求助另一道LSAT的解题方法（明白了）

lisiberry

The problem that environmental economics aims to remedy is the following: people making economic decisions cannot readily compare environmental factors, such as clean air and the survival of endangered species, with other costs and benefits. As environmental economists recognize, solving this problem requires assigning monetary values to environmental factors. But monetary values result from people comparing costs and benefits in order to arrive at economic decisions. Thus, environmental economics is stymied by what motivates it.

If the considerations advanced in its support are true, the passages conclusion is supported
(A) strongly, on the assumption that monetary values for environment factors cannot be assigned unless people make economic decisions about these factors
(B) strongly, unless economic decision-making has not yet had any effect on the things categorized as environmental factors
(C) at best weakly, because the passage fails to establish that economic decision-makers do not by and large take adequate account of environmental factors
(D) at best weakly, because the argument assumes that pollution and other effects on environmental factors rarely result from economic decision-making
(E) not at all, since the argument is circular, taking that conclusion as one of its premises


答案：A
大家，请教个问题。
这道题提干的每句话都明白，就是最后2句话的因果关系就是打死也看不明白了But monetary values result from people comparing costs and benefits in order to arrive at economic decisions. Thus, environmental economics is stymied by what motivates it.


请问如何解释这两句话的因果关系呢？

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明白了，请看下面答案。

This is a challenging question with which to end this LR section. The stimulus opens by pointing out that environmental economics aims to address the problem that people cannot readily compare ecological costs and benefits with other costs and benefits. Next, the stimulus states that the solution must involve assigning monetary values to environmental factors. Third, and problematically (as indicated by "but" at the start of the third sentence), monetary values result from people comparing costs and benefits to arrive at economic decisions. The stimulus then concludes that environmental economics is stymied (which means "frustrated" or "stopped") by what motivates it.

The dilemma is that making easy comparisons requires being able to assign monetary values, But, monetary values actually result from comparisons in the first place. Thus, we have a problem with a circular aspect: to have X happen you need Y to happen, but to have Y happen, you need X to happen. Don't confuse the circular aspect of the dilemma with a flawed circular argument—that's not what is happening here. A flawed circular argument basically assumes the conclusion is true (often via restatement of a premise or via an assumption of the argument that turns out to be identical to the conclusion). In this argument the author is describing a problem where two things basically require each other to happen, and in that situation, it's tough to get the whole process started. That's a tricky concept, so let's use an analogy to help make it