This is maybe the single stupidest question I have ever seen since I started studying for the LSAT. I spent like 3 minutes on it, but I did get it correct, fortunately. To share some advice, I always like to remember that I heard somewhere that top scorers get two chances to get the question right; the first time by actually identifying the correct answer and the second by understanding why the other four answers are incorrect. I don't think any question better encapsulates this idea than this one. A and B deal with clams, and not a single time in the stimulus are clams mentioned so I eliminated those. We aren't given any information about the clearing of intake pipes, so I also eliminated C. For D, we aren't told anything about the algae besides the fact that the mussels eat them, so I didn't feel it was very supported and so I eliminated it. For E, while I didn't think it was totally, 100% supported by the stimulus, it was the only answer that dealt with something explicitly engaged with in the stimulus, the removal of hazardous waste. While I don't understand how we can make the assumption that the waste remains in the mussels, and they can then be classified as hazardous waste, I thought it related more closely to the stimulus than any other answer choice. Overall, to be a top scorer, unfortunately, it is not enough to simply know the correct answer, you must be able to identify incorrect answers as well. More importantly, it is also very important to understand that LSAT writers are the biggest dickheads on the planet, and we cannot let them win.

Is E the right answer because it is the only choice that addresses jurisdictions that have mandatory headlight usage? Thanks.

Hi everyone!

I'm having a hard time with parallel method of reasoning questions. I know that I have to find the method in the stimulus and find the answer choice that uses the same method. Any tips?

Thanks in advance,

Amy

Doesn't [D] just strengthen the premise that scholars are more likely to study successful businesses than unsuccessful businesses? Can someone explain to me why it's right? It doesn't seem to strengthen the support that being more likely to study successful businesses -> overestimating successes of past businesses.

I chose [E] because it seemed to directly relate to the support. Just because scholar are more likely to study successful businesses doesn't mean that they're overestimating the successes of past businesses... what if they're also including setbacks that those successful businesses had along the way? [E] seems to guard against this potential weakness by saying that historical records actually don't allow historians to infer those setbacks. Why is [E] wrong?!

Hello!

Could some explain to me why C is correct and how they arrived to the answer? Would also appreciate it if you could tell me why the other answer choices, especially D (which is what I chose), are incorrect! Thank you so much.

Admin Note: Edited title. For LR questions, please use the format: "PT#.S#.Q# - brief description of the question."

Anyone have some tips on LR ? Would love to have a zoom call with someone who's strong on LR and maybe teach me a different approach? I read the powerbooks .. use Khan.. have Kaplan tutoring coming up.... Sometimes I learn better from peers.

Hi everyone! I scored a 158 on the July LSAT with about a month of prep. I'm taking the September LSAT and am seeking a tutor to help bring me into the 160s, willing to pay, let me know if you can help :)

Okay, Im having so much trouble trying to fund out what goes into the sufficient or the necessary conditions. Specifically in group 3 and 4. I feel like I get it wrong every time. Can anyone direct me to a specific lesson in the syllabus or explain to me how to better distinguish what goes in the sufficient or the necessary.

Hi, I’m new to 7sage and was wondering if there is a PDF with the group 1-4 keywords when we start talking about logic.

My PT scores are around 166-173 and just got a 16mid score in April, aim 173+ in June. Hope to find someone to discuss PTs especially RC/LR section together, also we can oversee each other's study schedules. Please DM me or reply if interested!

RC is by far my worst section-- and the most inconsistent which worries me. I can go from -3 to -8 between preptests.

I find that on preptests I get a lot of inference questions wrong. I'm usually able to eliminate the obvious wrong AC fairly quickly BUT I ALWAYS select the trap AC.

I was wondering how other people tackle these problems and if anyone else has similar problems with inference questions!

Now that you can use mechanical pencils on the LSAT Flex, I thought I would give some advice here as someone that is a self proclaimed mechanical pencil nerd. I have used many in practicing for the LSAT and have to give my #1 recommendation to the Delguard ER . It is 0.5 MM and has a mechanism that prevents the lead from breaking (up to three clicks). It has saved me all kinds of time and frustration. The Delguard ER is great for smaller hands, and the regular non ER model is still great, but thinner. All around it's a great pencil. The eraser is OKAY, so I would recommend a mono black foam stick eraser, but that's your personal preference.

the impression I get is that the majority of people struggle more with RC than LR, but I'm the opposite. I wanted to know if anyone who is in a similar situation had any tips? I often find the advice of "just drill" to be not super helpful because 1) I'm already doing that and am looking for more specific guidance and 2) it often comes from a person who doesn't struggle with LR in the same way so just drilling might be a good enough solution for them. Thoughts?

