Can someone break this down for me like I'm 5 years old because I have no idea what is going on here. I feel like you have to assume whether or not the proportions are inverse or not and I dont really see how you could deduce that from the stim.

Can someone explain this question to me please? I totally dont get it. I dont see why superior conductors even have to exist in order for this argument to hold true. I dont really see any of the ACs as being viable.

Like, one could say that the mark of a purple dragon is having scales and a big tail...that doesnt mean that purple dragons have to exist.

I feel like D) tries to hone in on just saying that it is possible for this conditional argument to actually occur in the real world, specifically amongst top orchestras.

This was my thinking:

SC -> AI -> ER

To be a superior conductor, one must have the authority to insist that rehearsal work be intensified, and to have this authority one must earn respect of his/her interpretation

A) & B.) are just nonsense

C) I crossed off bc orchestras could sometimes not be ready. If the contrapositive of the stim. holds true, then orchestras could just never respect their conductor's interpretation and thus never [want to] be ready for intensified work. Also, work could be intensified regardless of the orchestra's readiness.

D) If orchestras sometimes dont appreciate the merits of an interpretation...then those some orchestras just wont respect their conductor and that conductor isnt superior. I dont see how this wrecks the argument since it matches up with the contrapositive /ER -> /AI -> /SC

E) I just ended up guessing this. I dont think this is necessary. It could be the case that all top orchestras are led by superior conductors. It could also be the case that some of them arent led by superior conductors.

Why does this early PT seem way harder than the later PTs ugh

Hi Guys,

Can you please help with this question ?

Either A’s faction or B’s faction, but not both, will win control of the government. If A’s faction wins, the nation will suffer economically. If B’s faction wins, the nation will suffer militarily.

Given the statements in the passage, which one of the following statements must be true?

(A) It is possible, but not certain, that the nation will neither suffer economically nor suffer militarily.

(B) If the nation suffers economically, it is certain that A’s faction has won control of the government.

(C) It is certain that the nation will suffer either economically or militarily, and also certain that it will not suffer both.

(D) If the nation suffers militarily, it is possible, but not certain, that B’s faction has won control of the government.

(E) If the nation suffers both economically and militarily, it is certain that neither A’s faction nor B’s has won control of the government.

I tried to apply the conditional logic but still i am not able to figure it out.

AW - A's faction wins

BW - B's faction wins

NSE- Nation suffers economically

NSM- Nation suffers militarily

ST(1) : AW->/BW

BW->/AW

ST(2) : AW->NSE

/NSE->/AW

BW->NSM

/NSM->/BW

I am not able to derive D (Right AC) from this logical conditionals.

Source: Gmatclub

I hope it is rephrased correctly.

Thanks.

LSAT 21.S2.Q5 For D, it says, "Concedes the very point that it argues against."

I thought it meant this person is not arguing against the main point of the argument. However, the other website explanation says it's circular reasoning answer. Is it really circular reasoning ...?

After combing through numerous tests looking for ways to improve my logical reasoning score, I isolated a concept throughout the preptests that I was having trouble with. I will not really be discussing any particular question type, more just the concept behind statistics, and the way the LSAT uses it. I'm going to break it down into two types of statistics: formal statistics and informal statistics. Formal statistics will deal with percentages, numbers within totals, and totals. I will also discuss average under formal statistics. Informal statistics are questions that involve polls, studies, surveys, and stuff like that.

FORMAL STATISTICS:

The test writers love confusing students using percentages and totals because they can be confusing concepts for people like me, who was never very good at math. "Formal statistics" questions have three elements to keep in mind when reading: overall total, numbers within the total, and percentage. You cannot make inferences without at least two elements.

Words indicating %: percent, proportion, fraction, likelihood, probability (note that the last two are speaking in "terms of probability" meaning the chance that an event will occur. "More likely" and "Less likely" are telling you that the chances are greater than 50% or less than 50% respectively.)

Words indicating #: amount, quantity, sum, total.

Note: there are other indicator words, but these are the ones most commonly used.

Here are some common tricks test writers use on students:

2)Decreasing percentages lead to decreasing numbers (this is not necessarily true because the size of the group under discussion could be larger)

Here are some inferences you can make:

% decrease + # increase -> overall increased

Example: if I drink 30% less coke (in my overall diet of drinks) than I did three years ago, but now i'm drinking 20 more cokes a day than I was three years ago, then it just has to be true that I am drinking a lot more over all than I used to be.

