After going through all of the core curriculum, I'm still scoring -12 or -13 on LR. Does anyone have any recommendations?

hi looking to start a study group to weekly or biweekly go over and discuss practice tests. i plan to take august lsat and aiming for high 160s / low 170s! let me know so we can make a groupme!

I believe this should be a weaken question not flaw. Manhattan says its weaken too. Besides, the right answer choice E is giving a new cause- that of not being extroverted as a person OVER astrology affecting them.

I am planning on taking the August 12th exam, how many more tests should I take?

I was posting this as a comment to a thread in which someone asked for a "trick" to identifying assumptions. But I thought it'd be more useful as its own thread.

Unfortunately, there is no trick for answering assumption questions, and a full treatment of how to approach them isn't reasonable to fit in a forum post.

However, many, many students would benefit from adding another step in their process to NA questions (and SA, flaw, strengthen/weaken): ask whether there is a "new" concept in the conclusion.

This is because one of the most important aspects of identifying assumptions is noticing concepts in the conclusion that are not mentioned or logically covered in the reasoning. If there is a "new" concept in the conclusion, then the argument must be making some kind of assumption related to it. There may be other assumptions, too, related to gaps between premises, but you can be sure that at least one of the assumptions must be about that new concept in the conclusion.

As good LSAT students, you probably are already familiar with the idea described above. But a lot of people seem to rely mainly on passively noticing new concepts rather than actively thinking about this as a step in solving questions.

Let's work through some example that increase in difficulty.

Example 1:

Rooney graduated with the highest GPA in the history of our law school.

Thus, she must be good at writing law school exams.

Is there a new concept in the conclusion? Yes - do you see that "good at writing law school exams" is not mentioned in the premise? That means the author is making an assumption about the relationship between having the highest GPA and what that tells us about being good at writing law school exams. The author is assuming that having the highest GPA is an indicator of ability at law school exams.

Oftentimes students just fail to notice the difference between two concepts - they make the assumption that the argument itself is making, which is why it's hard to spot that assumption.

Example 2:

Our new neighbor, Xander, was convicted of over fifty murders and has been referred to by local historians as one of the worst serial killers in the United States.

So, we were living next to a murderer this whole time and never knew it!

Are there new concepts in the conclusion? You might see that the idea of "not knowing" our neighbor is a murderer is new - the evidence never provides anything related to what we knew about Xander. So the argument is assuming something about our lack of knowledge. What if we actually knew he was a killer before he was found out? Then the argument doesn't work.

Do you also see that the concept of "being a murderer" is also new? The evidence just refers to being "convicted" of murders and "being referred to by historians" as a serial killer. None of those is the same as being a murderer - what if he's an innocent person who was wrongly convicted and falsely thought of as a serial killer?

Another issue is that sometimes students don't realize something is a new concept because they think that the fact that it was mentioned elsewhere in the stimulus means that it's not new. But in reality, the concept can still be "new" if it's not mentioned in the reasoning that supports the conclusion.

In addition, you might have to translate the conclusion if it uses referential language. You can't identify new concepts in the conclusion unless you've spelled out exactly what the substance of the conclusion is.

Example 3:

Some social theorists claim that San Francisco's large homeless population could be reduced by implementing policies that condition the provision of free food and medical services to the homeless on their staying off drugs and actively looking for a job. However, most of the homeless do not react to incentives in the same way that the average non-homeless member of society would react.

Thus, the social theorists' claim is false.

If you break down the argument to premise and conclusion, here's what we get:

Premise: Most of the homeless do not react to incentives in the same way that the average non-homeless member of society would react.

Conclusion: SF's large homeless population cannot be reduced by conditioning the provision of free food/medical services to homeless on the requirement that they stay off drugs and actively look for a job.

Notice that the first sentence about the social theorists' claim is not a premise - it's simply referred to by the conclusion as being wrong. So in my understanding of the argument, the first sentence just disappears - we've translated that into the substance of the conclusion, and that first sentence has nothing to do with the reasoning of the argument. Now we can properly think about new concepts in the conclusion.

Do you see anything new? There are quite a few, so there are a lot of assumptions. But here are three that stand out to me.

San Francisco's homeless? They weren't mentioned in the reasoning. Maybe they are different from the "most of the homeless" in the premise. The argument is assuming that San Francisco's homeless do not react to incentives in a significantly different way from "most" homeless. What if SF's homeless actually react more like the average non-homeless? That would undermine the argument by making the premise irrelevant. (Notice that if the premise said "All homeless..." then SF's homeless wouldn't technically be a "new concept" because they would be logically covered by the premise, even if the words "San Francisco" are new.)

The whole idea of policies that condition food/medical services on requiring them to stay off drugs or look for a job --- where is that coming from? The premise doesn't say anything about them. The argument never explicitly identified these things as the kind of thing the premise was calling an "incentive". So the argument must be assuming that these kinds of policies relate to incentives and how people would react to them. It's assuming that having the conditions of staying drug free or getting a job would be things the average non-homeless would react to differently from most homeless. If this weren't true -- if the homeless and non-homeless reacted the same way to these conditions, then the premise would have nothing to do with the conclusion because they'd be talking about two different things.

Reducing homeless populations? Does the premise say anything at all about reducing homeless populations or what is required for that? No. So the argument is making some kind of connection between the different reactions that homeless people have to incentives and the reduction of homeless populations. It's assuming that the policies in question - conditioning food/medical services on drug-free/look for job - can reduce homeless populations only if they work through incentivizing the homeless in some way. If there were some way that the policies could reduce homeless populations in a way that didn't relate to incentivizing them, then the premise (which was only about incentives), would have nothing to do with proving the conclusion. What if, for example, the policies could reduce homeless populations by stirring the moral fiber of SF's private citizens, who find the policies draconian and cruel and as a result band together to build thousands of free housing units for SF's homeless? The argument is assuming that this isn't a possibility.

