ET --> PT or B

B <--s--> Eng

B <--s--> /Eng

PT --> Eng

---

ET (eng) > ET (/eng)

Mathematically speaking, the missing assumption that I wanted to find was

B (eg) + PT (eg) > B (/eg)

But I know LSAT was never going to give me the keys to my dream car in a very obvious way.

Answer choice B does this job, in a fairly subtle way.

if there are as many PT tools as there are B tools (let's say there are 100 tools each. 100 PT and 100 B), then no matter how you distribute the tools, you will get ET (eng) > ET (/eng).

Let's go with the worst case scenario:

Suppose there is only 1 B that is Eng, and the rest (99) is /Eng.

so that will give us 1+ 100 (PT)= 101 ET (eng) and... 99 ET (/ENG).

oh? 101> 99!

when lack of rain CAUSE farmers' wheat crops to fail --> bunch of business sectors relevant to farming go bankrupt

During my actual take, I misunderstood the stimulus as if it were saying "lack of rain --> people lose money" It was only during BR that I read the operative word "cause" meaning, whether it is lack of rain or wrath from God, whatever variable that initiates farmers' wheat crops to fail triggers the entire supposed casual relationship!

B is a trap answer choice that preys on people like me lol.

Like the model explanation, first of all, you can't justify ,without warrant, the following: below average rainfall=lack of rain.

If the stimulus gave us something ironclad, like " if lack of rain --> then farmers' wheat crops fail" then it would've been a solid choice, imo. (but then again, lack of rain DOES NOT mean below average rain, so this AC is still garbage)

E is the safest answer. E is basically saying "the consequences from lack of rain is not limited to only damaging (impacting) farms." WHICH MUST BE TRUE (since the consequences can impact businesses other than farming!)

Spending 5 minute outside in the cold and coming back with a new pair of eyes made me realize what I was missing during BR.

at first, when I read C, I thought "so if I negate this then the AC says 'engineered food has substantial advantages OTHER than improving muscular strength'... so what? The conclusion is bulletproof from this concern because it explicitly stated those who need to IMPROVE their muscular strength, right?"

But during BR, I noticed I didn't properly identified the conclusion. The real conclusion is: athletes should not consume engineered foods.

And that's a very tough argument to defend. Suppose you are in a debate team and this is the conclusion your team is trying to present. If the opposition brings out a single case of sports performance related advantage, you are done.

so C offers a strong shield against this concern. It's kinda like a cheat key. It is saying if engineered food DOES NOT improve muscle strength, then it has no other advantages to athletes! (something absolutely necessary for someone to argue that athletes SHOULD NOT consume engineered foods).

Purpose of art is to spur debate among art experts

The edifice spurred debate

---

Edifice qualifies as art

I need something strong, something ironclad like a conditional statement in order to help this poor dude's argument to become valid.

Since he defined the purpose of art and also provided that the edifice in question fulfills the purpose of art...

the missing assumption (SA) will have to chain those two ideas:

Fulfill Purpose --> Qualifies as art, hence D.

I thought this was an interesting stimulus.

The banker starts his argument by saying that controlled economy (think of the USSR, North Korea) doesn't go well with democracy.

Yeah no sh*t sherlock

should be your immediate response. But the next sentence is where things get interesting. He says that "repressive measures against certain capitalistic developments are REQUIRED during the transition from a totalitarian regime to a democracy."

HUH? This sentence threw me off irl. Intuitively or superficially, it makes no sense: So... I'm supposed to root for the very thing I don't want in my ideal society (democracy)?

But! each second I waste trying to prove and impress my wisdom to LSAC is a total waste of time. So let's take the face value of this dude's view (after all, it is the premise).

And bro concludes those who are complaining about "anti-capitalistic" (remember the repressive measures against certain capitalistic developments up there?) measures that are currently taking place are being hasty.

Hit the brakes right there. What must be true for this dude's conclusion to work in his world?

Or I guess here is the better question: what must be taking place in this investment banker's world in order for him to say that people who criticize the state's repressive actions are being hasty?

This is where NA like E comes in handy. If the dude's country is NOT undergoing a regime transformation (from totalitarian --> democracy), how on earth can he be justified to criticize the aforementioned people?

If you don't give him E, you are making him a conspiracy theorist in r/politics.

I spent a good minute trying to come up with a reasonable explanation, that will convince me that sea birds are included in sea animals :(

For some reason, I spent the whole day thinking about this stimulus lol.

The author (who wrote the letter) is at odds with the editorial's conclusion: the department is spending the newly increased budget to do the same duties (ever since 2001).

So, in a way, I know the QS is written in a STR style, but for me, I focused on how to WKN editorial's conclusion.

what's the subtle assumption that the editorial relies? Well, it is not that subtle lol. In order for the editorial's conclusion to stick, it NEEDS to assume that the Planning Department's "duties" have remained unchanged since 2001.

What if the duties are not the same? Then you can't (obviously) no longer say "Oh yeah, btw, did yall notice the newly increased budget for the Planning Department? Isn't it crazy how they are now spending that much money to do the same task?"

Ah, of course. LSAT loves these play on words.

I bet most of the test takers have no problem outlining the conclusion from a wordy stimulus. In this case, it is that very disposition (altruism) prevents SOME acts of altruism from counting as moral.