% increase + # decrease -> overall decreased

Example: lets look back at the coke example. If three years ago, I drank 2 cokes and 8 glasses of water. That is only 20 percent. Now I only drink one coke, but it makes up 30 percent of my liquid diet. Then it must be true that I am drinking less than I used to.

Most of the time LSAT uses formal statistics like this, they talk about it in terms of change I.E. percentage and number differences between two periods of time. Example: between 2000 and 2006 there was a 30% increase in violent crime or In 1990 the number of crashes was less than it was in 2000. Etc...

It is important to remember that despite the changes within the total, there are only three logical options for what change the total could take: it gets smaller, it stays the same size, or it becomes larger.

Tips and tricks:

AVERAGE:

When you get a change in average, whether it be higher or lower, it gives rise to a few possibilities.

When you have a rise in the average, the possibilities are:

When you have a dip in average, some possibilities are:

Example: PT 46 Q 22

"Over the last 10 years, ... Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-46-section-3-question-22/

Our possibilities are: more older people, fewer younger people, or both. Our conclusion is that there are more older people, so to strengthen it we have to rule out the possibility that the average change was not because there were fewer younger people. To weaken it you could say that there are fewer younger people.

Inversely, it works the same. If I tell you that the average LSAT score has changed from 157 to 150 over a period of 10 years, that could be because there are more people scoring in the 120s or that there are less people scoring in the 170s, or both. Tailor your answer choice to the conclusion. Don't get caught in whether the total number of people increases or decreases unless they tell you they are members of the group that will affect the average (120s group). These are sometimes disguised causation problems, if the conclusion says that the change of average happened for a certain reason (more older people), the answer choice could strengthen that by blocking out the other alternative.

INFORMAL STATISTICS

Informal statistics are things like polls, surveys, or experiments, or studies. You can recognize these questions when the stimulus says something like:

"In a recent study"

"50% received vaccine X and 50% received a placebo" (Really anytime they talk about experimental and control groups)

"Randomly selected"

"A nationwide poll"

"Consulted"

" _____ were surveyed"

Etc. The LSAT will almost always (maybe always I haven't taken every test) indicate when you are in informal statistics territory. While many questions that fall under the category of informal statistics have answer choices that refer to the causation mechanism in the stimulus, there are a lot of questions that revolve around your understanding of how an experiment should be tested. Here are some questions you should ask yourself.

what am I studying?

comes from the context + premise

PT 51

"Seventy-five percent of dermatologist surveyed Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-51-section-1-question-04/

So here we are studying dermatologist's preference of skin cream using Dermactin, and they are conducting a survey to figure out the results

PT 30

"In a recent study, a group of subjects had Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-30-section-4-question-22/

PT 34

"A group of 1,000 students was randomly selected Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-34-section-3-question-04/

It does not have to be a detailed summary of the experiment, but you should know a brief summary of what they are testing because it is helpful in answering the other questions.

Is the premise representative of the conclusion?

Representativeness is a concept the LSAT repeats frequently. What does it mean for the premise to be representative of the conclusion? Well it means the conclusion should not be too broad compared to the evidence presented. If your conclusion is that most Americans love McDonalds then the answer come from a survey, poll, or study, that is diverse, large and unbiased enough to represent the general sentiment of most Americans. For a long time whenever I thought of representativeness in studies and polls, I usually only thought about if the sample size was large enough. While this may be important, it is only part of what you should be focused on when you are reading a stimulus for representation.

Here are some other flaws you should look for:

Lets look at some examples of representation in logical reasoning problems

PT 36 #24: Flaw

"George Orwell's book 1984 has exercised much influence Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-36-section-1-question-24/

The correct answer picked up on the fact that we don't know the specific numbers of who picked what. Does 1984 influence a great number of readers? Not if 999 people picked the bible and only 1 person picked 1984.

PT 31 #3: Flaw

"Announcement for a television program: Are female physicians Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-31-section-2-question-03/

PT 34 #13: Necessary assumption

"Essayist: one of the claims of laisses-faire economics...

Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-34-section-2-question-13/

For the conclusion to hold, the fast-food restaurants must be representative of the industries in general.

Note: although representation is a big thing that test makers will test you on, there are a lot of wrong answer choices that try to trick you into thinking the flaw or assumption is about. Don't bother too much with it unless there is a glaring representation issue. Example: 40 fourth graders took lessons in reading, and all of them improved their reading skills. Thus, lessons in reading can help fourth graders improve their reading skills. The conclusion is weak enough for the 40 fourth graders to be sufficient evidence. Would more students help? yeah probably. But as it stands "it shows reading classes can help students on their reading skills." Here is 40 students where it did.