I hope this helps if you're having trouble with assumptions and always find yourself thinking "there's no way I would have noticed that..." Maybe one reason you're not noticing it is because you're not explicitly identifying key concepts in the conclusion and asking whether they were mentioned or logically covered by the premises?

If you're reading quickly and uncritically, the difference between QOQOOQOQ and QOQOQOOQ might not stand out. But if you actually examine each set of letters and explicitly ask "Are these the same?" Then it's a lot easier to see where the difference is.

I was stuck between C and E for this question and chose the latter because the stimulus seemed to be more focused on extraterrestrial life. E can also be an actual reason for why we wouldn't know about life outside of Earth. How would you know to choose C over E? Why is it not the answer?

Does anyone have a trick for answering assumption questions? They are killing me! No matter how many times I re-watch the lessons; I still cannot understand them. Please help!!!

I have no idea why it is not E

I don't understand how AC A strengthens the argument...so we can't see them when it is a wet year, shouldn't that mean that in '85 the observer would have seen less beetles that year than in '89?

#help

Is anyone able to explain not just why AC B is correct, but why AC A is incorrect?

My understanding from the question stem is that the correct answer choice will be one that establishes either one of the two plans (demolition or rehabilitation). I chose AC A because I reasoned that the principle established that rehabilitation should occur UNLESS the neighborhood association deems the buildings a threat (which they do). So if the neighborhood deems the houses in question a threat, then they should not be rehabilitated, and if there are only two options: demolition or rehabilitation, then demolition would need to take place.

My guess as to why AC A is incorrect is because AC A only rules out rehabilitation as a possibility and does not establish that demolition will occur. AC B used some tricky language and it established that rehabilitation should occur and that makes sense, but unfortunately I read AC A first and understood it as establishing reason for demolition so I was biased in evaluating answer choice B. This question stem was especially odd so I am not very worried about getting confused by it but I would still like to understand this question better.

Hi fellow students! I'm a bit confused about the question listed above. I don't understand how, based on the language in the stimulus, we were supposed to infer anything about cost. Can someone help explain why B is the correct answer as opposed to C or E?

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Hello all, just had a few quick questions about the LSAT on exam day. I am signed up for the August LSAT.

Even though there are only three graded sections as of 2020, we still take the full four section exam, correct?

What is the timeline for exam day? Should i expect a 5-10 minute break in between each section, or are they strictly back to back?

Also, has anybody actually legitimately prepared for the writing section? I've been studying since around January of 2022, and I haven't done a practice writing a single time. My score keeps on going up when I'm studying the graded portion, so i don't want to waste any time on something that seems to be far more inconsequential.

Hi All,

I wondered if anyone knew where to find the starred individual LG's to review later. I starred some hard ones to review later on but am unable to find them individually. Does anyone know how to find them again? I'm sure it's simple enough but here I am lol. Thanks!

I am not sure why the correct answer is (A). I have tried to reason for why it could be (A) but it does not really make sense to me.

A society in which there are many crimes, such as

thefts and murders, should not be called

"lawless."

Why is the right answer D and not B?

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Why is (A) right and not (D)? I cannot for the life of me figure this out

Hi all -- I'm confused about how to access the writing section for the June 2022 LSAT. My test is tomorrow morning, June 11. Am I supposed to click "start test"? Also, am I allowed to take the writing section after the actual LSAT? Thank you!

P.S. Good luck to all test takers!!

would answer choice B be incorrect because of "do not know?" what makes A a better choice?

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I never got an email to make a proctoru username and password but now it says I have to log in???

what do I do

Taking the June LSAT this Saturday. I have been taking as many tests as I can recently, taking PT 92 today and getting my highest score. I have 2 more full days before test day. What do y'all suggest one does in these upcoming days? I was planning on taking another PT tomorrow and then taking a break the day before the test. I am starting to think I should not take another PT and keep my confidence up with the one I took today. I do know that there is room for improvement for my PT scores, so should I try to maximize that before test day, or is it too close to make any progress?

Also, what kind of advice would you give for test day? My test is at 1pm, so what would you recommend I do that morning?

I arrived at the correct answer, (A), by process of elimination. I understand why (B)-(E) are incorrect, but how does (A) strengthen the argument?

How can I do the logic game problem set over without seeing the answers? I did it one time, struggled now want to do it for the second time. Please help!

Hey all! Just need some advice on which section of the CC I should dive into first. I know typically it's recommended to follow the outlined structure: LR -> LG -> RC. I worked on LR predominantly on another curriculum before switching to 7Sage and it's one of my better sections. I haven't touched LG, at all, and know it's my weakest.

That being said, do you recommend I just tackle LG first?

LSAC just sent out an email mentioning that we should not take the test in a room with floor to ceiling windows, but this wasn't explicitly discussed in the Candidate Agreement. The candidate agreement says no rooms with glass walls (like cubicles), so this entire time I've been planning to take my test in my kitchen where I have a dining table. However, the kitchen leads to the backyard so there is a sliding door that is almost floor to ceiling...what should I do?

When does ProctorU open up time slots for the September and October LSAT? Should I make a ProctorU account prior to receiving an email from LSAC? Additionally, does anyone know the earliest and latest times in a day to take the exam?