@Carolinehink1 This is a level one difficulty. If you click on "show question" on top (near the comments tab) and then go to analytics, it will show you. I'm using a mac and that's how it shows up for me. Hope this helps!
What is the best way to determine whether a definition following a technical term (such as the bit about acoustical range) is provided solely for comprehension purposes or is independently relevant to the argument as a whole?
@Katharína For most LSAT questions, technical terms will be comprehension. LSAT will include elaboration or definition as some ideas are not general knowledge
I find it hard to focus on his videos but I feel as if in the initial video the speaker tends to over-explain or like confuse me more than when I started. Does anyone feel the same or is it just me?
Wouldn't E be contradictory... I may be mistaken here, if anyone can elaborate on the logic of this for me I would really appreciate it. If the passage says "the killer whales do not seem to behave differently around running boat engines" and E says "Killer whales would probably be more successful in finding food if boats did not travel through their habitats." then wouldn't this be contradictory to the claim in the passage?
Not necessarily. These two are independent from one another -- the killer whales' success in finding food is separate from whether there are changes in behaviour due to the noise. Whether they are successful in finding food or not may have to do with many other factors separate from behaviour, it is not implied nor does it follow that just because they do not seem to behave differently around the boat engines that they would probably be more successful in finding food in the absence of the boats.
In doing so you are assuming that there is an implied connection between the two despite the fact that the stimulus mentions nothing about their ability to hunt for food -- its main claims regard communication. Hope this helps!
C felt extremely obvious. I got the answer within like 15 seconds of reading the answers after the stimulus. Should it feel that obvious? All the other answer choices were clearly incorrect to me.
Answers feeling obvious is a great sign that things are becoming more intuitive for you. However, this is a very easy question. There will be many more questions whose answer will not feel obvious whatsoever, especially under time restraints. So it is good to learn how to answer questions even when you are unsure.
I thought this too, but communication inherently implies an exchange of information. Well if you can't hear the information given to you, how can you possibly communicate? If I say hello to a deaf person, but they can't hear the sound or see my lips, are we properly communicating? I would say no.
You might next think; "Well there are other forms of communication outside of sound!" Well yes this is true, our argument tells out right that these whales communicate through sound (screams and squeals). Trying to come up with any other form of communication outside of that is purely an assumption on our part, because it exists outside the parameters this argument.
Not an assumption, because the premise says that whales communicate through screams and squeals which they hear, so not being able to hear these screams means not being able to communicate.
I got down to B and C. However I eliminated B because of the language "less likely". Would this still be a correct way to answer this. What I thought was it only said that there communication would be affected not that their less likely to want to communicate. I thought that even though it's affected they still may want to communicate.
I understand how we eliminated B based off biting in outside information but couldn't we also just have eliminated B by pointing to the author's concession point where it says killer whales tend to not behave differently around these boat noises so essentially not making it either more likely or less likely for them to communicate
I was between B and C and was very reluctant to pick C because of the strength of such conclusion comparable to B. However, I came to the same realization that JY did: if they don't behave differently, then they wouldn't be more or less likely to communicate. Made C the only answer choice that flowed from the passage.
Taking the time to carefully translate and understand the stimulus increases my chances of selecting the correct answer. I focus on thoroughly comprehending the passage, and that is my main focus when reviewing the answer choices. I also make sure to highlight indicators to avoid selecting the wrong answer. I tend to fall short when i do not focus on indicators also. it changes the meaning almost instantly.
Like other comments I was also thinking A could be supported because of the "over time" line in the stim. But that relies on an assumption I was making about how long these whales have been around boats. I was assuming they have been around boats for their whole lives. But, if boats showed up yesterday, the older and younger whales would have been around them for the same amount of time, having the same hearing damage.
I see why the correct answer is what it is, but this question is a good example of something I have been struggling with, which is differentiating between making assumptions and using context clues from the stimulus. I feel like sometimes it is wrong to use context clues (this stimulus is a good example), but other times it is good to use them... Can someone help me with this? I tend to do this A LOT and don't know how to not overthink it like I do.
Here is an example for this passage. When the stimulus said "engine noise from boats can be loud enough to damage their hearing over time", I look at answer choice A and think:
"well, older killer whales would have more exposure to the noise than younger ones would, which is supported by the "over time" part of the stimulus, and since damaged things tend to not be able to tolerate whatever damaged it in the first as well as one that is less damaged, then it should be that older whales are able to tolerate the noise less than younger ones, so that could make sense."
I see how that might be flawed because you assume that older whales have more exposure to the noise than younger ones do, but does anyone have any advice on how to stop overthinking questions like this? I always use up time and end up getting the wrong answer by doing this.
