Could there ever be a possibility that the correct answer choice has the rule written in contrapositive form? Or are the answers truly always going to follow the general pattern from the stimulus?
@AlizaGGG The coverage receiving criticism is the context (or you could say a counterargument), but not a premise in support of the argument that the coverage was good journalism. The video is just mapping out the premise therefore conclusion structure :)
#help - Where did I go wrong here. I now understand why C is correct (I originally misread it) but I'm still struggling to understand why E is wrong.
I interpreted the stimulus to be:
accurate + curious → Good Journalim
I kinda ignored the part about high viewership, maybe this is part of my error.
I interpreted E to be:
/(accurate or curious) -> /Good journalism
Using DeMorgan's law, I took the contrapositive of the OG stimulus to be the same thing that E was saying.
Did I incorrectly translate something into lawgic here? Or is the takeaway that if the actual argument is present as an AC, then that overrules the contrapositive of the original argument?
I put E too, took a break and came back to it and it was clear as day. C and E have the same structure, but in one being positive and the other negated flip their sufficiency and necessity. I think it's easier to see this if you take away demorgans law (which would just turn your 'Ands' into 'ors', negate, and flip) and just look at the necessary conditions like this:
C="Any Journalism that... (Insert sufficient conditions here)... is good journalism (necessary condition)
Which translates to:
(Stuff in the middle) → Good Journalism
The contra positive is
/Good Journalism → /(stuff in the middle)
E= "any Journalism that.... (insert sufficient conditions here)... is not good journalism"
(Stuff in the Middle) → /Good Journalism
Contra positive:
Good Journalism → /(Stuff in the middle)
This is how I had to look at it to understand that E does not give me a rule that tells me anything about what is sufficient for good journalism. It only tells me that good journalism is sufficient for whatever is in the middle. I need a set of rules that give me the outcome desired, which is the conclusion, which is that this was good journalism. Therefore, I need to know what is sufficient for good journalism, not what good journalism is sufficient for. E is wrong in form even without getting into the specifics. C is correct in form which means we need to look into the details.
Should we even be thinking about the contrapositive of the rule when going through the answers, or will the correct answer always (or at least usually) be a straightforward restatement of the rule? I feel like trying to hunt for the contrapositive would take up too much previous time
sometimes the correct answer will be the contrapositive of the rule to make it harder. Only consider it if you hunt and can't find the answer directly stated
My advice would be to get so familiar with contrapositives that seeing a conditional is the same thing as seeing a contrapositive. This only happens after a lot of drills that you most often create yourself. Otherwise the lsat will catch you lacking at one point or another. Additionally, often taking the contrapositive will not be very intuitive based on the specific wording (having to negate the word neither for example, it works but might be kinda confusing) and if you don't have extensive experience with contrapositives and negation this most likely either make you answer wrong or be a time sink. Moral of the story, contrapositives suck.
It is still just pseudo sufficient assumption questions, so we are not being held to absolute logical validity still. If it strengthens the argument through the use of a rule, even if it is just partial, it is still strengthening it. "Helps justify," it just has to "help"
In the video he mentions that you can have a subset of the premises met, so all the premises do not need to be met in order for the answer to be correct! :)
Are there correct answers where the answer is presented as it's contra-positive?
In other words answer choice C could be written as: It is not the case that journalism is good if it does not provide accurate information or is not of interest to the public.
E felt tempting in that respect, but I am following everything you're saying
I'm not sure whether there are correct answers where the answer is presented as the contrapositive. But I was also tempted by E until writing out the Lawgic and realizing that it confuses the sufficient and necessary conditions:
"never" is a negate necessary, so I negated "good journalism" and made it the necessary indicator.
/ satisfy curiosity + / info accurate --> / good journalism
contrapositive:
good journalism --> satisfy curiosity or info accurate
I have been rolling through this section. Would it be dumb of me to assume that a large majority of LSAT questions may consist of these type of assumption questions because of how long the section is (28 Lessons) and how many drill questions there are?
