I'm interested. Durham area.

Got this question right going through this section but spent 2.5 minutes on it and another 15+ trying to map out the rationale in BR. This is maybe the best question explanation I've seen on 7Sage. Great stuff Kevin!

This understanding of the stimulus suffers from sufficiency/necessity confusion. The proper contrapositive of the first statement would be:

/(reducing taxes should be done) → /(benefit the consumers as a whole)

With this correct interpretation of the stimulus, we know that we cannot conclude a sufficient condition based on confirmation of a necessary condition.

Fully understanding my response is a decade late, but perhaps my perspective can help someone else struggling with this passage.

I disagree with the notion that the first paragraph "describes the point of view of the anthropologists that the passage later goes on to offer evidence against." I believe that the rest of the passage is not an outright dismal of the ideas presented by the anthropologists, but rather, at most, lays out evidence that suggests different motivations for the creation of the art than the anthropologists in paragraph 1 imply. Many of the statements within the opening paragraph are consistent with the contents of the rest of the passage, including that the quality of art was so high that there were likely trained artists -- a fact which should help with answering question 5. Framing this passage explicitly as phenomenon-hypothesis may be a helpful mindset for proper evaluation.

I also would contend that JY justifiably attributes the point of view in the first paragraph to the author. This paragraph plays an important role in presenting the subject of the passage, and while there are certainly anthropologist perspectives woven within it, the author does nevertheless have a presence. While the author does not speak on the anthropologists' conclusion within the first paragraph, line 12 through the end of the paragraph (beginning with "moreover...") is asserted by the author themselves. Again, this information is consistent with -- and not contradicted by -- the rest of the passage. I used similar reasoning to J.Y. to answer to Q5 correctly, based on the aforementioned assertion as well as the inclusion of shamans in the final paragraph.

TLDR: This is perhaps best understood as a phenomenon-hypothesis, where some anthropologists, in explaining the presence of the products of highly-skilled artists, believe that Aurignacians had a more secure life than their predecessors. But, the provision of additional evidence undermines that hypothesis in favor of the idea that art was the product of religious practices solely aesthetic pursuits.

Those are macadamia nuts, which are delicious nuts. A coconut is also delicious, but is not a nut.

macadamia nut → delicious

coconut → delicious

coconut → /nut

Unlike some standardized tests, the LSAT does not assign different point values to questions based on their perceived difficulty. That is why it is recommended that you skip questions difficult questions (particularly on LR) -- you will have more time for questions that you are more likely to get correct in less time. It would be better to get 15 easy to medium questions correct than 14 medium to hard questions.

From LSAC: Your LSAT score is based on the number of questions you answered correctly — your “raw score.” All test questions are weighted exactly the same. The total number of questions you get right is what matters for your score, not which particular questions you get right or wrong.

I know what ontology means!

(I googled it)

Is that the only reason you would get J.Y. tattooed on your left cheek and do you currently have J.Y. tattooed on your left cheek?

Think of it as a particular sports team being the most likely to win the championship in a given league i.e. Team A has a 30% chance, Team B and C each have a 20% chance, and each of the other teams have less than a 10% chance. There is a small but important bit of phrasing in the stimulus that distinguishes between your interpretation and the interpretation required to understand this question. See here the difference:

...since the best team in the city will be the team most likely to win the city championship...

...since the best team in the city will most likely win the city championship...

The former is the true stimulus found in this question, stating that, of the teams in the city, the author's club is the one most likely to win. We would take the latter to mean what you stated in your comment.

Hope this helps!

Who is J.Y.'s favorite rapper?

Getting LSAT questions wrong makes it feel like a Gloomy Sunday.

#feedback In the fourth paragraph, this lesson refers to a question stem that has not yet been presented. This may cause confusion.

Check out my response. Maybe it will help you!

Your negation of AC E is correct, however I think your interpretation of the argument as requiring a positive correlation between tuition and applicant pool size is not accurate. It seems that a few reasonable assumptions are required.

The hypothesis presented in the stimulus states that there are other institutions with higher tuition that prospective students and their parents perceive to provide a higher quality of education. This strongly implies that despite any increases in tuition that have occurred at our university of interest, they still lag behind others, presumably those with whom they are competing for applicants. As J.Y. said, even if the tuition has been increasing, it can still be too low. It is possible also that the decrease in applicants due to a non-competitive tuition figure may outpace any curbing affects small tuition increases have.

Consider an example:

Lets call our university of interest University A and competing universities B and C.

All three universities are competing for the same pool of applicants, who have finite resources to make applications, hold quality of education in high regard when making application decisions, and perceive quality of education based on tuition cost.

Tuition at University A has been on the rise. Pacing with inflation, tuition has increased in recent years by a factor of 5% annually and now is at $30k. University B has also consistently raised tuition prices by 5% per year and is now at $40k, up from ~$38k in the prior year. University C's tuition cost is up to $45k, growing at a fixed rate of 7.5% year-to-year. So, while the tuition cost at University A has been on the rise, it has been outpaced by the wider market, and therefore is rendered moot. You must not consider University A in a vacuum. Given that negating AC E still allows such an example, it fails the negation test.

It is very important also to note that in our conclusion, raising tuition is stated as necessary to increase the applicant pool (increase applicant pool → tuition increase). Even taking the stimulus as true, increasing the applicant pool requires a tuition increase, but a tuition increase does not guarantee growth of the applicant pool.

Concerning AC A: When we negate an AC as test for necessity, we are not looking for the conclusion to be destroyed. Rather, we are looking at how it affects the argument generally i.e. its impact on the relationship/bridge between the premise(s) and conclusion. Sure, another alternative hypothesis with its own reasoning may find the resolution to be increasing tuition, but it is certainly not because of the hypothesis in the stimulus that it would make sense to increase tuition if we negate AC A.

I realize I've written a novel here, but I hope it helps you or anyone else similarly struggling on this question!

When we negate an AC as test for necessity, we are not looking for the conclusion to be destroyed. Rather, we are looking at how it affects the argument generally i.e. its impact on the relationship/bridge between the premise(s) and conclusion. Sure, another alternative hypothesis with its own reasoning may find the resolution to be increasing tuition, but it is certainly not because of the hypothesis in the stimulus that it would make sense to increase tuition if we negate AC A.

Hopefully this helps!

Azedcorp owns more than 50%. That is by definition what a majority means. Choice D attempts to contradict a stated premise, which is almost never what the LSAT is looking for.

Sure, but that's a reasonable assumption and the question language is "most helps to explain..." so it does not have to be an ideal answer.

In this question type, we are taking the answer choices as true. C states that the survival of small-beaked birds was favored over large-beaked birds due to changes in food supply. That is, smaller beaks provided an evolutionary advantage for the wild birds. The wild birds with longer beaks presumably had a more difficult time obtaining necessary nutrients as the food supply changed, and it is a reasonable assumption that they did not live as long, did not reproduce at the same rate, or some other phenomenon that lead to proportionally more wild birds with shorter beaks by the end of the study period. Thus, the average beak size decreased.

Yes, this is valid.

An easier way to understand this in Lawgic would be to flip the initial some claim (as it is bidirectional) to:

C ←s→ A

and chain it with the other claim A → B to make:

C ←s→ A → B

From which we know C ←s→ B would be a valid conclusion, as it is now some before all. Flip that to B ←s→ C to confirm that your conclusion was valid.

I agree. Even just changing "are" to "of" would remedy any confusion due to a mistake in the writing on this question.