LSAT Question Explanation
PT 108, Section 3, Question 15
Identify the FlawArgument structure
These historians neglect many important repositories of historical knowledge.
Most historians surveyed regarded written texts as the best source for historical understanding. None of the historians regarded the other sources to be the best.
Explanation
Just because the historians think written text is the best source doesn't mean that they are neglecting the other sources. Maybe they use those sources and think they're great, just not the absolute best.
This is a false dichotomy. There is a middle ground between something being the best and being neglected that the author is ignoring.
Answer choices
This is out of scope of the conclusion. The author isn't assuming these are the only sources, just arguing that the historians neglect the art sources because they don't consider them to be the best.
This is out of scope of the argument. The argument is just claiming that these sources are neglected as historical sources.
The author assumes that if sources are not the best, then they are neglected. This answer choice points out that the author has created a false dichotomy.
The author doesn't assume that something besides written texts may be the best. The argument just assumes that everything that isn't considered the best by historians in the survey must be neglected.
The author certainly doesn't take this for granted. If anything the author seems to indicate that the sources mentioned are important.