My first takeaway is that one should identify the conditional premise and map it out correctly. Then look for the second premise, add it to the diagram, then the conclusion. I kind of felt lost and didn’t know where to even start so I got the mapping wrong. Then I was debating between choices C and E. By the time I reached E and started diagramming, I was already panicking because I was spending way too much time on this question. So I half finished the E diagram, wanted to skip the whole question, but decided to make a guess and picked E. C was the other one I kept as a potential answer, so seems like I was intuitively going in the right direction at some point… Now that I saw how to approach these type of questions, I’m kind of looking forward to try another one later.
I think maybe I'm a bit less of a visual learner than I thought (at least when it comes to these concepts in particular). I have felt though, that a change in mindset, similar to when I was taking Calculus helps.
Upon reading the question, the main gist I got was that just because bilateral symmetry is common, the author said that it was enough to justify it being advantageous, simply because it was a common trait (and survived and was carried over to other species and whatnot). This reasoning in itself in my brain felt like "um...okay..I guess?"
Using my own understanding that it wasn't really a strong argument or necessarily true, I looked for similar responses that had similar texts, which eliminated about half the options and then C was the only one that stood out to me in the end.
What helped me here was looking for the contrapositive in the stimulus and then trying to see what adds up in the questions. It is def hard for me to apply patterns and diagrams though, I've def been leaning towards looking for words like "if" in the answer etc but got it right so hopefully I start getting better at application
So I got the right answer, but my only hint was 'IF', meaning I did not diagram or use any learned estrategy.
I undestand de conditional indicators idea, I cannot grasp how to apply them to the stimulus, so far. I can indetify premises, but that appears to be it.
For anyone that can offer help, I mapped mine out by starting with the first 2 premises:
AB = CT, AB = SA, so CT = SA.
The conclusion shows that /SA = /CT, which is the opposite of what is above, so that checked out.
I was wondering if that thought process above is correct? Also, my issue is that I can only answer these questions correctly if I write out a diagram on paper. Is this something I should be worried about?
I just wanted to ask how to know when to shift gears. I was looking at this from the context of purely logic, so I even turned the first premise into logic. and i somehow took it as context. idk what was going on but i didn't even think to take it as a premise and conclusion sandwich and ended up spending over 30 mins on the question.
I got too in the weeds of the Skill Builders and instead of looking for the entire argument structure, I ended up ignoring everything but the conclusion which messed me up.
So grateful to have these breakdowns afterwords to help me see why I got something wrong. I hope to do better on the next one!
I'm earnestly thanking God and you guys have such extensive stuff on this topic of necessary and sufficient stuff. Its becoming aparent this is one of my main sore spots and its great to have the resource to really hone this
So I followed the structure of the statement and mapped it out as this:
premise: advantages —> ABS —> common
conclusion: advantages —> common
I see in the video that it was mapped completely differently but I still got the right answer… so I guess I’m just wondering if my lawgic translation is still good or not?
@DeborahJimenez I'd be careful! I think you are confusing sufficiency and necessity.
For me, I started with translating the last sentence into Lawgic first because that was the clear conditional statement with indicators. When you do that, you get:
If no advantages --> not common
Which in abbreviated Lawgic is just:
/Advantages --> /Common
As we've also learned, we can take the contrapositive of that Lawgic statement and it should still be true:
Common --> Advantages
Which translates to: If bilateral symmetry is common, then it does confer such advantages.
Then, moving to the rest of the stimulus, we see that Anatomical bilateral symmetry IS common, so it therefore it SHOULD confer such advantages, and we know that is a valid conclusion to make because it follows the contrapositive statement we just derived from the original statement.
Your conclusion "Advantages --> Common" is not a conclusion that can be drawn from the conditional logic we have here. The stimulus isn't saying that if you have this survival advantage then it is a common thing to have, but that's what your Lawgic implies!
I'd be curious to see your mapping that led you to the correct answer, but definitely be careful about making the sufficiency necessity confusion!
I think your incorrect mapping probably stemmed from a misidentification of the conclusion. The conclusion is the second sentence of the stimulus: "therefore, ABS confers survival advantages". The conclusion is not the last sentence and the last sentences should be properly interpreted as the main premise:
@DeborahJimenez If you really wanted ABS to be in your Lawgic translation as a condition (I don't think this is an efficient way of thinking), it should instead look like this:
P1: ABS --> common
P2: /advantages --> /common
Chain from Premises:
ABS --> common --> advantages
Conclusion:
ABS --> advantages
^I prefer the more efficient thinking of ABS as a "dot" in the sets of common traits and confers survival advantage instead of doing the above with ABS in the conditional Lawgic translation as a condition. That said it can be done.
@AnandChoudhary thank you! this really helps a lot :) I’m definitely having problems confusing sufficiency and necessity. I tried to map the statements as a chain (really had to try to make it work which should’ve been a red flag) and I’m shocked as anyone that I got the question right lol. I’m continuing to practice and little by little things are starting to make more sense
@bellaens18 thanks! AI can actually be very helpful in explaining basic LSAT concepts if given the right parameters. As with anything though, it’s always best to do your own reasoning
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24 comments
My first takeaway is that one should identify the conditional premise and map it out correctly. Then look for the second premise, add it to the diagram, then the conclusion. I kind of felt lost and didn’t know where to even start so I got the mapping wrong. Then I was debating between choices C and E. By the time I reached E and started diagramming, I was already panicking because I was spending way too much time on this question. So I half finished the E diagram, wanted to skip the whole question, but decided to make a guess and picked E. C was the other one I kept as a potential answer, so seems like I was intuitively going in the right direction at some point… Now that I saw how to approach these type of questions, I’m kind of looking forward to try another one later.
