Before I watched the video I literally solved it like "if there are fewer then 50 people per year AND duplicate more than 25% THEN a proposal for a new department will not be funded" and instinctively knew the answer would be something about having at least 50 or more people in the department before i read the rest of the stimulus. when the stimulus mentioned that there will be a duplicate of 25% that automatically means there are at least 50 people in the department. Im not sure if i solved it the right way in my head but the way the video explained the embedded conditionals was just very confusing
@MLugo1998 You can use the "Show question" button right below the title. That gives you the entire question to evaluate before looking at the rest of the lesson.
University administrator: Any proposal for a new department will not be funded if there are
Fewer than 50 people per year available for hire in that field and
the proposed department would duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in one of our existing departments.
The proposed Area Studies Department will duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in our existing Anthropology Department.
However, we will fund the new department.
Which one of the following statements follows logically from the university administrator's statements?
a. The field of Area Studies has at least 50 people per year available for hire. 50 or more so correct.
b. The proposed Area Studies Department would not duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in any existing department other than Anthropology. Incorrect.
c. If the proposed Area Studies Department did not duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in Anthropology, then the new department would not be funded. Incorrect.
d. The Anthropology Department duplicates more than 25 percent of the material covered in the proposed Area Studies Department.
e. The field of Area Studies has fewer than 50 people per year available for hire. Incorrect.
This felt so intuitive to me. It was just clear that the answer would be that the new department has at least 50 people to hire. Is it necessary to diagram when you intuitively know the answer? Or is it a best practice to diagram only when you're not so sure?
@CheyenneBandy diagramming takes time so if you intuitively know, you should answer and move on. Diagramming feels more useful when you need to eliminate answers.
I'm confused about the "and" between both necessary conditions. I thought if it was AND instead of OR that means both apply? As in, if both occur then the department would not be funded
I found this video explanation to be concise. Though it is long , I still paused and wrote down all the breakdowns from sentence 1 to 3. It is a lot of note taking but, if the questions are this detailed, I would rather do that now than NOT during the test.
I feel like the video explanations for questions in the lessons are way to long and include so much unnecessary info. It makes it hard to pay attention and distinguish between useful and fluff information.
proposal not funded if <50 people for hire and >25% duplication
Area Studies proposal will be funded
>25% duplication? yes
<50 people for hire? no --> why? because if there were <50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
A) must be true. if there were fewer than 50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
B) doesn't matter if the proposed department duplicates material in more than one existing department. we already know it duplicates more than 25% of the material in anthropology and that is enough to know that one of the conditions for not receiving funding has been met.
C) it could still be funded with less than 25% duplication. we know only that funding will be witheld if there is more than 25% duplication and less than 50 people for hire. So less than 25% duplication could lead to funding (regardless of hiring avaialbility)
D) We don't know the amount of material in each department so we cannot determine whether or not this is true. Let's say that 'material' = books. anthropology department = 100 books and area studies department = 500 books. 50 of the books overlap (are in both departments). This means that area studies duplicates 50% of the material covered in anthropology, but anthropology duplicates only 10% of the material covered in area studies.
E) cannot be true. if there were fewer than 50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
[No funding if less than 50 people and more than 25% duplication; X has more than 25% duplication so we will fund]
Then another commenter mentioned that conjunctions like this REQUIRE both conditions to occur, if only one occurs then the conclusion still follows. Contrapositive and make OR
Is it correct to say "I wont play basketball with my bro if he is wearing a red shirt and pants. He's not wearing pants, so I'll play basketball with my bro".
Can you explain in greater detail why answer choice C is incorrect. I am trying to write out the reasoning for each incorrect answer choice. The explanation in the video did not really pinpoint why C was incorrect other than, "I don't know if that is true"
@ckimballdeaguero805 I did the same. I kicked up to the domain the term "proposal" and followed the conditional claim: Less than 50... and duplicate 25%... → /funding. However, I'm not too sure if this might cause an opportunity to fall for a trap answer.
