In case, you know, you're not capable of reading comprehension. In which case reading this probably isn't going to help much.

ERRBODY PICKIN D!!! Yeah, me too. JY does a good job of explaining how D does support the argument by eliminating a possible alternate explanation. Grr.

The way I read it, they only ate sea animals during the long journey to and from the islands. Since the paintings weren't done on that journey, it makes perfect since not to have depicted any sea animals depicted. As such, both B and C give pretty much no support either way.

Also, part of the paintings not surviving seems like a pretty tepid alternative theory. No art from any period survives in its entirety, and to base any theory on the basis that all of a category of art was destroyed is very poor evidence.

Imagine using a shovel to dig. You stick the shovel in the soil, pick it up and drop it somewhere else. While you drop the soil, nearly all of the soil will briefly be exposed to sunlight, but most of it will only be exposed for a second or two.

Why A is counterintuitive, but logically correct.

According to the stimulus:

1. Computers are closer to thinking than any non-human animal

2. Because computers are close to thinking, they have not yet achieved thinking. Computers do not think.

3. Computers are closer than any non-human animal to thinking, but computers do not yet think, therefore no animal thinks

4. Animals do have volition

Therefore, A) Having volitional powers need not involve thinking.

If you're like me, when you read this your mind protested, because animals clearly do think. Remember that LSAT questions don't necessarily reflect reality. Put aside your reality-based knowledge and try to accept the logic of the stimulus for the purposes of answering the question.

I selected C, and I need to break down what I did wrong to get their for my own learning. Here's my flawed reasoning.

I chose C as the most rejectable answer. C: Most of the hunting and scavenging that crows do occurs more than eight kilometers (five miles) from their roost.|

FLAWED ASSUMPTION 1:

My thought was that it was likely that crows have an extremely number of feedings close to the roost and smaller numbers of feeding at further distances. In other words, they will only go as far as they need to for a meal, and the likelihood of not finding a meal steadily decreases the farther they get from the roost, so the probability of a crow eating a meal close to the roost is higher than the probability of a crow eating a meal away from the roost.

Just because although the total distance of travel is high, it is possible that the majority of time is spent near their roost. I'm not a crow (surprise), but I occasionally travel up to 2000 miles away from my home city. Because I have such a large radius of travel, does that mean I spend most of my time between 100 and 2000 miles? No. Most of my time is spent within 20 miles of my roost.

I see the problem now is that while C is possibly false, it isn't JUSTIFIABLY false from the prompt.

FLAWED ASSUMPTION 2:

I rejected E as the most rejectable answer using the same logic:

E: When a flock of crows moves to a new roost site, it generally does so because the area in which it has hunted and scavenged has been depleted of food resources.

I figured, ok, if most of the hunting and feeding occurs CLOSE to the nest, with excursions further away rarely happening, then it is quite possible that crows would leave their roost due to food depletion. If 90% of scavenging occurs within 4 km of the roost, then moving 8 km could very feasibly be motivated by food depletion.

THE LESSON:

The explanation by JY is wonderful because it can be rejected using the information we have in the prompt, not on speculative information. I think the lesson is that the LSAT does not reward speculation or assumptions, regardless of how reasonable they may be. Use the information in the promt, and ONLY the information in the prompt. Any departure from that will yield only pain, suffering and parental disappointment.

Here's how A can be ruled out as a correct answer.

1. The wording of A is as follows: "Drivers of category x should be rehabilitated or go to jail." Lacking a qualifier, this can be accurately read as "all drivers" of x category.

2. All drivers of x category should be sent to drivers ed or go to jail.

3. No driver of x category should go to drivers ed if he will not rehabilitate.

4. It is "almost impossible" for drivers of x category to be rehabilitated. Because of the almost, we know that it is extremely rare for drivers of x category to be rehabilitated. So what qualifies as "extremely rare?" 1/1000? 1/10000? 1/1,000,000? It doesn't really matter, because we know that it is greater than 0. If it was 0, the statement would read "it is always impossible" not "it is always almost impossible. So we can accurately say that some drivers are able to be rehabilitated, since the definition of "some" is a quantity greater than 0.

Now let's look at A) again.

A: "(All) drivers with a large number of demerit points who have been convicted of a serious driving-related offense should be sent to jail."

This is clearly false, since we know that drivers can be sent to rehab rather than jail if it is possible for them to be rehabilitated, and from point 4 we know that at least some drivers are able to be rehabilitated.

I would love it if JY could take a look at my logical reasoning. Seems like the type of question I would appeal to LSAC, since there appears to be no correct answer. Thanks!

Really helpful for arrogant assholes like me, thanks :D