Is there a control aspect to the experiment?

Control parts of the study are crucial aspects of conducting experiments because they allow you to eliminate and isolate variables.

PT 31 #9: Strengthen

"During the three months before and three months after Admin note: please review the Forum rules "Do not post LSAT questions"

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-31-section-3-question-09/

What are we missing? To find out whether or not earthquakes had an effect on California student's dreams, we would need to control for what they dreamed of before the earthquake, and monitor the change.

Was there a difference in the results of a laboratory experiment vs the same experiment tested out in the real world?

One way a study/experiment can be flawed is if they only study it under laboratory conditions. Imagine you plant seeds in a testing center, and they grow amazing. Out in the world the seeds grow like shit. Well there are a lot of reasons why the seed did not grow as well in the real world. It could be because in the lab they got more water, or they weren't vulnerable to insects, etc...

How long was the study? Did it need to be longer?

There was a really tough parallel flaw question that hinged on you understanding of the timing concept in the study. It was something like they asked a bunch of young kids if viewing a cigarette pack made them want to smoke, and concluded that because the kids didn't want to smoke it at the age of 9, it had no impact on the desire to smoke. The obvious flaw is why are you asking kids this? They are not representative. But the more subtle flaw is that the experiment should have taken longer, maybe come back to them when they are a few years older and can buy cigs and ask them again.

Your job is to strengthen, weaken, point out flaws, or explain experiments. Remember to ask yourself these questions when you see informal statistics, it will allow you to be able to better pre-phrase the correct answer choice.

I hope this lesson has been helpful for anyone who took the time to read it. Statistics is such a big concept that i'm sure that there is stuff I missed out on. Please let me know if there is anything I should add on, or change, to make this better!

J.Y. summed it up perfectly in one of the intro LR lessons - the LSAT LR stimuli are terribly written. Not in the sense that they lack deliberate meaning, but in the fact that the meaning is impossibly worded and very difficult to discern.

I've been finding myself having to re-reard some of the stimuli 3-5 times to dissect the meaning, often being hard pressed for time towards the end of each section. This sharply contrasts with RC, where the passages are far more intelligible and I finish with plenty of time to spare.

So, I wanted to see if anyone has recommendations for authors that write in the similarly shitty style of the LSAC test writers? I think that reading overly verbose, awkward prose for meaning will help my speed on LR. However just like the LSAT the writing needs to be deliberate in intention and meaning (while still maintaining an awkward and generally shitty structure).

Recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Hi fellow 7sagers, I'm currently scoring low 160s and I really desperately want to get into the 170s, have been working at this for around 9 months, and I'm just worried I still won't be able to make it by June 23rd. (that's my date since I'm taking it in France) I usually don't finish the LGs on time but the ones I do -0 or max -2. LR I usually miss 3 with timing even though I get around -5 including the missed ones usually, and RC it depends, when I'm focused I almost finish and when it's difficult one is left and that really hits my score. I have all the PTs I just don't know what to do right now, maybe focusing on LGs would help the most? How do I improve my RC and LR timing?? My focus could be the main problem, it's so difficult to keep it consistently!

Also do you guys think doing 5 sections is really important to prepare for the final test or doing 4 sections is good enough and the extra adrenaline should make up for the 5th one...? I took the Dec test and didn't have too much trouble focusing, but was faaar from my goal score so I dunno.

Also anybody else taken it abroad? anything scary I should know about?

My test is June 24th, exactly 2 months from now. I was late to the party in starting CC (because figuring out internet connectivity in my rural SE Asia location has been hard), and I'm currently 45% of the way through. Before starting the CC, I read all the PS Bible for LG. My RC score has swung around a bit, it's not as high as I'd like (I started at a -2, and then I dipped a bit, and I'm hoping to get back towards -2). LR was where I was weakest pre-CC, and I do feel like I've learned a lot from JY. My LG still isn't at that sweet, sweet -0 I'm aiming for, but idk if CC will get me there any faster than practice.

Should I quit spending time watching the CC videos and just move on to PTs and BR? Should I power through the other 50 hours I have left of it and then PT like crazy with one month to go before the test? What should be my game plan here?

It's worth noting that I'm working full time in a foreign country right now, so there's a lot of demands on my time and energy that are not LSAT related. I can't move faster than I am on studying because even giving 3-4 hours a day to the LSAT is a LOT alongside full-time teaching and community integration and long-term projects.

