Maybe I got this question right because when it started talking about bikes in the 1800s I immediately thought of those bikes with the enormous front wheel and the dude is sitting up like 6 feet off the ground. People falling off and getting hurt could turn away a bunch of people from riding bikes, which is basically what E says. Doesn't work every time, but sometimes good ol' intuition does the trick when conditionality seems misleading.
The power of skipping is strong in this one. Got flustered on this one, finished the section with 5 minutes left, came back and finally realized the flaw of the argument. major key.
I was down to A and C on this one. Hesitant of A because I'm always hesitant of weakening/strengthening ACs that say "some." My initial thoughts are, "So what if some do? That means some don't. Moving on." But after mapping out the argument, it makes so much sense that A is the right AC.
The argument structure:
Contorted bodies → Death by angiosperm
In english, if you die with a contorted body, you always die by intoxication via angiosperm.
A:
Contorted body → Death by angiosperm
if a mammal dies contorted, then by the stimulus's argument, it must have died by ingestion of an angiosperm. However, they can't die by angiosperm. The argument is invalid.
Does anyone have data on whether these fee waivers are any indication on chances of acceptance? I assume these schools just want to boost their application numbers to seem more competitive and there’s no affect.
So we have to assume two things: that refuges are part of animals’ natural habitats, and that they came about due to the international effort. 1000/1000 times I would pick A. Despite the rate of extinction, the international efforts could be saving their habitat. Even if there are no animals in it, can’t their habitat be saved regardless? The efforts were designed to “protect the natural habitats of endangered species,” and if scientists are now better at accomplishing that aim, how does this not weaken the argument that the efforts were wasted? #help
Answer choice A's attacking the analogy aside, just the fact that a weakening AC has the word "some" in it is suspicious. When I read a strengthening/weakening AC that has "some" or "many" in it, in my head I think "so what? Some do, some don't. Many do, many don't. Who cares?" Has anyone else come up with a strategy for eliminating ACs with certain words in them for certain types of questions like this?
Speed kills, I did this question in about 15 seconds and E jumped out at me because I wasn't paying attention. What a shame.
#12 tripped me up but for a different reason than what JY explained. I misread the question (something I need to work on). I saw "the court.. most likely.. answer.. which of the following questions" and assumed it meant "the court's ruling in Charrier v Bell is most likely to answer which one of the following questions?" and answer choice E provides some support to answer such a cookie cutter question, but even then it's not a great AC. Rushing + not reading carefully = loss of points.
Another reason D is wrong is because the odds of payout are already taken into account when discussing the average payoff. Average (expected) payoff = probability x number of payoffs. If probability of winning the lotto is 1/100 and you play it 100 times, your average (expected) payoff is $1. Who cares what the odds are? Need to distinguish between analogies.
25 I really wanted to pick B, but in the moment I was having a hard time buying the "truth" aspect of the AC. But then I realized that you can basically equivocate "truth" and "knowledge" as it is referenced in the second paragraph.
Excellent, thanks everyone!
So if you print PTs from 7Sage, in the LG section, you have a giant margin at the bottom of at least one, usually both, pages to do all your scratch work. In the prep test books supplied by LSAC, there's hardly any room. Which one reflects how much space you get on the actual test?
Could not bring myself to pick anything other than A because I could not pick an AC that only picks up on one of the two flaws here. A didn't seem good so I chose it reluctantly.
So is JY just going to ignore the fact that AC A only talks about what happened since the 70s but the stimulus says that the increase started in the 60s? I mean come on, there are dozens of LSAT questions that pick up on this difference and test you on it.
Don't worry, you just need more time. My first 5 PTs were 157, 159, 162, 162, and 162. I thought I plateaued, but I got a 168 on the July test. Do timed/untimed practice, watch explanations, read different material, take note of why/how you got questions/passages wrong, and try to absorb the material as much as possible. The more you do, the more you'll get the hang of the LSAT. I really can't stress untimed practice enough. Get your fundamentals down, then incorporate timing, and work your way toward a strategy. Dig through these forums, too. There is a plethora of knowledge and study tips in these here forums.