I completely agree. I have read books that contradict this information. We will be doing one section and the author says that the LSAT does not care what you know of the real world, we stick to what they type as being true, but then in answering other questions that same author has said, "Now we know that this is not at all true just by living, so we can eliminate these answer choices, and that has made me struggle trying to maintain when I can use real world knowledge to get to certain answers on certain tests.
Even went as far as saying on Necessary Assumption questions, the answer does not come from neither the conclusion or the support alone, but directly from the relationship of the reasoning between the two, so that is how I answered a few questions with that mindset and got them wrong because the answer was directly a restatement of the conclusion.
This is a well known author with well known books. To say I have restarted all of my fundamentals to focus on each type to not be confused is an understatement.
I think the main challenge here is to look at ONLY what the passage says. The passage is the only thing where we can get any kind of support from to come up with a conclusion because the question type is not asking us to infer anything from the choices. The only things we have to go off of to formulate a conclusion are said explicitly in the rest of the passage.
Another thing is that "over time" is vague, and nothing about time is inherently correlated with age like what choice A is getting at. For example, let's assume exposure to a certain sound frequency over time is bad for a dolphin's ability to communicate, but does that mean it has to be exposed from birth until a certain age for the deleterious effects to kick in? What if the dolphin is middle aged and suddenly gets a lot of exposure to boat noise in that range? Or a geriatric dolphin lives in a place where a new boating route is established and it gets repeated exposure? Isn't the effect (reduced ability to communicate) the same for all of these groups? Again, nothing about time is inherently correlated with age like what choice A is getting at, and we have to make assumptions (which isn't what this question type wants us to do) for A to be right.
While it's a great skill to think about A and find a way to make A work, the question type isn't about finding a way to make it work. That talent will be more helpful with other question types tho!
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57 comments
i like that it has lessons to review
#feedback it would be interesting to see the difficulty of these sample questions
@Carolinehink1 This is a level one difficulty. If you click on "show question" on top (near the comments tab) and then go to analytics, it will show you. I'm using a mac and that's how it shows up for me. Hope this helps!
A cooked me
u cooked on this one
@ZachistheLawyerinCharge No better way to put it Zach who is indeed in charge.
What is the best way to determine whether a definition following a technical term (such as the bit about acoustical range) is provided solely for comprehension purposes or is independently relevant to the argument as a whole?
@Katharína For most LSAT questions, technical terms will be comprehension. LSAT will include elaboration or definition as some ideas are not general knowledge
This was excellent
This was a great lesson, definitely helped clear up a bit of the confusion from the previous lesson
Wow, this really is like a puzzle set, you find two pieces and so you try to find the right piece to fit in with those two pieces (or more)
I cannot see the video, only audio. Why is that?!
I find it hard to focus on his videos but I feel as if in the initial video the speaker tends to over-explain or like confuse me more than when I started. Does anyone feel the same or is it just me?
@AamaniThompsonlaw25 I agree, I've realized sometimes it helps if I end the video early and move on.
is this super easy for anyone else? i knew the answer right away
@DillonDavidesfahani yes. I would love lessons like this on some of the level 5 difficulty questions. Maybe those will appear later in the course
@DillonDavidesfahani Do you want a cookie?
I also thought B was wrong because it says it doesn't change their behavior and communicating is a behavior.
Wouldn't E be contradictory... I may be mistaken here, if anyone can elaborate on the logic of this for me I would really appreciate it. If the passage says "the killer whales do not seem to behave differently around running boat engines" and E says "Killer whales would probably be more successful in finding food if boats did not travel through their habitats." then wouldn't this be contradictory to the claim in the passage?
Not necessarily. These two are independent from one another -- the killer whales' success in finding food is separate from whether there are changes in behaviour due to the noise. Whether they are successful in finding food or not may have to do with many other factors separate from behaviour, it is not implied nor does it follow that just because they do not seem to behave differently around the boat engines that they would probably be more successful in finding food in the absence of the boats.
In doing so you are assuming that there is an implied connection between the two despite the fact that the stimulus mentions nothing about their ability to hunt for food -- its main claims regard communication. Hope this helps!
C felt extremely obvious. I got the answer within like 15 seconds of reading the answers after the stimulus. Should it feel that obvious? All the other answer choices were clearly incorrect to me.
Answers feeling obvious is a great sign that things are becoming more intuitive for you. However, this is a very easy question. There will be many more questions whose answer will not feel obvious whatsoever, especially under time restraints. So it is good to learn how to answer questions even when you are unsure.
Is there a small assumption in C being made that by impairing their ability to communicate is the same as damaging their hearing loss?
I thought this too, but communication inherently implies an exchange of information. Well if you can't hear the information given to you, how can you possibly communicate? If I say hello to a deaf person, but they can't hear the sound or see my lips, are we properly communicating? I would say no.