I hope you don't mind me responding to another one of your comments—I responded to one at the end of the PAI/Disagree section. I promise that the best thing you can do for yourself is just to practice, and practice a lot. The best bit of advice I've received, and one thats emphasized here through blind review, is to take it really slow at first. I would do drills and take an hour to finish them, making sure I got it right. Of course, I'd still get 2 wrong out of 25 or something, but I would mostly come to understand why those were wrong. Over time, I realized that I was coming to answers faster and with more certainty. It can take a while, but once you can understand the question stem (stimulus) and the basic argument at a glance, you have more time to think about what the right answer should be. And what the wrong answer should be. And that makes it easier/faster to find the right answer.
This question, for example. I kept the video paused at the first second, read the stem, and then read the argument. I recognized almost immediately that it was a kind of either/or question. "If less than 50 and more than 25, no funding. We know there will be funding, and we know more than 25 (percent of material will be duplicated)." So, before the answer choices were even revealed, I had some idea that we were looking for something which stated "more than 50 (new hires per year)." That means that when I see an answer choice like D, which speaks only about some x duplicating more than 25%, I can eliminate it without even a second thought. The professor surprised me when he pointed out that D swapped the named departments. I eliminated it for a separate and more basic reason. His reasoning is more solid, but its also more time consuming and thought intensive.
So, if your LSAT date is more than a few months from now, don't worry about timing. At some point, you'll see that C states "x is better than y if...." and you will be able to instantly eliminate it as a choice because you know the question didn't mention any comparative value measurement, or because you know you need to look for something which mentions y's relationship to z and not x's relationship to y.
Hopefully this was helpful. Sorry for typing an essay at you!
Correct me if I'm wrong but since "25% and 50< and proposal → /funded," the contrapositive would be "funded→ /25% or /50< or /proposal" and we know "25%" and "proposal" is true, so that would make "/50<" true, right?
I negated the "and" to "or" when translating to the contrapositive. This made it simpler for me to understand, if my logic is incorrect let me know. The stimulus says that it is funded as well so the contrapositive would not be hypothetical anymore but be proven.
This entire question is contradictory... If two requirements must be met for ANY proposal to be funded, then shouldn't the "and" in that sentence be changed to "or?" It's almost as if the whole first sentence means absolutely nothing lmao
I thought the same thing at first and just reservedly answered A. But I think that I got mixed up by thinking that this question was saying that if you meet either of these conditions, the new department would not be funded. But the question is actually saying if you meet both conditions your department will not be funded. Since it only met one condition, the department will be funded. ig lol
Not gunna lie, theres no need for the breakdown and I feel it makes it over complicated for people to underdstand, I got this question right with like 30 seconds.. super easy. My logic to this was it concluded it would fund the new program even though it was going to doup 25% more material, so the only other variable was it needs to have more then 50 people. I went to the answer choices, completely ignored everything that didnt talk about 50 people. There was only two choices, one saying less then 50 and one saying at least 50. If it needs 50 then the lesser is wrong right off the rip which leaves you with A... at least 50.
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123 comments
Why cant it be the area studies department isn't new, maybe it's old and got shut down?
It's possible but is not logically followed by the stimulus.
Before I watched the video I literally solved it like "if there are fewer then 50 people per year AND duplicate more than 25% THEN a proposal for a new department will not be funded" and instinctively knew the answer would be something about having at least 50 or more people in the department before i read the rest of the stimulus. when the stimulus mentioned that there will be a duplicate of 25% that automatically means there are at least 50 people in the department. Im not sure if i solved it the right way in my head but the way the video explained the embedded conditionals was just very confusing
I gave up the video part from the last charpter
[This comment was deleted.]
@MLugo1998 You can use the "Show question" button right below the title. That gives you the entire question to evaluate before looking at the rest of the lesson.
University administrator: Any proposal for a new department will not be funded if there are
Fewer than 50 people per year available for hire in that field and
the proposed department would duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in one of our existing departments.
The proposed Area Studies Department will duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in our existing Anthropology Department.
However, we will fund the new department.