Hello again, fellow 7sagers.

After doing a week of Pacifico's LG drilling method, I've noticed improvements in the relatively easier/medium games regardless of their type. However, I find that I still continue to struggle diagramming the more difficult appearing games. I use "appearing" because even games that are "simple" or "easy" to solve continue to give me a problem if they consist of multiple categories or variables (for example, I got 4 incorrect on PT 3's first game which is not difficult at all). Arguably the most difficult questions, for me anyway, are those with subcategories, particularly in/out games with subcategories. I simply just struggle with creating a good diagram, which is incredibly frustrating because if I could draw these types, I would be only getting about 2 or 3 incorrect per LG section.

So, my main question is this: should I be approaching these question types differently? Perhaps is this a mentality issue? Is continued drilling and familiarity the answer? Yes to all three? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. As I mentioned, my scores would be vastly improved if I simply could diagram these seemingly complicated games more clearly.

just ran into an answer that entailed a baby preferring certain colors with no indication in the passage that it has any preference.

Can it really? How do we know?

Another example i've found is that one must PREFER an easier/more efficient task over a more difficult one! But why always??

In a broader sense, i've encountered a few situations in which the word "preferred" appears in answer choices, and i cant help but feel that the use of "preferred" is a sneaky attempt to get me to make an over-assumption!

Maybe it's just me, but anyways, I need to stop psyching myself out.

I am scoring about 4/5 points lower then goal score, but on those PT I am getting -5/-6 LG . This is my best section and I am usually lower then that but lately have been higher and not sure why. I know I can go -0 or MAX -2, but not doing it recently. When I BR I just shake my head because I fix the couple little mistakes so quick and wonder how I even ended up at that AC timed. I have full proofing all LG from 1-35 now so maybe it's because I have been doing too many games ?? not really sure and looking for advise to tweak up LG before test. Thank you!

I am coming up on my October LSAT, and my RC scores have started to slip. I'm not quite sure how to tackle this! I think the PTs in the 70s and 80s are turning up the heat a bit with the questions, but I'm wondering if anyone has any tips for reviewing my tests, remembering details, etc...I am watching the question explanations for the questions I'm missing, but it doesn't seem to be making a difference.

I so, so, so appreciate any advice that you can offer!!!

Hi all,

I would like to know how do you dissect the principles of the answer choices which has no conditional indicator or universal quantifier?

I've some trouble in correctly dissecting the principle behind answer choices A, B, and D, since none of them has a conditional indicator or universal quantifier. I understood they are wrong because none address the situation when parent should not encourage their children to outdo others. Here, my focus is solely on how to dissect the principles of the answer choices which has no conditional indicator or universal quantifier.

I had tried to interpret their principles as below:

A- If something can make their children happy about it that they do well, parents should encourage their children to do so.

B- If something can help their children have easily satisfied desires, parents should try to ensure their children do so.

D- If something can help their children have important achievements, parents should ensure their children do so.

But in my review, I felt I had pigeonholed these statements into conditional statements. So, perhaps, their principles are just assertion without premises, like "Human should be kind." Assuming such statements are all valid, they would imply that any subject mentioned should follow the prescribed advice irrespective of circumstances. Again, I am not sure whether this is the correct way to discern the principles of A, B, and D.

I am sorry for the long post. Any helps would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Leon

Admin Note: https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-88-section-4-question-17/

Really confused by the extent to which we rely on diagram in this question. For PF questions, when is the case that we do not strictly follow the diagram in the stimulus? https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-44-section-2-question-22/

STIMULUS:

H–>/G

——-

H /G (confirm one theory at the expense of the other)

However, AC E:

D–>/J

——–

/D–>J (either or)

If the above is true, why is AC E is still the correct AC? Or in this case, are we choosing the best AC?

