@8Swans Not sure where you are getting the idea that the physicists are not pursuing a theory of everything. We are told the idea that they “are close to arriving at a ‘theory of everything’” is a mischaracterization. Not that they aren’t pursuing such a theory, or that the notion that they are pursuing it is misleading. We have every reason to believe they are indeed pursuing it. The author wants us to doubt that they are close to fully articulating (that they are close to arriving at) such a theory. That’s the popular mischaracterization.

@Anthony121 We have to be able to make commonsense, everyday assumptions on the LSAT, yes. The notion that fraud involves deception is one such piece of commonsense we are presumed to have, apparently. Beyond commonsense, you are right we should be wary of making assumptions in order to force ACs to work.

In this case, the author tells us that the authors did a thing that’s not allowed and then jumped to “it’s fraud!” without establishing that their actions actually involved the stuff we typically associate with literal fraud, e.g. deception, (intentional) misrepresentation, etc. It could have been that the authors accidentally submitted the manipulated images or were otherwise unaware that it was not allowed. In which case, it wouldn’t be fraud (the conclusion wouldn’t follow).

AC D): Incorrect. The tapes are unreliable, not innacurate. And even if we misunderstand “unreliable” to mean “inaccurate”, the administrator does provide justification. They give a reason: that the number is “based on a partial review…” So this AC is double wrong.

Only got this one cause I prephrased “what if something else caused the reduction in accidents?” and E seemed to eliminate one possible way this could have happened using a common LSAT trope: the LSAT often says “okay but that effect also happened at the same time in this other place where the purported cause didn’t take place, so its probably some broader cause that is responsible.” AC E seemed to be doing a version of this. Wish I could like the answer on its merits, but at a certain point I guess it’s just pattern recognition?

@lynvgn I fell into the same loop of worrying about the wording of the question stem (and I’ve come to the conclusion that people are making too big of an issue about it.) My charitable take on caring about the q-stem is that the “grounds” that are strengthened with AC B) is the part about “the rubbish within” (rather than strengthening the idea that there was erosion, like you point out). Because AC B) does reinforce the notion that the rubbish within (the rubbish remaining) is stuff that is has suffered destructive effects. So it strengthens one of the grounds given—the one that says there were destructive effects on the rubbish within.

Like you (if I’m understanding you), AC C) also baited me to think about the erosion. It seems to support the “grounds” that there was indeed erosion. But we are already told that “the pits have been subject to erosion over long periods of time”, so information explaining that erosion really adds no strength to the argument. But does it “strengthen the grounds” of the argument, that there was erosion over long periods of time?

No. Because we are only told that the soil surrounding the pits was “sometimes” removed. Removing soil in this way does indeed contribute to erosion, as you point out. But is it erosion “over long periods of time” as the argument tells us? We have no idea. AC C) could have only happened like twice in a single weekend. If that still counts as erosion I have no idea (and the LSAT cannot assume we have such knowledge—only general, common sense assumptions). But even if it is erosion, it still doesn’t strengthen the “grounds” that “the pits have been subject to erosion over long periods of time.” At best it strengthens the notion that “it has been subject to erosion” sometimes.

TL;DR: I hate everything about this question.

@LSATDemon I took “generally” in the stim to mean ‘across the board’ or like ‘as a general rule’ which is still a big hasty generalization. My understanding with parallel flaw is that we prioritize matching the flaw over the strength of the argument perfectly. So I think you’re right that “generally” leaves room for some exceptions while AC B is absolute, but they are both hasty generalizations.

Is “music is merely sound” even a generalization?

@mvsouthbay Yes they can be considered premises. Here the example is a premise, just not one that gives direct support for the main conclusion. Rather, it gives support to the subconclusion (another premise) that “many entrepreneurs who succeed in starting a company fail later for lack of managerial skills.” This subconclusion then supports the main conclusion directly.