Which one of the following statements follows logically from the university administrator's statements?
a. The field of Area Studies has at least 50 people per year available for hire. 50 or more so correct.
b. The proposed Area Studies Department would not duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in any existing department other than Anthropology. Incorrect.
c. If the proposed Area Studies Department did not duplicate more than 25 percent of the material covered in Anthropology, then the new department would not be funded. Incorrect.
d. The Anthropology Department duplicates more than 25 percent of the material covered in the proposed Area Studies Department.
e. The field of Area Studies has fewer than 50 people per year available for hire. Incorrect.
I totally confused "and" for "or" on this one. But it makes sense now
This felt so intuitive to me. It was just clear that the answer would be that the new department has at least 50 people to hire. Is it necessary to diagram when you intuitively know the answer? Or is it a best practice to diagram only when you're not so sure?
@CheyenneBandy diagramming takes time so if you intuitively know, you should answer and move on. Diagramming feels more useful when you need to eliminate answers.
I'm confused about the "and" between both necessary conditions. I thought if it was AND instead of OR that means both apply? As in, if both occur then the department would not be funded
@hebakalises You are correct, in case of AND both sufficient have to be true for the necessary to be true. In this case the logic is:
Domain: New Department
(fewer than 50 and duplicate 25+) -> /funded.
The stimulus tells us that "duplicate 25+" is true and the department is "funded".
So, the contrapositive using De Morgan's would be:
Funded -> /fewer than 50 or /duplicate 25+.
Therefore the answer is "not fewer than 50" which means 50 or more. Hence, choice A.
overexplanation
I found this video explanation to be concise. Though it is long , I still paused and wrote down all the breakdowns from sentence 1 to 3. It is a lot of note taking but, if the questions are this detailed, I would rather do that now than NOT during the test.
I feel like the video explanations for questions in the lessons are way to long and include so much unnecessary info. It makes it hard to pay attention and distinguish between useful and fluff information.
@sydneybouwman my exact thoughts. I've learned to turn the video off after a certain point
This writing is so messy, I can barely read it.
proposal not funded if <50 people for hire and >25% duplication
Area Studies proposal will be funded
>25% duplication? yes
<50 people for hire? no --> why? because if there were <50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
A) must be true. if there were fewer than 50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
B) doesn't matter if the proposed department duplicates material in more than one existing department. we already know it duplicates more than 25% of the material in anthropology and that is enough to know that one of the conditions for not receiving funding has been met.
C) it could still be funded with less than 25% duplication. we know only that funding will be witheld if there is more than 25% duplication and less than 50 people for hire. So less than 25% duplication could lead to funding (regardless of hiring avaialbility)
D) We don't know the amount of material in each department so we cannot determine whether or not this is true. Let's say that 'material' = books. anthropology department = 100 books and area studies department = 500 books. 50 of the books overlap (are in both departments). This means that area studies duplicates 50% of the material covered in anthropology, but anthropology duplicates only 10% of the material covered in area studies.
E) cannot be true. if there were fewer than 50 people for hire, the proposal would not have been funded
The stimulus broke my brain at first:
[No funding if less than 50 people and more than 25% duplication; X has more than 25% duplication so we will fund]
Then another commenter mentioned that conjunctions like this REQUIRE both conditions to occur, if only one occurs then the conclusion still follows. Contrapositive and make OR
Is it correct to say "I wont play basketball with my bro if he is wearing a red shirt and pants. He's not wearing pants, so I'll play basketball with my bro".
Can you explain in greater detail why answer choice C is incorrect. I am trying to write out the reasoning for each incorrect answer choice. The explanation in the video did not really pinpoint why C was incorrect other than, "I don't know if that is true"
hi a bit confused I missed why we would make this a conjunctive ? You did not explain why box and proposal should be conjunct.
I find this explanation video unnecessarily detailed and too confusing. It is much simpler to break it down as follows:
less than 50... and duplicate 25%... → /funding.
The stimulus says there will be funding. So take the contrapositive.
funding →/less than 50... OR /duplicate 25%.....