Also worth noting that I'm aiming to get a 173+, and I was PTing around 166-168 before I halted testing to do the CC.

Hi all!

I am retaking the LSAT on the June 11th date. When I took the LSAT for the first time in December, I had so many hiccups prior to this. I want to explain my position in hopes of receiving some brutally honest feedback to motivate me. I started studying for the LSAT in May 2017 while doing 3 courses in the summer. I self studied using PowerScore Bibles along with 4 workbooks of LSAT practice tests. If I'm honest, I think I didn't study as hard as I should of and I didn't grasp the concepts. I was just reading the Bibles and working on sections while doing some PTs. I was prepping for the September LSAT and unfortunately, I had to postpone my exam because I got caught in Hurricane Irma (I live in Miami but I go to school in Waterloo, ON). Fast forward, LSAC allowed me to pick a date and change my test for FREE. So, I selected the December exam. I was really hopeful I could crush the LSAT with all this extra time however, the pressure of a full course load (5 courses), 3 clubs that I run, and a sport really took a toll on me. The December exam fell on a date right in the middle of semester ending thus coinciding with final exams. You can only imagine my workload with final tests, exams, papers, assignments and commitments. I was studying 25-30 hours a WEEK for the LSAT on top of my school work. I would lock myself up in the library for 8 hours on the weekends and anytime I had a break in between classes I was at the library.

The day of the test I felt so confident! I was scoring around 155 on my PTs from my diagnostic of 145 despite all of my obstacles. Then, as I was sitting in the room I lost it. It hit me all at once where I was and what was happening, I felt everyone's energy and it made me panic. I left the exam room and cried as soon as I walked into my apartment. I knew I bombed it and I did. I only got a 145 on the December exam and I tried not to discourage myself. I took a break from my LSAT studies this Winter term (Jan-April) and I just bought the Premium pack. I will start studying for the June exam on May 1st (I just need a break I just finished my exams + I need to decompress a bit!). I'm NOT working for this month, I dropped my extra online course for the summer because frankly I didn't need it, and I will either take my breaks with some work outs at my Muay Thai gym or visiting a law firm for a flexible internship.

I also burned myself out with the PTs. I went through all 4 books in 4 months. I would use timed/ untimed individual sections to work on problem areas and I would also use FULL timed tests. Looking through my custom study schedule, there are no PTs for me to take until the final weeks before the June exam. Therefore, this course is requiring me to learn the fundamentals BEFORE I begin to PT. Do you advise I follow through with this plan or try to integrate some additional PT practice? Do you think a score of 160+ is attainable with no other looming stresses around me? I think my main downfall was trying to take everything on at once and not devoting my full undivided attention. I'm looking forward to all of your responses :)

I only used the free trial of 7Sage during my studies for the December exam to review LG so now that I purchased a course I hope this will help me out!

Edit: Taking the September exam. If needed, retaking in November or January.

Hi everyone! can someone explain why the answer is (a)? I can't figure out at all why this is (a). I really appreciate the help. Thank you so much!

Can someone explain the process of fool-proofing? What resources do you use? Does is matter if I fool proof before or after going through CC? How many months (average) does is take?

Just for fun, I'd like to know what you guys think is the worst reading comp passage. My vote is the Navajo blanket passage from PT3. What's yours?

hey all,

in many of JY's LR explanation videos, he often visualizes the LR stimulus - either by drawing something, or diagramming, or putting some numbers down. Note : this 'writing stuff down' isn't just for conditional logic, but for other things as well.

often, i find that for very long and convoluted LR stimuluses, i need to write some things down to keep track of the various relationships among the various variables. this is especially true for LR questions that are very math heavy/a math problem in disguise.

anyway, do other people do this...or do they manage to just keep it all in their head? any advice or comments would be appreciated. thanks!

I’m looking at PT 70’s game 2 right now and I’m trying to understand the intuition behind question 12. “Which one of the following is a pair of employees at least one of whom must be on the team?” Would someone mind explaining to me how they know which members must be in in an conditional chain for an in-out game? Is the logic that it’s the friendly variable that doesn’t kick many other variables out?

Any help would be much appreciated!

Any suggestions on how to "foolproof" LR, especially LR questions you got wrong?

Also, any advice on how to get better at identifying and understanding LR cookie cutters? Thanks!

Hey all,

I know Blind reviewing is usually done before one looks at the answers, where one thinks to himself why one answer choice is 100% right and the other four are 100% wrong.

