P3, S4 - Author's conclusion

Passage B:
P2, S2 - Author's response to the author of passage A
P3, S1 - Author's concession in favor of the author of passage A
P3, S3-5 - Author's conclusion

Meta-Structure? Relationship Between Passages?
Relationship - Opposing Viewpoints: The authors of these two passages have slightly opposed viewpoints. While both authors agree that the tendency to dismiss moral standards as expressions of power is unfortunate, they disagree on the implications of this tendency. While the author of passage A asserts that any exclusion of plagiarism's moral dimension compromises the historical analysis (PA, P3, S4), the author of passage B argues that there is, in fact, some value to omitting moral standards in historical studies. By doing so, we can better acknowledge the perspectives of our predecessors (PB, P3, S5).

Meta-Structure - Criticizing a Viewpoint: Both passages utilize a Criticize a Viewpoint Meta-Structure. In passage A, the author criticizes Rosenthal's study on plagiarism, which discounts the moral dimension of plagiarism in favor of the "required postmodern answer" that there is no difference between plagiarism and imitation in the arts — other than the fact that those in power get to determine which artistic appropriations are considered plagiarism (PA, P1, S2; PA, P3, S1). To the author of passage A, Rosenthal's study is unfortunately emblematic of recent political histories on plagiarism (PA, P3, S4). The author of passage B, in turn, criticizes passage A's argument. The author of passage B acknowledges that passage A makes a few good points (PB, P3, S1-2), but ultimately concludes that setting aside moral considerations can help historians reconstruct what historical figures actually thought about plagiarism (PB, P3, S5).

Last Thoughts?
Don't forget to read the introduction before "Passage A"! If you overlooked that, you might have missed that Ricks is the author of passage A and that passage B is a direct response to the argument made in passage A.

Question prompt

Which one of the 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.

Question Type

Humanities

Answer choices

  1. A
    Passage B recommends an Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    Does this answer choice suggest that the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies?

    Nope. This says the recommendation in passage A "conforms" to the recommendation in passage B. That suggests that these authors draw similar conclusions when we know that's not the case.
  2. B
    Passage B advances an Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    Does this answer choice suggest that the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies?

    No. This answer choice would be correct if it said that passage A advances an argument that's undermined by some of the evidence in passage B. After all, passage B's evidence that attitudes toward plagiarism have changed considerably over time and that not all historical studies on plagiarism adopt the "bad," postmodern approach weakens some of passage A's criticisms.

    However, as written, this answer choice doesn't describe the relationship between the two passages. Passage A doesn't offer any pieces of evidence against the argument in passage B. Passage B argues that omitting moral standards in historical studies can help scholars acknowledge the perspectives of our predecessors. The author of passage A doesn't provide evidence that this conclusion is false.

    In fact, passage A doesn't even respond to passage B. The introduction and passage B make it very clear that passage B is written in response to passage A. Since passage B was written after passage A, passage A cannot bring up any evidence that addresses passage B's argument.
  3. C
    Passage B supports the Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    Does this answer choice suggest that the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies?

    Not quite, although this is an extremely popular answer choice. Still, experienced test-takers might not read past "Passage B supports the overall argument advanced in passage A." Knowing that the two authors draw opposing conclusions is enough to conclude that passage B does not support passage A's overall argument. Passage B concedes that passage A makes a few decent points. But supporting passage A's overall argument would require passage B to acquiesce to passage A's conclusion. Passage B does not do that, so this answer choice mischaracterizes the relationship between the two passages.
  4. D
    Passage B concurs with Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem
    Question Type:
    Major Point/Main Point

    Strategy Overview:
    Review the main point of both passages, consider how the main points relate to each other, and find the answer choice that describes the primary similarities and differences between the two passages

    Answer Anticipation:
    This question asks us to identify the overall relationship between the two passages. This big-picture question often shows up on comparative passages. For this reason, we should always take a moment to consider the passages' overall relationship after reading the two passages.

    Generally speaking, the authors of the two passages will draw similar conclusions about a similar topic or draw opposing conclusions about a similar topic. Additionally, the scope of the authors' arguments might be different. The authors might discuss the same topic, but one author might take a broad, bird's-eye view of the topic, while the other may dive into a more specific issue related to that topic.

    In this case, we determined that the authors of these two passages have slightly opposed viewpoints about the same topic. While both authors agree that the tendency to dismiss moral standards as expressions of power is unfortunate, they disagree on the implications of this tendency. While the author of passage A asserts that any exclusion of plagiarism's moral dimension compromises the historical analysis (PA, P3, S4), the author of passage B takes a more nuanced approach. The author of passage B argues that there is, in fact, some value to omitting moral standards in historical studies. By doing so, we can better acknowledge the perspectives of our predecessors (PB, P3, S5).

    Therefore, we should look for an answer choice that says the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies.

    Answer Choice Explanation:
    Does this answer choice suggest that the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies?

    Yes, this gets very close to that anticipation! Passage B concurs (agrees) with some views advanced in passage A — namely that the author of passage A is justified in their disdain for scholars who always associate moral standards with expressions of power or who project current ideologies onto past controversies (PB, P3, S1-2). Passage B also suggests that passage A carries their position to an unjustifiable extreme. Passage B doesn't agree with passage A that every historical study of plagiarism must address plagiarism's moral component, as passage B argues that removing moral considerations can help us understand past views on plagiarism. Therefore, this answer choice accurately describes the relationship between the passages, and we can select it and wrap up this passage.

    Key Takeaway:
    We should always take a moment to consider the passages' overall relationship after reading comparative passages. Doing so will help us answer many different question types. It will also give us the actual answer to this specific question type.
  5. E
    Passage B implies that Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    Does this answer choice suggest that the two passages agree on some points about historical studies of plagiarism but draw divergent conclusions about whether moral considerations should be removed from those studies?

    Nope. Passage B agrees with at least a few points passage A made (PB, P3, S1-2), so this answer choice is what's misguided.

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