Not necessarily. In the 7-sage V1 curriculum when we got to necc. assumption questions there were over 20 drills (each of which were 5 question sets) yet on a given LSAT you would get anywhere from 3-5 N.A. questions. The volume of the drills is to help register the concepts and patterns so you can easily recognize those things during a timed section/exam.
I think D is wrong also because it doesn't trigger the premises/sufficient (rules) conditions of having high viewership AND being accurate information.
Not necessarily because the sufficient and necessary conditions are reversed. I was thinking that "always" introduced the sufficient condition. ~
Thought the same initially but realized that E switches nec, suff conditions. Contrapositive of E would be if a journalism is always good then it then it satisfies public curiosity and is accurate. You could see from this that it will not allow one to draw conclusion in stimulus
I also think it is because the rule states the conclusion must be "good journalism." E is stating that the result is something can "never be good journalism." At least, that's how I interpreted it. correct me if I'm wrong.
It would actually be, good journalism --> satisfies OR accurate, because the initial statement is and, and when you contrapose and it turns into or, so that's another issue. You need to satisfy both, not one or the other.
PSA question types have not humbled me yet like the S and W questions. Maybe it will humble me in the rest of the "you try". I understand the structure and even if my logic set is not strong enough I am intuitively able to grab the right answer. Is that bad or good?
I feel like it is good that you intuitively are able to grab the right answer. I feel like it shows that you have basic understanding of the foundations of the argument (premise and conclusion) and you are able to see where the gap is in regards to how which rule (answer) is applied to the question.
The way I got this was the idea that the conclusion in the stimulus involved a positive claim about journalism, and when it is good. Therefore, any answer explaining when good journalism is not good, and therefore bad, wouldn't have satisfied as a solid rule. Since, we're trying to justify the premises leading to the conclusion, and as mentioned, the conclusion was a positive claim.
Not sure if I skipped through the part of this section where he explains the two defects and starting/ ending at the wrong places/ right places. Can someone explain?
Don't know if you're still confused, but he also reexplains this concept in the "You Try" right before this one which is "You Try: Intentionally harming a child"
Oldest mistake in the book is confusing sufficiency for necessity or vice versa.
These rule application questions apply heavily to formal logic. The rule lays out a set of sufficient conditions that leads to a necessary condition, which is usually the conclusion we are trying to justify the reasoning for.
Starting/ending at the wrong place refers to the answer choice giving you a bad sufficient condition or necessary condition that is not relevant or contradictory to the rule in place I believe. Just stay anchored to the stimulus and you will be OK!
In general, yes, but the conclusion technically could be the sufficient assumption if we flip and negate it and take the contra positive. It is important to understand what can be concluded. Id recommend going back to the lessons on conditional logic. If you dont fully comprehend the difference between Sufficient and Necessary you will just be fighting an uphill battle and likely repeating the same mistakes over and over again.
Does anyone else find it shocking that 92% of people answered this question correctly? I understand it is not a very difficult question but still, I am surprised.
Haha those numbers are based on your current score and how many people with a similar score (say, a 162 average on all drills or questions) answered that question correctly.
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75 comments
It's starting to click for PSA. AGTG!
Slow, but I got it right
I FELL FOR THE BAITTT NOOOOOOO (got it right in BR though) #yay
got it wrong initially, then answered C in the BR :/
Idk if i should be happy or not but I have been doing pretty good in this section as compare to others. Anyone else ?
@legallyhaya same!!
@legallyhaya Superman does good. You do well!!
Could there ever be a possibility that the correct answer choice has the rule written in contrapositive form? Or are the answers truly always going to follow the general pattern from the stimulus?
@frandyr This happens all the time -- be ready for it.
Why isn't "Coverage received Criticsm" one of the facts? I feel like it just dropped off
@AlizaGGG context
@AlizaGGG The coverage receiving criticism is the context (or you could say a counterargument), but not a premise in support of the argument that the coverage was good journalism. The video is just mapping out the premise therefore conclusion structure :)
#help - Where did I go wrong here. I now understand why C is correct (I originally misread it) but I'm still struggling to understand why E is wrong.
I interpreted the stimulus to be:
accurate + curious → Good Journalim
I kinda ignored the part about high viewership, maybe this is part of my error.
