#5 - Global Reference, Must Be True

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation
(See the complete passage discussion here: lsat/viewtopic.php?t=10843)

The correct answer choice is (A)

Here, we need to identify a question that can be answered by referring to the content of the passage. The correct answer choice cannot be prephrased, so proceed by the process of elimination and keep the Fact Test in mind: any question that raises an issue extraneous to the information contained in the passage will be incorrect.

Answer choice (A): This is the correct answer choice. In lines 47 - 52, the passage states that the Kayapo filmed transactions with Brazilian government officials in order to provide legally binding transactional records.

Answer choice (B): Key terms, especially those that appear in quotation marks, should always be highlighted or underlined. The idea of the “noble savage” is no exception. A quick reference to the beginning of the third paragraph (lines 30-31) shows that the origin of this idea is never discussed, making answer choice (B) incorrect.

Answer choice (C): The passage does not name the indigenous cultures that have not yet used Western video technology, so this choice should be ruled out of contention.


Answer choice (D): In the third paragraph, Faye Ginsburg is quoted as saying that “no Western object that has entered cultural circulation since the fifteenth century has been neutral” (lines 31-34). However, she makes no reference to the specific Western technologies that entered cultural circulation in the fifteenth century, making this answer choice incorrect.

Answer choice (E): Although inexpensive video equipment is now available worldwide (first paragraph), the author never explains why such equipment became inexpensive.

[deck1134]

I understand why B-E are incorrect, but do not understand what the answer to "Why do the Kayapo use video technology to create legal records?" would be. Would the answer be "to provide legally binding records?"

If so, that would prephrase to: "they use video technology to create legal records so that they can create legal records?"

[Jennifer Janowsky]

Hey, Deck1134!

The line you summarized in your question (47) is the right one to be looking at, and it’s the following: “Kayapo use video to document … transactions with representatives … to provide legally binding records of the transactions.

So, the Kayapo use video technology to create legal records because it makes them binding. It’s a small distinction and seems repetitive at first—as you mentioned. But it’s there!

[nmgee]

I had somewhat of a problem with (A), because I saw its purported answer as a sort of "circular" response...
i.e. Q: "Why do the K use video tech to create legal records?"
A: "To create legally binding records" (lines 50-51).

It didn't seem to me the passage explained why they use it, more an explanation of the fact that it is a method they use.

Could someone please help break down whatever distinction there is between the question and what its answer would be? If the question in (A) had been "Why do the K use video tech to record transactions with reps of the government?", I can clearly see how that could be answered by lines 50-51, but as the question stands, its answer seems to be redundant in relation to the question (A) poses.

[Adam Tyson]

I think Jennifer's analysis is on point here, nmgee, in that it distinguishes between a record and a binding record, so it's not completely repetitive and redundant, but there is another bit of text that we have thus far overlooked in this discussion, and that is found a few lines earlier. Why do the Kayapo use video technology to create legal records? Because they are "primarily an oral society"! Without the videos, they would have no record at all, since they are an oral society rather than one that relies on the written word. That text also helps us to answer the question posed in Answer A, making it the best answer of the bunch.