So, SA has been kicking me straight in the crotch and I'm starting to understand why.
For me, it's not enough to think of hard questions like this in terms of building a bridge between premises and conclusion. Framing SA in these terms has killed some of my clarity about what these questions are on the face of it. What you're doing in these questions is making an argument valid. What does that mean? It means that whatever stimulus they give you has not yet reached the point of logical validity!
Alright, so what does that have to do with the P --- C bridge? Well, in terms of this question, the validity issue can definitely be seen in the way JY presents it... if you tease out all of the embedded conditionals and slowly work your way toward what he did here. But if we're saying that the fundamental problem with SA question stems is that the argument isn't valid, then there are often other, easier ways to validate the argument.
This question presents the perfect example. Our dude says we will not be able to determine if there's ET life out there unless they're as smart as us. That's because we can't visit them with a spacecraft, so they have to reach out. Seems legit... except it's not. That's not valid because we don't know that there aren't alternative ways to determine that ET life exists. Our telescopes could give a spectroscopical reading that could only mean organic compounds. A meteor could slice off a chunk of the ET planet and then bring it to our doorstep. The hole in the argument and the reason it's invalid is the fact that it gives us no reason to preclude these alternative possibilities.
Enter answer choice D. It's telling us explicitly, OK, imagine dumbshit aliens exist. In that case (because the answer choices get the benefit of being true, which is why they supply the validity), there is NO OTHER WAY to determine their existence besides spacecraft. Since those aren't happening anytime soon, the loophole has been closed. It's now a valid argument.
Just needed to get that all out to prove to bring these things back down to Earth, so to speak. If I have to conditionalize all of these questions with formal logic, I'm fcked, so I'll be moving forward with this framework and saving the conditional stuff for if I'm truly stumped.
It's alright, yo. I got the last five wrong earlier this week, then today I went back with a fresh set of eyes and tried again and got them all correct. I couldn't remember the answers, and I just worked on making sure the answer addressed the conclusion.
The marriage one kicked my ass, but with 15 mins, I was able to get there. If my ass can do it, so can you.
The LSAT reminds me of a father that I simply can never impress. Anytime that I think that I did something good, the LSAT always finds a way to put me right back in my place and throw something like this in my face. However, there is no better feeling than beating them at their own game. Not entirely sure how I will accomplish that, but I have a feeling it will involve at least another 100 hours of video tutorials and at least 5,000 more questions.
Same but I ended up getting this right using a different method than he does. I used the rule exception theory to negate the 'unless' in the conclusion and then it became a whole lot clearer. It looked something like this....
Exception: At least same level of intelligence
p1: cannot send spacecraft
p2: communicate -> same level of intelligence
-----------
c: cannot determine soon
This allowed me to eliminate B, C, and E. Then all I needed to do was evaluate A/D and D was clearly better than A. I hope this helps! (Remember we don't always need to negate sufficient in logic, we can use exceptions!)
Just to add on after rereading, I eliminated B,C,E because they fit the exception and therefore the rule is silent and we cannot make any conclusions about aliens that are as intelligent as we are.
351 comments
yup......that'll do it for today folks
So, SA has been kicking me straight in the crotch and I'm starting to understand why.
For me, it's not enough to think of hard questions like this in terms of building a bridge between premises and conclusion. Framing SA in these terms has killed some of my clarity about what these questions are on the face of it. What you're doing in these questions is making an argument valid. What does that mean? It means that whatever stimulus they give you has not yet reached the point of logical validity!
Alright, so what does that have to do with the P --- C bridge? Well, in terms of this question, the validity issue can definitely be seen in the way JY presents it... if you tease out all of the embedded conditionals and slowly work your way toward what he did here. But if we're saying that the fundamental problem with SA question stems is that the argument isn't valid, then there are often other, easier ways to validate the argument.
This question presents the perfect example. Our dude says we will not be able to determine if there's ET life out there unless they're as smart as us. That's because we can't visit them with a spacecraft, so they have to reach out. Seems legit... except it's not. That's not valid because we don't know that there aren't alternative ways to determine that ET life exists. Our telescopes could give a spectroscopical reading that could only mean organic compounds. A meteor could slice off a chunk of the ET planet and then bring it to our doorstep. The hole in the argument and the reason it's invalid is the fact that it gives us no reason to preclude these alternative possibilities.
Enter answer choice D. It's telling us explicitly, OK, imagine dumbshit aliens exist. In that case (because the answer choices get the benefit of being true, which is why they supply the validity), there is NO OTHER WAY to determine their existence besides spacecraft. Since those aren't happening anytime soon, the loophole has been closed. It's now a valid argument.
Just needed to get that all out to prove to bring these things back down to Earth, so to speak. If I have to conditionalize all of these questions with formal logic, I'm fcked, so I'll be moving forward with this framework and saving the conditional stuff for if I'm truly stumped.
Okay Hamurabi, that is some seriously good strategy
Love this
yes, i hate the formal logic side of things
Thank you, this was a great explanation!
I'll be telling my therapist about this one
this section is making me crash out!
this question fucking sucks
what the hell, what the helly, what the helleonte
lolllllllll
what the helly berry? this is not my best work rn
Becoming a housewife does not sound so bad right now tbh.
real
im feeling beat up after this whole module bruh
Same
that part
Feeling: like the dumbass aliens
This one was even cuter.
bruh what is this
lol
bruh I was on fire with SAs until these last two questions cry that's enough 7sage for today
I am literally having a break down rn😤😤😤😤😤😤😤😭😭😭😭😭😂😂😂😔😔😔😔☺️☺️🤯🤬
It's alright, yo. I got the last five wrong earlier this week, then today I went back with a fresh set of eyes and tried again and got them all correct. I couldn't remember the answers, and I just worked on making sure the answer addressed the conclusion.
The marriage one kicked my ass, but with 15 mins, I was able to get there. If my ass can do it, so can you.
this question is an automatic skip babes
I got it right, but at what cost (nearly 4 mins)
real
fuck this question ???
lol frl
The LSAT reminds me of a father that I simply can never impress. Anytime that I think that I did something good, the LSAT always finds a way to put me right back in my place and throw something like this in my face. However, there is no better feeling than beating them at their own game. Not entirely sure how I will accomplish that, but I have a feeling it will involve at least another 100 hours of video tutorials and at least 5,000 more questions.
i'm about to crash out
I feel like crying
@breezyprabahar944 I feel like dying
these SA question explanations are not clicking for me ngl
ditto
Same but I ended up getting this right using a different method than he does. I used the rule exception theory to negate the 'unless' in the conclusion and then it became a whole lot clearer. It looked something like this....
Exception: At least same level of intelligence
p1: cannot send spacecraft
p2: communicate -> same level of intelligence
-----------
c: cannot determine soon
This allowed me to eliminate B, C, and E. Then all I needed to do was evaluate A/D and D was clearly better than A. I hope this helps! (Remember we don't always need to negate sufficient in logic, we can use exceptions!)
this is a much more practical approach
Just to add on after rereading, I eliminated B,C,E because they fit the exception and therefore the rule is silent and we cannot make any conclusions about aliens that are as intelligent as we are.
This is what I did as well!
I am not getting the majority of SA correct. anyone else? :/
Same my friend. Same.
This is my worst question type so far...
Same. SA is kicking my ass.
im gonna tweak fr
@onthebrinkoffailure dont't tweak, twerk.
@ZMAJORKEY werk
these questions are written by fucking maniacs
I'm only 15min into today's study time, and I'm over it with this question. jfc.
NGL I feel like I need a different approach for explaining this question.
this question is getting skipped 10000% of the time
HAHAHAHA... I was thinking the same thing