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https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-41-section-3-question-23
I understand the reasoning in the video, that just because X is preceded by Y, it doesn’t mean that Y is the necessary condition.
However in the other forums that I have ventured, the instructors would diagram the conditional as
Every Major War in the last 200 years -> Sharp increase in acquisition of weapons.
I understand that “every” introduces a sufficient condition, but if we accept that “is preceded by” is not a necessary condition, then could the conditional statement stated above still be valid?
Thanks!
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Yes, the conditional above is still true since it necessarily follows that in every single major war occurring in the past 200 years there must have been a build up of arms.
However, the flaw isn't a problem with the conditional statement, it's with the causal implications present in the conclusion. The conclusion isn't talking about the major wars in the past 200 years, but FUTURE wars. Conditional relationships do not imply causal relationships. In other words, the only conclusion we can draw from the information given is about the major wars from the past 200 years; we know nothing about what will cause or not cause wars in other time periods (namely, the future).
If you are curious about arguments that make this flaw, Google post hoc ergo propter hoc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc
Bumping this to the top so more people see it!