Hit the brakes right there. How can you express "Altruistic disposition prevents SOME acts of alturism from counting as moral" differently?

That's what D does.

Not all A are B= Some A are not Bs.

Not all altruistic acts are moral behavior= Some alturistic acts are NOT moral behavior, which is what the conclusion basically says.

A--> if this is true, then dopamine addicts might be ENCOURAGED (no effect in discouraging) leading criminals to go out there and loot best buy.

B--> Okay, similar case study.

C--> huh? Tell me more dude. What happened to the robbery rates when the terms were decreased? Without knowing this, this answer does absolutely nothing to the argument.

D--> Makes sense. If most of the criminals believe they are invincible, increasing the prison term will have no bearing.

E--> Makes sense too. If most of the criminals have absolutely no idea what the average sentence for their crime is, how does increasing the prison term carry any significant effect?

To those of you who got this question wrong, take a deep breath.

Read the stimulus again. The Geologist's conclusion depends on a subtle assumption (VERY SUBTLE).

Dude is basically relying on the presence of biomarkers (whatever they are) to do the entire task of debunking the scientists who think oil came from non-living materials. Seems boring? Watch this out: he is also assuming that the biomarkers MUST have originated during oil formation, something that is not supported from the stimulus.

So how do you weaken this? Superficially, his argument seems rock solid.

Your mission, should you choose to accept, is to show this Geologist that the presence of biomarkers is not the smoking gun he thinks it is.

This is a similar situation I thought of after reading the stimulus.

I bet this cake is entirely made out of chocolate.

"Oh yeah? How are you so sure?"

Cuz I can smell and see the chocolate, duh.

YEAH I CAN SMELL AND SEE THE DAMN CHOCOLATE TOO. But what if I told you that the chef added the chocolate at the very last minute, just before the presentation? Are you still going to sit there and say that the cake is ENTIRELY made out of chocolate?

Now all of a sudden it seems pretty farfetched to argue that the whole cake is made out of chocolate right?

Back to our PT142 world, oil containing biomarkers doesn't prove anything actually. So what if there are biomarkers in oil? Do you know when they are added?

D points this out. If D is true, then NOBODY can say with 100% certainty that biomarkers initiated the formation of oil.

E is the sweet trap answer choice that preys on people like me who are sloppy thinkers.

I read E and instantly thought "Hit the breaks. So you are telling me that there are zillion other types of behavior that are associated with the gene variant?"

I took the bait lol. Without giving a concrete second thought, I naively thought the fact that there are MANY behavioral types associated with the gene variant would weaken the causal support. But if you take a closer look, it really is irrelevant.

So what if there are other behaviors linked with the gene? The stimulus argues that there is a casual behavior between a particular behavior set (impulsive behavior) and the gene. Other behavior types are simply irrelevant.

The author is arguing that the student probably will recieve a B in another course. That means, even if the student somehow gains some sort of enlightenment and ends up scoring B+/A/A+, that will weaken the author's argument.

THis is something that I missed out when I was rushing through this question.

I WILL NEVER FORGIVE MYSELF.

SHIT. I ALWAYS NEED TO REMIND MYSELF TO READ ALL THE AC BEFORE CHOOSING.

(C) was so tempting and I chose without giving ga second thought.

1. RETAIL price of decaff > regular coffee

2. process is farily simple, and not very costly

   ----

   conclusion: the price gap can't be explained by the greater PRODUCTION cost of providing defcaff

As soon as I read the conclusion, I thought two things.

1. The author is assuming costs other than production have to explain the apparent price gap.

2. Decaffeinated process HAS TO REPRESENT and succesfully capture to so called "production cost." if it DOESN'T, then all hell breaks loose.

(E) does this by shielding our Premise - Conclusion relationship.

I think a lot of yall be surprised if you remove all the distractions in this stimulus.

At its core, this question is testing elementary math lol.

1. adults consume more fat as they age

2. nearly all adults' % remains the same

Forget all the fancy math concepts for a second. Your natural reaction to this information should be: "wait a sec, if a variable increased, yet the total % remains the same, then the denominator MUST HAVE INCREASED"

Fairly easy type of SA, once you break down the CONDR.

From the stimulus, we know that

/satisfied --> seek controv --> enjoy demonstrating

but the conclusion suddenly introduces a new idea: these (those who are dissatisifed) people tend to anger the majoiry.

B instantly captured my attention because it convinently linekd the new idea to the last NC (enjoy demonstrating --> anger the majority).

The key to this question IMO is highlighintg the word "that." Pundit aruges that money (excess profit coming from INCREASED parking fee) would have gone to the city.

So B has to be true. If the city can't raise parking fees even if they didn't sell the rights, the argument just shatters.

If someone hid the question stem, I would have thought this was a flaw question. Right off the bat, the author commits a textbook ad hominem error!! Simply because an argument comes from a competitor does not mean that it is “not good” lol.

E was very tempting. BUT my eyes read "CURRENTLY" and I instantly thought: "wtf? who cares about current shit? the premise and the conclusion exclusively concerns about the future."

My dumbass, without warrant, assumed that "solely" is the same thing as "primarily."