Since the stimulus says there is a duplicate 25%..., then there must not be less than 50 people available for hire.
@ckimballdeaguero805 I did the same. I kicked up to the domain the term "proposal" and followed the conditional claim: Less than 50... and duplicate 25%... → /funding. However, I'm not too sure if this might cause an opportunity to fall for a trap answer.
@ckimballdeaguero805 Thank you, this is very helpful!!
pov: you're at the end of the road
we'll get there, keep truckin
facts!
Shouldn't "proposal" be kicked up to the domain? So it would be >25% and 25% or /<50).
Every time I submit my comment it changes my formatting, nevermind.
I understand but how do we do this under timed situations? because I can answer the questions just fine but I cannot do this so fast
I hope you don't mind me responding to another one of your comments—I responded to one at the end of the PAI/Disagree section. I promise that the best thing you can do for yourself is just to practice, and practice a lot. The best bit of advice I've received, and one thats emphasized here through blind review, is to take it really slow at first. I would do drills and take an hour to finish them, making sure I got it right. Of course, I'd still get 2 wrong out of 25 or something, but I would mostly come to understand why those were wrong. Over time, I realized that I was coming to answers faster and with more certainty. It can take a while, but once you can understand the question stem (stimulus) and the basic argument at a glance, you have more time to think about what the right answer should be. And what the wrong answer should be. And that makes it easier/faster to find the right answer.
This question, for example. I kept the video paused at the first second, read the stem, and then read the argument. I recognized almost immediately that it was a kind of either/or question. "If less than 50 and more than 25, no funding. We know there will be funding, and we know more than 25 (percent of material will be duplicated)." So, before the answer choices were even revealed, I had some idea that we were looking for something which stated "more than 50 (new hires per year)." That means that when I see an answer choice like D, which speaks only about some x duplicating more than 25%, I can eliminate it without even a second thought. The professor surprised me when he pointed out that D swapped the named departments. I eliminated it for a separate and more basic reason. His reasoning is more solid, but its also more time consuming and thought intensive.
So, if your LSAT date is more than a few months from now, don't worry about timing. At some point, you'll see that C states "x is better than y if...." and you will be able to instantly eliminate it as a choice because you know the question didn't mention any comparative value measurement, or because you know you need to look for something which mentions y's relationship to z and not x's relationship to y.
Hopefully this was helpful. Sorry for typing an essay at you!
Correct me if I'm wrong but since "25% and 50< and proposal → /funded," the contrapositive would be "funded→ /25% or /50< or /proposal" and we know "25%" and "proposal" is true, so that would make "/50<" true, right?
I negated the "and" to "or" when translating to the contrapositive. This made it simpler for me to understand, if my logic is incorrect let me know. The stimulus says that it is funded as well so the contrapositive would not be hypothetical anymore but be proven.
Is it bad that I’m not doing any of this writing out logic stuff, seems less complicated without
This entire question is contradictory... If two requirements must be met for ANY proposal to be funded, then shouldn't the "and" in that sentence be changed to "or?" It's almost as if the whole first sentence means absolutely nothing lmao
I thought the same thing at first and just reservedly answered A. But I think that I got mixed up by thinking that this question was saying that if you meet either of these conditions, the new department would not be funded. But the question is actually saying if you meet both conditions your department will not be funded. Since it only met one condition, the department will be funded. ig lol
Not gunna lie, theres no need for the breakdown and I feel it makes it over complicated for people to underdstand, I got this question right with like 30 seconds.. super easy. My logic to this was it concluded it would fund the new program even though it was going to doup 25% more material, so the only other variable was it needs to have more then 50 people. I went to the answer choices, completely ignored everything that didnt talk about 50 people. There was only two choices, one saying less then 50 and one saying at least 50. If it needs 50 then the lesser is wrong right off the rip which leaves you with A... at least 50.
0:44 "we've increased the burden of proof, so to speak"
I think you meant "the standard of proof" and not "the burden of proof".
#feedback