276 posts in the last 30 days

Hello, I'm struggling with understanding Hybrid games. I have a solid foundation on ordering and grouping but for some reason hybrid is tough. Are there any tutors that specialize in Hybrid games?

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If this is not the hardest question on the set, I don't know which is. I had a great time trying to understand this question and why C is correct and spent an hour just scratching my head trying to figure it out. Would still love to see what everyone thinks about this question. But so far I don't see that many asking about this question so here is my take on it.

Background: Some researchers claim that people gesture less when expressing abstract instead of physical ideas

Premise: Some people perceive words in different ways: for a word that has both abstract and physical understanding, people can perceive it as either abstract or physical

Conclusion: The argument that the researchers' claim is not universal is not sufficient reason to reject it.

WTF. What are the connections between the premise and the conclusion? It seems to me that the premise is trying to say that the researchers' claim MIGHT WELL BE universal.

The argument implies that the critics would challenge the researchers' claim by doubting its univsersality. It might be something like this: the word "comprehension" represents an abstract concept, but some people apparently gesture and make a grabbing movement when they say it. This is a disproving evidence that would show that this claim is not universal, therefore it can be rejected.

Author counters by saying: hey, "comprehension" doesn't have to mean the abstract concept of understanding. It can definitely mean "catching" or "grasping." Not so fast critics, the claim of the researchers can still be universal: people just understand a word differently, and their actions regarding gesturing when expressing different words or concepts are still in accordance with what the researchers have claimed. Just because someone does gesture when expressing a word that has an abstract definition does not mean that person are thinking of the abstract definition of that word. He or she might well be expressing the physical definition instead of the abstract one. In this line of reasoning, the researchers' claim still stand and still might be universal.

AC C matches this pretty well. The author is trying to use a psychological fact (people perceive words in different definition) to reconcile a general claim (researchers' 'people gesture less with abstract concepts'") with apparently disconfirming evidence (people do NOT always gesture less when expressing abstract concepts). I find this line of reasoning the most applicable to the right answer to this question. I might be dead wrong with this, and I would love to see what others have to say about this.

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Wednesday, Mar 20, 2024

Flaw Questions

I don't know why but I always struggle with Flaw questions and get 50% of them wrong all the time. It's just not clicking! Does anyone have any tips that worked for them? Anything would be appreciated.

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I watched JY's explanation video and I see why B is correct, but I'm still confused why D isn't either. It says "if ALL farmers..." in the premise, so how isn't it overlooking that possibility?

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Hello, I am studying logic games not for taking the exam but for a programming course and so don't need the full course, but would like to view the sequencing games lessons and how to read the diagrams. Are there any free youtube tutorials on this that you recommend? Thanks!

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PT F97.S1.Q18 – Roseville Courthouse

We are asked to identify the point at issue / disagreement between Mayor Tyler and Councillor Simon. Tyler suggested to build a new courthouse for the city of Roseville in 1982 for a price of 26 million dollars, but ‘now’ in 1992 the price of the courthouse is 30 million. Tyler uses these premises to infer that Roseville would have saved 4 million dollars if the courthouse had been built in 1982, as suggested. Tyler also mentions in passing that the existing courthouse has been overcrowded.

Simon responds by bringing in the topic of inflation: The 26 million dollars that the courthouse would have costed in 1982 are equivalent to 37 million in 1992 dollars. Simon takes this to show that Roseville actually saved money by not building the courthouse. Simon also mentions in passing that the courthouse, had it actually been built, would have been underutilized.

There thus are at least two disagreements in this exchange, one much more overt than the other: (1) Roseville was right not to build the courthouse in 1982: Tyler disagrees, Simon agrees. (2) Had the courthouse been built, it would have been put to good use: Tyler agrees, Simon disagrees. The answer choices are tricky in that four of them purport to get at this first disagreement while not actually resolving it. Only one answer choice, the correct one, gets at the second disagreement and actually resolves it:

(A) This gets at Roseville’s actions going forward, does not directly relate to either disagreement.

(B) This gets at the issue of inflation adjusted prices, does not directly relate to either disagreement.

(C) This gets at the extent of Tyler’s responsibility, does not directly relate to either disagreement.

(D) This does get at the second disagreement and points out one issue where Tyler and Simon disagree: Would a new courthouse actually have been needed / been put to good use? Tyler agrees, as Tyler proclaims the present courthouse overcrowded, i.e. insufficient to serve Roseville’s existing population spatially. Simon disagrees; states that a hypothetical larger courthouse would have remained underutilized. The disagreement is subtle, but definitely present.