Really confused by the extent to which we rely on diagram in this question. For PF questions, when is the case that we do not strictly follow the diagram in the stimulus? https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-44-section-2-question-22/

STIMULUS:

H–>/G

——-

H /G (confirm one theory at the expense of the other)

However, AC E:

D–>/J

——–

/D–>J (either or)

If the above is true, why is AC E is still the correct AC? Or in this case, are we choosing the best AC?

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-27-section-4-question-07/

I've watched JY's explanation and the only other forum post regarding this question, but I'm still not sure why my reasoning for B is incorrect.

I understand the diagramming to be:

P: know a lot about history —> easy to impress intellectuals

C: /(know a lot about history) —> /(easy to impress intellectuals)

I also understand this to be a case of:

Invalid Argument Structure

A —> B

———

/A —> /B

What doesn't make sense to me is I chose B though because I'm thinking it's possible

(you could know a lot about history ---> /(easy to impress intellectuals)) or (A --> /B). I'm not sure if my reasoning is correct and it's just not appropriate in this situation because it fails step 2 of the flaw test or if something else about it is flat-out incorrect. Any feedback is appreciated. Thank you.

I chose AC C and didn't even know I was wrong until I did heavy review on the right AC D.

C. I initially thought "Yes the author would agree it is a predominant strength for the Mexican American writers to not be tied down by a literary establishment. It would follow reasonably that without the need to be accountable to a larger establishment the writers are more free to experiment."

The part where this is wrong is the 2nd half - "So are free to experiment..." Where is the support from the passage that the author believes the writers are more free to experiment in ways Mexican writers can't? There isn't any. In fact, where is the support that Mexican writers can't experiment??? This was an assumption I made - that if you are tied to a literary establishment, you won't be able to experiment. But in fact no such reference is made. All we know is that Mexican writing tends to be characterized by longer writing, more "cosmopolitanism," and more theoretical content. We don't know that Mexican writers are discouraged from being experimental.

My takeaways - 1. Where is "experimenting" mentioned? It's not, this should be a red flag if the AC mentions a theme / content that's not found in the passage. 2. It is a big assumption that to be tied to a literary establishment, even if the author thinks this is a bad thing, may not mean you're less able to experiment. What if in fact the establishment has been encouraging experimentation relentlessly to Mexican authors?

D. I was put off by "regional" writers; I didn't think the author believed Mexican American writers were regional at all! But this doesn't matter!!! We could exclude the Mexican American writers completely and the author would still have to agree with this AC.

The Mexico city literary establishment = "this community." They believe "regional" writing (dismissive tone) is "parochial" again a negative tone word. So in Mexico "this community" writes in a certain way and has control for who is successful and who isn't. If someone is writing "regional" and "parochial" content, is this going to win the award for best book in Mexico? No, because the establishment who runs the show doesn't value the regional and parochial content. They value something else.

The question stem for this question asks us to pick an answer choice that shows that the explanation we were given in the stimulus is only a "partial one." I was doing this question as part of my weakening problem set. I read through the stimulus and was quickly able to identify my premise and conclusion:

P: Time runner's foot spends on the surface is less on a hard surface

C: Hard surface makes for greater running speed than a soft surface

I ended up choosing answer choice B, because I thought it provided us with an alternative explanation for why runners perform faster on the hard surface. In my mind, I thought the author was neglecting to acknowledge that it was actually the height of the runners that was affecting their performance rather than the hard surface.

If I were to add the following to answer choice B:

"when running on hard surfaces"---- would this make answer choice B correct? If not, why? Or would the stimulus have to make reference to the short v. tall runners?

Admin Note: https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-30-section-2-question-09/

Am I the only person struggling to understand the explanation video? I find it very confusing. Per the explanation from the video, the passage excludes Spain from Europe but isn’t Europe still in Spain which would support answer A? The reason I could perhards see A as the answer is line 7-9 cites the origin of spanish-language proverbs while A says Mexican American proverbs. Besides that, I'm not getting the explanation that proved A wrong and I've watch the video 7 times.

Admin Note: https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-64-section-4-passage-2-questions/

Are there tips for practicing identifying this? Like a list of potential things each paragraph could be? the vocab always trips me up. thanks! @"Juliet - 7Sage"