#7 - Generations of European-history students have been

[haileymarkt]

I was able to narrow this down to my contenders of A and C. After that I really struggled to choose and ended up incorrectly choosing A. To me, these answers seem fundamentally the same with small differences (though I know that's never true on the LSAT). Looking for any guidance about how I could have continued to approach this question after I narrowed it down.

[KelseyWoods]

Hi Hailey!

As you suspected, there are actually some pretty significant differences between answer choice (A) and answer choice (C). First, (A) states that the assassination did not cause the war, whereas (C) says that it was a cause of the war. The stimulus says that the assassination was a cause of the war (even if it was only a trivial one) so that is enough to eliminate answer choice (A) because it is not something that is supported by the stimulus. Also, the stimulus does not state that the additional causes each has "equal claim" to being called the cause of the war. Remember that in Main Point questions, the answer choices have to first simply be something that must be true based on the stimulus, and then have to specifically be the main point of the stimulus rather than just a premise or other argument part. Answer choice (A) is not something that must be true based on the stimulus.

It also helps to prephrase Main Point questions pretty specifically so you know what it is you're looking for in the answer choices. Here, the conclusion is that "Without some qualification, however, this teaching is bound to mislead" (notice that the second sentence has the word "since," a premise indicator; when used, the part of the sentence following "since" is a premise that supports the other part of the sentence. Also, notice that the stimulus starts off with a viewpoint that is not the author's. Usually when an author starts off with a different viewpoint, the author is going to argue against that viewpoint). "This teaching" refers to the teaching that "a political assassination caused the First World War." The author doesn't state that this teaching is false, but rather that it is misleading. The author goes on to say that the assassination was a spark that ignited the situation that had already been created by the additional causes. Answer choice (C) describes this well by saying that the assassination technically caused the war but that the true "cause" applies to all of the other conditions that were in place that the assassination ignited.

Hope this helps!

Best,
Kelsey

[cutiepie]

I dont understand how answer choice C is the mainpoint of the passage. It seems like a restatement of the third premise, which isnt the conclusion. I expected an answer choice like " European-history students have been taught that a political assassination caused the First World War are mislead."

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi pie,

The conclusion here is actually the next line---that without some qualification, the teaching is bound to mislead. We want to flesh out that statement a bit---we want to fill in what teaching they reference, and what qualification they mean.

When we read the rest of the stimulus, we see that the conclusion references the traditional teaching that WW1 was caused by an assassination. It says that statement is misleading because while it was A cause, it wasn't the really the underlying cause of the war. That's what answer choice (C) describes. It's a describing that line from the passage, but filling in the extra details that are provided by the rest of the stimulus.

Hope that helps!