How do we know the first sentence is just context/not logically connected to the argument? Thinking it was support is what drew me to AC E.

Principle question, so all our ACs are conditionals. Eliminate any AC that isn’t “if [something in the stimulus], then harm” or “if not harm, then [negation of something in the stimulus]”.

AC A: “if harm,” nope

AC C: “if ??? then dishonest” nope.

AC D: “if unintentional, then responsible for harm” nope.

AC E: “if convince, then partially responsible” nope.

AC B: “if [something in the stimulus], then harm.” yep.

@QuinnOlson I don’t think they are being equated, but I think we are meant to assume some relation between them. The author is saying that “understanding the needs and problems of others” is necessary for sympathy and justice. And whatever threshold is sufficient for “understanding others” , “little knowledge” probably doesn’t reach that threshold (this is our reasonable assumption). So “little knowledge” is actually equated to “lack of understanding.”

p1: little interaction—>little knowledge

p2: sympathy&justice—>understanding

So if you have little interaction, you have little knowledge (p1). If you have little knowledge, we can reasonably infer that you don’t have full understanding, so triggering the contrapositive of p2, you (roughly) aren’t going to have sympathy&justice. And this basically gets us to AC B: some interaction is required for sympathy&justice.

I may have misunderstood your confusion, but this is how I understood the correct AC.

@philanderknox Not sure what you mean by the final sentence implying “they would fetch a high enough price if there was less of a risk.” In any case, the author thinks it is the financial risk that makes growing such crops unwise (i.e. the risk is the reason it is unwise), not the other way around. If A were correct, that would mean that the reason it is a financial risk is because it is unwise. But this doesn’t make much sense.

@VioletSorrengail @Rmm Comprehensive international solution is just one type of comprehensive solution. If “No nations would be required to give up some of their power over their own industries as part of any comprehensive solution to the problem of pollution” then they certainly wouldn’t be required to for some specific type of (i.e. international) comprehensive solution. If you mean the unnegated version of B feels too strong, I agree. But negated it definitely undermines the argument.

I got down to AC E) and thought “is stress connecting to hospitalization really an unwarranted assumption? I guess so, since I eliminated everything else.” No!! You know it’s warranted, so do a hard reset and reread the stimulus cause something went left in the first read. (note to self and others who think like me).

@ErinSiodmak This is a good question. I think in this case the past-future flaw is sort of circumvented because we are told up-front that El Niño is expected to become more frequent. So it is warranted to infer that “heavy winter rainfall” will become more frequent—thats just what El Niño does. The issue is what is actually involved when that happens (is it sustained over monthlong periods? or is does it just pour down rain on and off every few days?).

Also, AC D) isn’t necessarily forcing us to assume that El Niño will not bring more sustained rains because it usually hasn’t before. This would be a flaw. Its just pointing out that it usually hasn’t, so absent any other reason to think things will change in that regard, the Ecologist cannot just conclude it will become more sustained because of the increased frequency of the event as a whole.

I would also add to why AC A) is incorrect: it is consistent with the reasoning in the stimulus and the conclusion. The argument establishes that experiences accompanied by increased adrenaline tend to be remembered more clearly, so frightening experiences tend to be remembered more clearly. If some super intense experiences fall outside this tendency, that’s fine—the tendency can still be a general tendency.

@ZoeNelson “need not X” does not imply “could X”, although they are consistent with each other. For example, I could say “I don’t need to go to the store, even though I could.” But I could just as well say, “Good thing I don’t need to go to the store, cause they are closed and I cannot go.” These are both fine. If “need not” strictly implied “could,” then merely by not needing something, it would follow that I still could—but this doesn’t make sense. The fact that I need not go to the store, does not necessarily mean that I could. It may be closed.