I interpreted E to be:
/(accurate or curious) -> /Good journalism
Using DeMorgan's law, I took the contrapositive of the OG stimulus to be the same thing that E was saying.
Did I incorrectly translate something into lawgic here? Or is the takeaway that if the actual argument is present as an AC, then that overrules the contrapositive of the original argument?
This is an interesting way to look at it, and it really clears up my confusion. I appreciate you writing it all out for me to see, thank you!
I put E too, took a break and came back to it and it was clear as day. C and E have the same structure, but in one being positive and the other negated flip their sufficiency and necessity. I think it's easier to see this if you take away demorgans law (which would just turn your 'Ands' into 'ors', negate, and flip) and just look at the necessary conditions like this:
C="Any Journalism that... (Insert sufficient conditions here)... is good journalism (necessary condition)
Which translates to:
(Stuff in the middle) → Good Journalism
The contra positive is
/Good Journalism → /(stuff in the middle)
E= "any Journalism that.... (insert sufficient conditions here)... is not good journalism"
(Stuff in the Middle) → /Good Journalism
Contra positive:
Good Journalism → /(Stuff in the middle)
This is how I had to look at it to understand that E does not give me a rule that tells me anything about what is sufficient for good journalism. It only tells me that good journalism is sufficient for whatever is in the middle. I need a set of rules that give me the outcome desired, which is the conclusion, which is that this was good journalism. Therefore, I need to know what is sufficient for good journalism, not what good journalism is sufficient for. E is wrong in form even without getting into the specifics. C is correct in form which means we need to look into the details.
3 for 3 chat lets goooooo
Should we even be thinking about the contrapositive of the rule when going through the answers, or will the correct answer always (or at least usually) be a straightforward restatement of the rule? I feel like trying to hunt for the contrapositive would take up too much previous time
Was wondering the exact same thing!
Me too-- I feel as if considering the contrapositive is misleading?
sometimes the correct answer will be the contrapositive of the rule to make it harder. Only consider it if you hunt and can't find the answer directly stated
My advice would be to get so familiar with contrapositives that seeing a conditional is the same thing as seeing a contrapositive. This only happens after a lot of drills that you most often create yourself. Otherwise the lsat will catch you lacking at one point or another. Additionally, often taking the contrapositive will not be very intuitive based on the specific wording (having to negate the word neither for example, it works but might be kinda confusing) and if you don't have extensive experience with contrapositives and negation this most likely either make you answer wrong or be a time sink. Moral of the story, contrapositives suck.
Do ALL THREE premises need to be met for the answer to be correct, or would just two be sufficient?
It is still just pseudo sufficient assumption questions, so we are not being held to absolute logical validity still. If it strengthens the argument through the use of a rule, even if it is just partial, it is still strengthening it. "Helps justify," it just has to "help"
In the video he mentions that you can have a subset of the premises met, so all the premises do not need to be met in order for the answer to be correct! :)
Are there correct answers where the answer is presented as it's contra-positive?
In other words answer choice C could be written as: It is not the case that journalism is good if it does not provide accurate information or is not of interest to the public.
E felt tempting in that respect, but I am following everything you're saying
I'm not sure whether there are correct answers where the answer is presented as the contrapositive. But I was also tempted by E until writing out the Lawgic and realizing that it confuses the sufficient and necessary conditions:
"never" is a negate necessary, so I negated "good journalism" and made it the necessary indicator.
/ satisfy curiosity + / info accurate --> / good journalism
contrapositive:
good journalism --> satisfy curiosity or info accurate
was thinking the same thing ... have you learned if there's ever an instance where the correct answer would be presented in the contrapositive form?
I have been rolling through this section. Would it be dumb of me to assume that a large majority of LSAT questions may consist of these type of assumption questions because of how long the section is (28 Lessons) and how many drill questions there are?
Not necessarily. In the 7-sage V1 curriculum when we got to necc. assumption questions there were over 20 drills (each of which were 5 question sets) yet on a given LSAT you would get anywhere from 3-5 N.A. questions. The volume of the drills is to help register the concepts and patterns so you can easily recognize those things during a timed section/exam.