AC E on #11 is just a definition of neorealism
I usually don’t get tripped up on this, but in the moment I definitely conflated “many” with “most” even though it really means “some”. If it had said “some” I definitely would’ve eliminated it and possibly POEd it down to D. Lesson learned
Hello 7Sagers,
I’m going over my last PT— 65– and in section 1 Q 16, there’s a sufficient assumption question with a bi-conditional premise. I understand it now, but it was a major time sink on the PT because I froze up. Can anyone think of other questions like this one? It seems cookie-cutter, so I’d like to practice a little more, and it’s too specific to filter in the Question Bank.
Thanks!
This is one of those questions that I will just always get wrong and have accepted that. I eliminated B so quickly, and I still feel like it doesn't touch our argument. So what if it varies? What does that prove? What if it varies significantly but proportionally to the amount of people living in that region? The AC isn't strong enough to me to infer that variance somehow equals inaccessibility. And even if it is varied, the claim that the stimulus is attacking says that it will "plague humankind," which implies every single human on the entire earth. Somehow variance supports this? I just don't get it.
Took me a solid 20 minutes to understand what was going on here after mistakenly choosing B. The mall is part of the local economy. If a bunch of tourists poured in from out of town and spent money at the mall, every single dollar that every tourist spent would be a dollar contributed to the local economy. If tourists spent $100 million, then the local economy would grow correspondingly. That didn't happen. One way to reconcile this is to imagine that the mall, rather, displaced money from other businesses in the local economy.
For these types of NA questions, I let my gut guide me, and somehow I got this one right.
@ said:
Burnout: Have you considered the possibility that you're burnt out? That may be a factor here hurting your progress. Take a week off.
Time: it took me ~5-6 months to really start consistently PTing in the 170s. At 2-3 months I was probably in the same place you are.
You're not stupid. Nobody is, especially when it comes to the LSAT. There are very few people who are intuitively good at the LSAT - most have worked very hard to get to the point that they're at. The ones that say they didn't work that hard are either 1) lying, 2) geniuses, or 3) modest. It all comes down to how hard are you studying and how effectively you are studying. Which leads me to point 4:
Re-evaluate what you are doing. I mean really think about whether what you're doing is effective. Stand back and look at your study plan, evaluate what kinds of logic games are tripping you up, and drill those. Figure out the fundamentals that you're missing and the question types you're screwing up.
But also, you needa give yourself some tough love. It may very well be the case that you're not studying as hard as you could be. I have a number of friends that HAVE PROOOMMISED me that they are studying SUPER hard for the LSAT, and yet they just can't get their score up! But then when I study with them, they're checking their phone every 5 minutes, or switching the song they're listening to every 3. They get up to use the bathroom three times in an hour, or I catch them watching YouTube videos instead of J.Y.'s explanations.
Did you REALLY make the best use out of the last 3 months that you could have? If not, re-evaluate, re-examine, and re-plan to do so for the next 2. And if you decide that that is too much work and your heart isn't into mastering the LSAT, then yeah, maybe you should just "throw in the towel."
I hope you don't though. I hope your problem is just one of the four I mentioned above and you can dig yourself out of the rut you're in.
The LSAT is a learnable exam, and I'm confident if you keep devoting your energies to it (in the right ways) you will achieve your goals. To use a nerdy geology analogy, the LSAT is a lot like a block of carbon. It's ugly and useful by itself, but with enough time and pressure, you can turn it into a diamond :smile:
This needed to be said. Admittedly, some of my studying was weeks of studying 5-6 hours per day for 5 days in a row. On the other hand, some weeks I would only get maybe 5-6 hours total. So yes, it is time for me to get real. I'm moving my test to May (I was planning to apply for fall '19 anyway). Developing a real strategy and planning seriously is now a priority. Thank you for this, you rock.
