tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post8309352343513721897..comments2024-03-29T09:30:20.418-04:00Comments on LSAT Blog: LSAT Unplugged YouTube / Podcast: Most Strongly Supported Logical Reasoning QuestionsUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-91409721175838033602020-09-14T13:53:30.414-04:002020-09-14T13:53:30.414-04:00Super helpful distinction between claimed causal e...Super helpful distinction between claimed causal effect and a guaranteed trigger-result relationship, if I'm reading this correctly. Thanks, Evan & Steve for this exchange! Alisanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-64832107832630546862014-06-22T21:12:48.346-04:002014-06-22T21:12:48.346-04:00I really enjoyed your article on most strongly sup...I really enjoyed your article on most strongly supported questions. I would like to bring something to your attention. I discovered two different types of MSS questions:<br /><br />1. “The statements above, if true, most strongly support which one of the following?”<br />2. “Which of the following, if true, most strongly supports the statement above?”<br /><br />I think that the first MSS is a subset of Must Be True. <br />The second MSS is a strengthening question.<br /><br />If a student assumes that any stem that mentions "most strongly supported" is a subset of MBT, then they might miss that question.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-87377270898135999542011-04-02T17:57:29.697-04:002011-04-02T17:57:29.697-04:00Steve,
I am having a lot of trouble with PT 38 S...Steve,<br /><br /> I am having a lot of trouble with PT 38 S4, #25. On your study guide you have it listed as a MBT question, but is it a MBT (Except) question since it read:<br />The claims made above are compatible with each of the following EXCEPT:<br /><br />I am so confused by this question because it seems that the correct answer (D) is the only one that is compatible instead of being the only one that is not compatible.Erinnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-65540168988841815012011-02-03T13:54:51.331-05:002011-02-03T13:54:51.331-05:00Ok, having now gone through all the MBT and Most S...Ok, having now gone through all the MBT and Most Strongly Supported questions from PTs 1-20...DUH. The MSS questions are almost entirely different questions to me. The normally strict standard I apply to MBT does not hold for MSS, so I have in as many as 3 or 4 cases eliminated all of the answers and been unhappy with having to choose in the first place. These questions require turning off the strict rules--in that way they remind me of some of the reading comprehension questions that ask, for instance, which of the following would the author most likely support, i.e. the other MSS questions on the test, and in general one of the more uneasy questions available in my view.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-38402014000258096152011-01-23T18:45:03.480-05:002011-01-23T18:45:03.480-05:00http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/...http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/16-07/pb_theory/#/<br /><br />Take a look, correlation is all that matters in our Google world!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-51687972609357528862009-12-01T09:07:21.331-05:002009-12-01T09:07:21.331-05:00WOW, if what you say is correct then you have expl...WOW, if what you say is correct then you have explained what I have been struggling with the entire day. Could you please take a look at DEC 2001 Section 1 #4 about antidepressants? I don't think the answer is a Must Be True in that the people taking the drugs could be only taking those that do NOT cause weight gain (since only MOST of the drugs cause weight gain). PLEASE let me know if you agree. Thanks!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-27670887478866907842009-11-11T04:27:03.800-05:002009-11-11T04:27:03.800-05:00Hi Steve, been following your blog for some time. ...Hi Steve, been following your blog for some time. I think another good example is PT 39, Sec. 4, Q. 16? The one regarding Cezanne as an early modernist? Not sure if this fits the bill. Thanks.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-38968720336218803242009-11-05T08:41:29.077-05:002009-11-05T08:41:29.077-05:00Hey steve, If many can encompass all, can some enc...Hey steve, If many can encompass all, can some encompass none(no one)? an example of this would be in test 29 ques. #18 the answer is E) "Some persons ....do not live in the suburbs" but the stimulus clearly states that "no one on the planning committee lives in the suburbs.."Ricardonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-60142223690643281942009-10-29T20:22:09.820-04:002009-10-29T20:22:09.820-04:00This is a great question, Evan, and I'm glad y...This is a great question, Evan, and I'm glad you asked it. It's important to fully engage with everything you come across.<br /><br />This relationship in the stimulus is temporal (time-related). Just because ramp installations, etc., occur before wheelchair users' arrivals, this doesn't mean the ramp installations, etc., <b>themselves</b> caused the arrival of the wheelchair users. (That would be the correlation/causation post hoc fallacy.)<br /><br />The ramps, etc., installations could simply be a signal/effect of something else (like nice/mean business area managers).<br /><br />To directly answer your first (implied) question: Yes, this is a sufficient/necessary situation. Your diagramming is accurate.<br /><br />However, the contrapositive : No WC ---> No ramps, etc. is <b>not</b> what the credited response (correct answer) says. <br /><br />The correct answer contains information that is not 100% supported by the stimulus. We don't know for certain that it is the lack of proper accommodations itself preventing the WC folks from coming to the business area.<br /><br />Although it is quite <b>likely</b> that it is, it is not <b>necessarily</b> the case.Steve Schwartzhttp://lsatblog.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-62625674998351067312009-10-29T19:24:07.842-04:002009-10-29T19:24:07.842-04:00Still trying to figure this out so forgive my igno...Still trying to figure this out so forgive my ignorance.<br /><br />In PT 33, III, 13 it looks like there is a sufficient/necessary situation in the stimulus:<br /><br />Ramps etc. installed —> Wheelchair folks come<br /><br />And the contrapositive would be:<br /><br />Wheelchair folks don't come —> No ramps etc. installed<br /><br />Does this not make it a Must Be True question? Or perhaps the wording does not necessitate that. What do you think?Evannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10294095.post-50943898812011551412009-10-29T16:44:02.498-04:002009-10-29T16:44:02.498-04:00Now, an example from a recent exam where the answe...Now, an example from a recent exam where the answer to a Most Strongly Supported question is something that is Most Likely to Be True but does not have to be true:<br /><br /><b>June 2007, Section 2, Question 18</b> - Most researchers / climate change<br />(page 13 of the <a href="http://www.lsac.org/pdfs/SamplePTJune.pdf" rel="nofollow">free June 2007 LSAT PDF</a>, numbered as page 11 in the upper-right corner)<br /><br />Given incentives, etc., the credited response is Most Likely To Be True. However, it doesn't <b>have</b> to be true. In fact, with regard to this stimulus, another LSAT question could have easily pointed out a vulnerability (flaw) - something the author failed to consider. The same is true of the above example with the wheelchair users, by the way.<br /><br />Perhaps scientists aren't motivated by recognition. Maybe they just want to be left alone to run their experiments and studies without any paparazzi hassling them. In that case, they would have a *disincentive* to go against the norm and make waves. They can still show that other, less sexy, hypotheses are incorrect (this is, after all, the foundation of modern science according to the stimulus' evidence) without discrediting the global warming hypothesis in particular, which might bring unwanted attention.Steve Schwartzhttp://lsatblog.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com