I think D is wrong also because it doesn't trigger the premises/sufficient (rules) conditions of having high viewership AND being accurate information.
Not necessarily because the sufficient and necessary conditions are reversed. I was thinking that "always" introduced the sufficient condition. ~
I have a question! Can contrapositives be correct answers for these types of questions?
i think so. its the equivalent.
#help or would doing this be making too much of an assumption?
Wondering this too
I have a question about this too!
Absolutely, and in fact this is a common way the LSAT will try to make a question more difficult.
If "A --> B" can strengthen the argument, then "Not B --> Not A" can also strengthen the argument.
As a commenter below noted, the contrapositive expresses the same relationship as the initial statement. So if one helps, the other one will too.
I thought it was C then changed my answer to E. Can Someone explain to me why you could not just flip C to make is help the argument? #Help
I think it is saying the same but in reverse. So it does not really strengthen it like C does.
I choose C but I'm still wondering this too
Thought the same initially but realized that E switches nec, suff conditions. Contrapositive of E would be if a journalism is always good then it then it satisfies public curiosity and is accurate. You could see from this that it will not allow one to draw conclusion in stimulus
I also think it is because the rule states the conclusion must be "good journalism." E is stating that the result is something can "never be good journalism." At least, that's how I interpreted it. correct me if I'm wrong.
It would actually be, good journalism --> satisfies OR accurate, because the initial statement is and, and when you contrapose and it turns into or, so that's another issue. You need to satisfy both, not one or the other.
PSA question types have not humbled me yet like the S and W questions. Maybe it will humble me in the rest of the "you try". I understand the structure and even if my logic set is not strong enough I am intuitively able to grab the right answer. Is that bad or good?
I feel like it is good that you intuitively are able to grab the right answer. I feel like it shows that you have basic understanding of the foundations of the argument (premise and conclusion) and you are able to see where the gap is in regards to how which rule (answer) is applied to the question.
Yes exactly!! I think it is supernatural powers but better to think logic for harder questions. Thank you for the realization!
What percentage of questions on the lsat are considered level 5 difficulty?
In my experience, 2-5.
I would say 2-4 per section. I have found that the most are in RC
The way I got this was the idea that the conclusion in the stimulus involved a positive claim about journalism, and when it is good. Therefore, any answer explaining when good journalism is not good, and therefore bad, wouldn't have satisfied as a solid rule. Since, we're trying to justify the premises leading to the conclusion, and as mentioned, the conclusion was a positive claim.
Not sure if I skipped through the part of this section where he explains the two defects and starting/ ending at the wrong places/ right places. Can someone explain?
Don't know if you're still confused, but he also reexplains this concept in the "You Try" right before this one which is "You Try: Intentionally harming a child"
Its mostly covered in the formal logic section of the foundations. Bridge wrong way is "the oldest mistake in the book" or something like that
Oldest mistake in the book is confusing sufficiency for necessity or vice versa.
These rule application questions apply heavily to formal logic. The rule lays out a set of sufficient conditions that leads to a necessary condition, which is usually the conclusion we are trying to justify the reasoning for.
Starting/ending at the wrong place refers to the answer choice giving you a bad sufficient condition or necessary condition that is not relevant or contradictory to the rule in place I believe. Just stay anchored to the stimulus and you will be OK!
why was the last lesson and this one both level 3 but it felt like this one was easier to understand all the parts?
I agree, the last one felt harder.
agreed, I was confused the last two, but this one came easy.
Will the conclusion always be the necessary part of sufficient/necessary and the sufficient part will be the premises? #help
In general, yes, but the conclusion technically could be the sufficient assumption if we flip and negate it and take the contra positive. It is important to understand what can be concluded. Id recommend going back to the lessons on conditional logic. If you dont fully comprehend the difference between Sufficient and Necessary you will just be fighting an uphill battle and likely repeating the same mistakes over and over again.
Does anyone else find it shocking that 92% of people answered this question correctly? I understand it is not a very difficult question but still, I am surprised.
Haha those numbers are based on your current score and how many people with a similar score (say, a 162 average on all drills or questions) answered that question correctly.
This was the confidence boost I needed
Did this one in 40 seconds!