Time: 02:15 (+00:14)
Result: 100%
I think maybe I'm a bit less of a visual learner than I thought (at least when it comes to these concepts in particular). I have felt though, that a change in mindset, similar to when I was taking Calculus helps.
Upon reading the question, the main gist I got was that just because bilateral symmetry is common, the author said that it was enough to justify it being advantageous, simply because it was a common trait (and survived and was carried over to other species and whatnot). This reasoning in itself in my brain felt like "um...okay..I guess?"
Using my own understanding that it wasn't really a strong argument or necessarily true, I looked for similar responses that had similar texts, which eliminated about half the options and then C was the only one that stood out to me in the end.
What I did was:
Common --- survival advantage
/survival adv --- /common
The one that matched was C.
/superior --- /appointed
approved --- superior
It just started with the negative form
I did it! I used to just get all of these wrong before 7sage. It really is like arithmetic
What helped me here was looking for the contrapositive in the stimulus and then trying to see what adds up in the questions. It is def hard for me to apply patterns and diagrams though, I've def been leaning towards looking for words like "if" in the answer etc but got it right so hopefully I start getting better at application
So I got the right answer, but my only hint was 'IF', meaning I did not diagram or use any learned estrategy.
I undestand de conditional indicators idea, I cannot grasp how to apply them to the stimulus, so far. I can indetify premises, but that appears to be it.
Progress, I guess.
Why does he over explain it, jt makes so much more confusing
guys i'm beginning to believe
For anyone that can offer help, I mapped mine out by starting with the first 2 premises:
AB = CT, AB = SA, so CT = SA.
The conclusion shows that /SA = /CT, which is the opposite of what is above, so that checked out.
I was wondering if that thought process above is correct? Also, my issue is that I can only answer these questions correctly if I write out a diagram on paper. Is this something I should be worried about?
I just wanted to ask how to know when to shift gears. I was looking at this from the context of purely logic, so I even turned the first premise into logic. and i somehow took it as context. idk what was going on but i didn't even think to take it as a premise and conclusion sandwich and ended up spending over 30 mins on the question.
I got too in the weeds of the Skill Builders and instead of looking for the entire argument structure, I ended up ignoring everything but the conclusion which messed me up.
So grateful to have these breakdowns afterwords to help me see why I got something wrong. I hope to do better on the next one!
this made me feel so dumb
I mapped mine out like this
(A) ABS --> (B) Common --> (C) Advantages
A --> B --> C
Contrapositive /C --> /B --> /A
Why is that wrong?
@strawberryicecream Did this lead you to pick a wrong answer?
I'm earnestly thanking God and you guys have such extensive stuff on this topic of necessary and sufficient stuff. Its becoming aparent this is one of my main sore spots and its great to have the resource to really hone this
So I followed the structure of the statement and mapped it out as this:
premise: advantages —> ABS —> common
conclusion: advantages —> common
I see in the video that it was mapped completely differently but I still got the right answer… so I guess I’m just wondering if my lawgic translation is still good or not?
@DeborahJimenez I checked with chatgpt and it suggested something helpful so i thought i’d share:
When you see:
“X is common”
“X has feature Y”
Conclusion: “Y explains X” or “X must have Y”
Ask:
👉 Are they treating this like a rule?
If yes, try:
/Y → /common
common
∴ Y (flawed)
@DeborahJimenez I'd be careful! I think you are confusing sufficiency and necessity.
For me, I started with translating the last sentence into Lawgic first because that was the clear conditional statement with indicators. When you do that, you get:
If no advantages --> not common
Which in abbreviated Lawgic is just:
/Advantages --> /Common
As we've also learned, we can take the contrapositive of that Lawgic statement and it should still be true:
Common --> Advantages
Which translates to: If bilateral symmetry is common, then it does confer such advantages.
Then, moving to the rest of the stimulus, we see that Anatomical bilateral symmetry IS common, so it therefore it SHOULD confer such advantages, and we know that is a valid conclusion to make because it follows the contrapositive statement we just derived from the original statement.
Your conclusion "Advantages --> Common" is not a conclusion that can be drawn from the conditional logic we have here. The stimulus isn't saying that if you have this survival advantage then it is a common thing to have, but that's what your Lawgic implies!
I'd be curious to see your mapping that led you to the correct answer, but definitely be careful about making the sufficiency necessity confusion!
@DeborahJimenez I seriously recommend not using chatgpt for the LSAT. it doesnt understand it properly and you will get questions wrong because of it
@DeborahJimenez
I think your incorrect mapping probably stemmed from a misidentification of the conclusion. The conclusion is the second sentence of the stimulus: "therefore, ABS confers survival advantages". The conclusion is not the last sentence and the last sentences should be properly interpreted as the main premise:
/survival advantages --> /common
@DeborahJimenez If you really wanted ABS to be in your Lawgic translation as a condition (I don't think this is an efficient way of thinking), it should instead look like this:
P1: ABS --> common
P2: /advantages --> /common
Chain from Premises:
ABS --> common --> advantages
Conclusion:
ABS --> advantages
^I prefer the more efficient thinking of ABS as a "dot" in the sets of common traits and confers survival advantage instead of doing the above with ABS in the conditional Lawgic translation as a condition. That said it can be done.
@AnandChoudhary thank you! this really helps a lot :) I’m definitely having problems confusing sufficiency and necessity. I tried to map the statements as a chain (really had to try to make it work which should’ve been a red flag) and I’m shocked as anyone that I got the question right lol. I’m continuing to practice and little by little things are starting to make more sense
@bellaens18 thanks! AI can actually be very helpful in explaining basic LSAT concepts if given the right parameters. As with anything though, it’s always best to do your own reasoning
DUB! things are clicking. thanks for adding these!