So I took a PT last week, felt good on sections 1 and 2 (LR and LG respectively). Sections 3 and 4 (LR and RC) felt particularly tough, and I ran out of time on both. Ended up with a super low score--I know, I shouldn't look at anything until after BR but my curiosity was killing me. During the test, the questions after 15 felt SO hard and I ended up leaving a few blank, which is weird for me since I usually finish LR in 25-30 minutes.
Anyway, I ended up going back through and BRing really, really well in sections 1-3,100% on that second LR section that gave me hell. (To avoid as much bias as possible on my BRs I just print out another test and take it again with no time pressure.) So I figure that my level of knowledge in LR is pretty damn good if I can blind review well. I guess I scored so poorly in that section (65%) because of time pressure, and that more practice will make me quicker on tougher sections. I went back and watched explanations for questions that seemed tricky and reviewed my methodology, but I feel like I got everything down. Is there anything else I should do when reviewing after nailing it on BR?
Thanks!
I just stopped at the end of section 2-- logic games-- in a prep test, after leaving one game almost completely unfinished. I think I'm ready to give up on the LSAT.
My background: went to a good school, didn't have direction, graduated with a 3.0, and I've been working in a job that I hate for three years. Public service is my passion, and I really want to go to law school (a good law school, of course). I need to crack into the 170's to be a viable candidate. I started studying in May with the PowerScore books, then I discovered 7Sage a few months ago. I've been studying pretty seriously and intensively for the last 2-3 months. My score has improved from a 155 to a 162, but it has stagnated at that 162 for three tests. I've been doing some refining around the edges, really utilizing that LSAT analytics feature-- nailing 4s and 5s.
I feel like I'm not "getting" it-- like I don't have that edge, or intelligence, or whatever it is that allows oneself to crack 170. My throat is hoarse from screaming after ending another logic games section with a game untouched. I thought, what's the point anymore? I've been working at it for so long and hard and I still can't nail these games under timed circumstances, especially when there's only one 1 in the set. Sure, I can go back afterward under non-timed conditions and eventually get it. And sure, I can do it ten times after watching JY brilliantly explain it, but that doesn't change how I perform when I try to apply what I've learned.
I've read some stories from people who have scored really well (175+), and they all share a common feature: they studied for a couple of months (usually around 2-4, sometimes 6), and ended up scoring in the range near what they scored on the test on their last few practice tests. I know everyone is different, but after 6 months of studying I feel like I should be going 150->160->162->165->166->...->171 based on how hard I'm working on this.
I try my hardest to stay positive, think intuitively, be a good listener, and apply what I learned from the lessons to the new material presented to me in practice tests, but I feel like it's getting me nowhere. Am I not smart enough? Have I just hit my mental capacity? I'm no genius by any means, but I feel like I'm pretty damn intelligent.
At this point, I don't see a path forward. And it really sucks. Anyone else relate? How did you pull yourself out of it? How did you start nailing practice tests? My test is Feb 10, and I'm really considering throwing in the towel now.
#help JY seemed to have brushed over the "of computer specialists" part of AC A on 24. Any other analysis why A is incorrect? I picked it over E because it seemed the author thought the problems with the computer tools were irreconcilable.
I'm FINALLY getting these! It was so frustrating to listen to JY say "these should be freebies" while I was struggling. This is the cookie-cutter to end all SA cookie cutters. Keep at it folks!
tfw you thought "dearth" meant "breadth" and sank four minutes in the first paragraph
I read this one as a correlation-causation argument, which helped guide me to B. If you take away the cause, then you get no effect. I forget which PT, but there was a question that went something like this: a factory dumped chemicals into a river, so the fish grew two heads. Therefore, the chemicals caused the malformed fish. One way to justify that argument is to take away what you think the cause was, the chemicals, to see if the effect goes away. In this case, it’s gravity being a property of space and the photons and neutrinos arrive at the same time. Take away gravity’s space property and you have unsynchronized particles
Missed question 19 due to my misunderstanding of the word "anomalous" (thought it meant the one and only exception). Now E, which I eliminated, seems perfect! Thanks LSAT.