I wanted to hear your thoughts on "Blind reviewing" after you watch JY's LR video explanation. What I mean by this is that after you watch the video, maybe have some time distance away from that specific LR problem (like 1 or 2 days), and then go back to that question you got wrong and then really think and explain to yourself why 1 answer is 100% right and the other 4 are 100% wrong.

Granted, this is after you already watched the video explanation, but with this you're testing yourself to see if you REALLY understood the question and why you got it wrong...rather than tricking yourself that you fully understood the question simply because you watched JY's video explanation when in actuality you perhaps didn't really understand it. With this method, by dissecting wrong questions after having watched JY's video explanation, you're also trying to understand any "cookie cutter" lesson to be learned from that question, or find any general LR pattern.

I've heard top scorers do something similar to this where they cut out all their wrong LR questions and then review them scrupulously (re-resolve them, break down the grammar, fully analyze wrong answer choices and the right one, etc.) from time to time.

I've been realizing that sometimes when I redo LR questions, I get a same question wrong AGAIN, so this is just a way to really force myself to fully learn from my past mistakes. My LR score has for sometime hit a wall (-3/-4 per section) and i'm hoping to use this method of reviewing wrong LR questions to improve (granted I also blind review in the normal sense where I BR before looking at the right AC).

What are your thoughts 7sage?

Thanks.

#help

I have a quick question that I was hoping some of the more experienced LSAT takers might be able to answer (or maybe JY himself).

In one of the first couple of Reading Comp videos, JY says that if you don't understand something, you'll just let it slide. But often, it will just snowball into a bigger and bigger misunderstanding.

Later, in several of the other videos, JY says that it's important to be able to compartmentalize things that you don't understand, and to not let them impact your efficiency in dissecting the rest of the passage, since it might not be worth spending all that time trying to understand something that turns out to be relatively insignificant.

Can someone please help me reconcile this apparent discrepancy (had to make the LR joke :p )? Does anyone have ways of determining when it's necessary to fully understand something versus when it's not? If you could share some of your own experiences and results that would be awesome.

Thanks so much.

The questions is regarding the computer simulations vs. actual test crashes. Why B cannot be the answer? Is that because "highly likely" is not good enough to be a premise? Could anyone share your ideas? Thank you.

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-81-section-3-question-12/

Admin note: edited title

"A is good if it satisfies B." How would you guys translate this? B --> A? or A--> B?

I feel like without translating it as A-->B, it's impossible to get the right answer.

Admin note: edited title

Hi Guys,

I am stuck in parsing a sentence. I can't understand its meaning.

Here is the passage..

The ways by which you may get money almost without exception lead downward. To have

done anything by which you earned money merely is to have been truly idle or worse. If the

laborer gets no more than the wages which his employer pays him, he is cheated, he cheats

himself. If you would get money as a writer or lecturer, you must be popular, which is to go down

perpendicularly.

This line is taken Life without principles by Henry David.

Please help.TIA.

hi guys,

can you guys help explaining to me as to what the difference is between answer choice (d) and (e)?

(d) says "some" and (e) says "many" but if I remember correctly, those two words are used interchangeably.

So I am confused as to why answer is (d) and not (e).

Thanks a bunch!

Admin note: edited title

Hi all, just looking for any insight on what you think is possible/plausible/likely.

I just took my first diagnostic and scored a 158, then a 173 on the blind review. I still have 3 months until my actual test date. What type of score do you think I could or should be aiming for now that I know where I currently sit?

Thanks!

I have noticed that one of my biggest issues is the time it takes me to do an initial set up for a game. For example, on a target 9 minute game I will literally spend 4 minutes setting up the game and still realize that I am going to have to do hypos for a number of the questions. Any pointers?

The school I'll be attending this fall said I could increase my scholarship by improving my LSAT score (even by 1 point!). So... What do you guys suggest I do to increase my RC score in such a short period? I rock games (thank you FP method!) and LR is my second best section, but RC was averaging -12 when I was PTing before the Dec test... I run out of time AND miss questions on the passages I am able to get through.

My Ultimate + ran out about a month ago, but I have hard copies of most PTs and have the Starter to review CC.

Thanks!

There's a common questions type in RC where they ask you to predict the first sentence in the next paragraph (ex. PT7.S3.Q7 and PT1.S1.Q27)

I seem to be having trouble with this question type at a high level. What's the best strategic approach for these? And does anyone have a good resource for drilling this question type. #help