@lsath34rt Because the argument is contrasting ability to master ancient languages with the ability to master modern ones, there is an implicit premise that “if we can attain perfect knowledge of a language, we must be able to immerse ourselves in a country where the language is spoken.” Modern language learners, because they are modern, are able to meet this NC. Ancient language learners, being ancient, cannot. The claim that “you cannot travel back in time to spend a year abroad at Plato’s Academy” is meant to trigger the contrapositive of the implicit assumption. So you are correct that the NC is not explicitly stated, but if the reason why ancient language learners cannot attain perfect knowledge is because they cannot immerse themselves in the country where it is spoken (the point about Plato’s Academy tells us this is so), there must be some logical relationship between these points.

I think C is tempting because there is definitely some rhetorical sassiness from the Classicist about Plato’s Academy, but it is not merely rhetorical.

That of course doesn’t explain why AC B) is correct word for word, but hopefully helps explain the logic in the stimulus.

@SMRegalado AC A is not accurate. What you describe is not a genuine contradiction. A contradiction is “X and not X”. We know the critics believe 1) “etiquette has no beneficial effects for society” and 2) “kindness and social harmony are good.” While we are told that “kindness and harmony” are part of etiquette and can infer they are beneficial to society (this is why AC C is correct), we don’t know that the critics are actually aware of this. They may believe that kindness and social harmony are merely individual goods, or that etiquette doesn’t actually encourage kindness and social harmony. If these are their beliefs (and we have no reason to think they are not) then their beliefs are perfectly consistent.

Another way of thinking about it is that we know straightforwardly their views are not in contradiction. All we know that they believe is 1) and 2) above. These claims are not logical opposites, and so cannot be in contradiction.

Finally, if you still think their views about societal benefits are in contradiction, then you must also believe AC C is accurate because holding contradictory beliefs entails one of them is false, i.e. mistaken. And because this is the LSAT and you can’t have two correct answers…AC C is more strongly supported because while contractions are always false, false beliefs are not always contradictions. AC C is just safer at that point.

AC A) is incorrect (primarily, IMO) because there can be more varieties found in Paraguay than anywhere else without there being a “great” variety found in Paraguay.

@NatalieHein You should watch the video if you haven’t already.

Year 1

Region A: 1 job at $4/hr

Region B: 1000 jobs at $18/hr

National (weighted) average: ((1x4)+(1000x18))/1001= $17.986/hr

Year 2:

Region A: 1000 jobs at $5/hr

Region B: 1 job at $20/hr

National (weighted) average: ((1000x5)+(1x20))/1001= $5.015/hr

@r.wang1 That’s right, AC E) is not ideal in the sense that it doesn’t make the argument valid, but it is perfectly fine in the sense that it absolutely helps justify the conclusion in the stimulus. I like that he mentions in the explanation here (and not in the recorded lesson that I remember) that the first assumption that is otherwise missing would also be a fine AC here—as long as we fill in an assumption clearly being made here, it will strengthen it. (Albeit, it seems we should favor anticipating the one that more immediately connects to the conclusion, which ends up being E).

As far as the Cracking 180 lesson itself, the point of this particular one was on identifying different uses of the contrapositives that come up in LR. And training to see how the authors are relying on us seeing an assumption (or assumptions) meant to trigger that contrapositive. I thought it was super eye opening for comprehending the structure of the stimulus beyond simply thinking “okay this is a subconclusion, and this is its support and this is the main, etc.”, which is pretty much what I’ve been doing.

Some of the other questions he went through with different structured uses of the contrapositive were: 120.S3.Q10, 140.S2.Q25, 129.S1.Q14 and 143.S3.Q18. But I recommend watching it if you can.

@r.wang1 Thanks! I was actually watching Kevin’s recorded lesson this morning (Cracking 180 with Kevin) from July 13 and he discusses this question and my concern about the two gaps. It was super helpful as well.

@kaysh It looks like you are misunderstanding the stimulus. It is not the case, as you stated, that “29% of the students who take at least 1 night class live in W”. Rather, the last two sentences of the stim tell us: “29% of students living in W take at least 1 night class.”