(E) This confuses the issue of inflation adjustment with financial upkeep, purports to get at the first disagreement but actually misrepresents information from the passage, in an apparent attempt to confuse test takers who did not select one of the previous answers the first time around.

Takeaway: This is a tricky question in that there are two disagreements only one of which gets resolved. The question stem arguably hints at this by speaking of ‘A point of disagreement,’ rather than of ‘The point of disagreement;’ i.e. the question stem leaves open the possibility of multiple disagreements. Nevertheless, this question demands some reflection. Read stimulus and answer choices more than once to get at the nuance of the issues at play. Do process of elimination for the wrong answer choices. If necessary, flag the question the first time around and return to it at the end of the section.

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I personally find this the hardest LR question in PT 14; it is (1) bizarre on the level of content, (2) very long and overloads test takers with information, and (3) at the very end of the fourth section, thus hitting you at a point of the test where you already spent 2+ hours intensively thinking about stuff and are mentally exhausted.

In paraphrased form, the stimulus says:

(1) Phenomenon: In the Peruvian desert, there are different sets of lines in the sand. These lines occur in different layers: On the top layer, there are lines that branch out from a single point. Beneath that, there are lines that form a bird figure.

(2) Hypothesis: An investigator argues for the conclusion that both of these sets of lines were brought about by aliens, who supposedly used the Peruvian desert to land their space ships. To support this conclusion, the investigator evokes the premises that the lines in the sand would have been useless to Incas.

The first thing to do here is to figure out what the stimulus is even about: The phenomenon itself is not immediately clear – it is crucial to note that there are TWO sets of lines, not just one –, and the investigator’s hypothesis is counterintuitive to a degree that it becomes all too easy to disregard the glaring selective attention fallacy in their reasoning (Aliens or Incas, not Incas; therefore aliens). So the first hurdle here is to even figure out what is going on, and to throw out one’s common sense intuitions out of the window (How can you even identify the different layers of ancient lines in the sand? How did the lines stick around for so long? All of these questions become irrelevant).

The next hurdle then is the question stem, which again seems bizarre: Here, the test writers tell us that we seek to establish the conclusion that the lines are supposed to refer to astronomical phenomena, and that we are supposed to block an alternative hypothesis to the effect that the lines are non-astronomical. So at this point this seems to become a sort of strengthen question. The question stem is unusual to an extent that it becomes hard to pre-phrase or anticipate how a right answer might look like. Thus process of elimination seems to be the best approach:

(A) North American natives arranged stones in ways that allow for the measurement of astronomical phenomena. This seems to strengthen a little bit in that it points out a seemingly analogous case (It is not only in South America but also in North America that people used geological means to keep track of astronomical phenomena). However, it seems unclear how this answer choice would also have the blocking effect that the question stem is asking for. Thus keep around as a candidate but expect that one of the other answer choices might well be better.

(B) The straight lines indicate positions at which astronomical events could have been observed ‘at plausible dates,’ and the bird lines could represent a constellation. This gets at both sets of lines and associates both of them with astronomical phenomena. The answer thus is fairly specific. Furthermore, the answer itself postulates its own plausibility (‘plausible dates’), which seems like a massive hint, though again unusual. Like the rest of this question, (B) thus again seems wildly counterintuitive, but in the scenario we are supposed to explain, (B) arguably makes the most sense. In particular, (B) approximates the desired function more than (A). Thus far this thus is the least bad answer choice.

(C) The lines form patterns. This answer choice is worse than (B), due to its lack of specificity and its apparent disconnect from the question stem. Worst answer choice thus far.

(D) Central American Natives used rocks to measure astronomical phenomena. This answer choice seems almost identical to (A) and thus provides good grounds to dismiss both (A) and (D): There can only be one correct answer choice, two virtually identical answer choices thus are likely to both be false.

(E) The bird lines might be older than the straight lines. Again irrelevant; (B) must be right.

Takeaways: This seems to be a question where the LSAT really tries hard to make test takers focus exclusively on reasoning structures, not on common sense intuition or plausibility. In this sense, the question is similar to other early LR questions that seem weird content wise but make syntactical sense on the level of formal logic. Focus on getting a clear understanding of what is going on in the stimulus and the question stem; I spent four minutes on this and still felt overwhelmed. Get a clear grasp of what the phenomenon is, what the explanation attempt from the stimulus is trying to say, and how the two alternative explanatory directions from the question stem relate to another. Then use process of elimination to get through the answers.

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