You might next think; "Well there are other forms of communication outside of sound!" Well yes this is true, our argument tells out right that these whales communicate through sound (screams and squeals). Trying to come up with any other form of communication outside of that is purely an assumption on our part, because it exists outside the parameters this argument.
Not an assumption, because the premise says that whales communicate through screams and squeals which they hear, so not being able to hear these screams means not being able to communicate.
communicate -> hearing screams
/hearing screams -> /communicate
I got down to B and C. However I eliminated B because of the language "less likely". Would this still be a correct way to answer this. What I thought was it only said that there communication would be affected not that their less likely to want to communicate. I thought that even though it's affected they still may want to communicate.
I understand how we eliminated B based off biting in outside information but couldn't we also just have eliminated B by pointing to the author's concession point where it says killer whales tend to not behave differently around these boat noises so essentially not making it either more likely or less likely for them to communicate
This was one of the reasons it was not supported by the answer choice.
Nice
I was between B and C and was very reluctant to pick C because of the strength of such conclusion comparable to B. However, I came to the same realization that JY did: if they don't behave differently, then they wouldn't be more or less likely to communicate. Made C the only answer choice that flowed from the passage.
YES!!!
got correct!!
Taking the time to carefully translate and understand the stimulus increases my chances of selecting the correct answer. I focus on thoroughly comprehending the passage, and that is my main focus when reviewing the answer choices. I also make sure to highlight indicators to avoid selecting the wrong answer. I tend to fall short when i do not focus on indicators also. it changes the meaning almost instantly.
Is it safe to say that would should eliminate any new info outside of the passage in our answer choices?
Whatever you feel would help you the most, do it.
Like other comments I was also thinking A could be supported because of the "over time" line in the stim. But that relies on an assumption I was making about how long these whales have been around boats. I was assuming they have been around boats for their whole lives. But, if boats showed up yesterday, the older and younger whales would have been around them for the same amount of time, having the same hearing damage.
I see why the correct answer is what it is, but this question is a good example of something I have been struggling with, which is differentiating between making assumptions and using context clues from the stimulus. I feel like sometimes it is wrong to use context clues (this stimulus is a good example), but other times it is good to use them... Can someone help me with this? I tend to do this A LOT and don't know how to not overthink it like I do.
Here is an example for this passage. When the stimulus said "engine noise from boats can be loud enough to damage their hearing over time", I look at answer choice A and think:
"well, older killer whales would have more exposure to the noise than younger ones would, which is supported by the "over time" part of the stimulus, and since damaged things tend to not be able to tolerate whatever damaged it in the first as well as one that is less damaged, then it should be that older whales are able to tolerate the noise less than younger ones, so that could make sense."
I see how that might be flawed because you assume that older whales have more exposure to the noise than younger ones do, but does anyone have any advice on how to stop overthinking questions like this? I always use up time and end up getting the wrong answer by doing this.
I completely agree. I have read books that contradict this information. We will be doing one section and the author says that the LSAT does not care what you know of the real world, we stick to what they type as being true, but then in answering other questions that same author has said, "Now we know that this is not at all true just by living, so we can eliminate these answer choices, and that has made me struggle trying to maintain when I can use real world knowledge to get to certain answers on certain tests.
Even went as far as saying on Necessary Assumption questions, the answer does not come from neither the conclusion or the support alone, but directly from the relationship of the reasoning between the two, so that is how I answered a few questions with that mindset and got them wrong because the answer was directly a restatement of the conclusion.
This is a well known author with well known books. To say I have restarted all of my fundamentals to focus on each type to not be confused is an understatement.
I think the main challenge here is to look at ONLY what the passage says. The passage is the only thing where we can get any kind of support from to come up with a conclusion because the question type is not asking us to infer anything from the choices. The only things we have to go off of to formulate a conclusion are said explicitly in the rest of the passage.
Another thing is that "over time" is vague, and nothing about time is inherently correlated with age like what choice A is getting at. For example, let's assume exposure to a certain sound frequency over time is bad for a dolphin's ability to communicate, but does that mean it has to be exposed from birth until a certain age for the deleterious effects to kick in? What if the dolphin is middle aged and suddenly gets a lot of exposure to boat noise in that range? Or a geriatric dolphin lives in a place where a new boating route is established and it gets repeated exposure? Isn't the effect (reduced ability to communicate) the same for all of these groups? Again, nothing about time is inherently correlated with age like what choice A is getting at, and we have to make assumptions (which isn't what this question type wants us to do) for A to be right.
While it's a great skill to think about A and find a way to make A work, the question type isn't about finding a way to make it work. That talent will be more helpful with other question types tho!
I normally despise these questions when I see them, but ngl this really helped me see how to solve them perfectly.