Fell for the trap (B) in both my original and BR. I can now see why B is wrong.

Could somebody help explain my flawed perspective for A, though? This was my thinking that caused me to eliminate it both times.

A.) Says if the only issue is offending, it's wrong to restrict the act. Ok, so offending is not in itself causing harm. But the stimulus says that it could be restricted if not doing so would allow individuals to cause harm.

I'm thinking of this in a comparable fashion to the purchase of a gun. The transaction of buying the gun is itself not causing harm. But possessing a gun would certainly allow the individual to cause harm. Likewise, the act of publishing is itself not harmful if it's only offensive. But does a solely offensive work allow an individual to eventually cause harm? We haven't ruled this out (in my mind), so the certainty behind the language of A seems unwarranted. Thus, I eliminated it

For anyone who chose B for Q. 10 (I did initially, chose D after BR), just keep in mind that the fact that he made some amendments earlier doesn't guarantee that some would've been made later (maybe he made all the corrections possible and the rest of his research/findings was correct). However, we can be sure that the scope of his research would've been expanded (last sentence, as JY points out)

@ said:

does anyone here not use a watch at all?

There was a small discussion on the Thinking LSAT podcast about the use of a watch. One of the hosts said "I'm not strongly for or against one. Just check it once or twice on a section if you do."

The other had a funny response. He's anti-watch. The reason? "The correct answer to the question isn't on the watch."

I'd been completing the individual question type drills on here using the stopwatch on my phone. Just entering PTs now. Guess the rule change came at a great time for me since I'm just now looking into buying a watch. I'm gonna toy with it and see if it benefits me whatsoever.

The two I got wrong here (Q. 3 and Q. 5) irritate me because I had the right idea of how to approach them prior to referring back to the passage.

Q. 3 talks about Miles Davis's playing prior to 1948. In my head, I said "oh, he played bebop". I happen to be familiar with bebop and its style, so I saw A and said, "yup, that's what bebop is". But I then said to myself, "Wait, I have to rely on what the passage says, not my own knowledge." Incidentally, I did not go far enough to the passage to find the info. I went to the beginning of paragraph two and saw that 1948 brought about his first stylistic change that, as the last paragraph said, upset critics. So I saw D and said, "Well, don't love it, but that's what it seems to imply. Prior to 1948, all was well. Then 1948 came." Ugh, this goes against the very essence of what jazz critics admire. They don't hate deviance from the "norm" (there is no norm). They hate individual deviation form one's unique style. Had I went a little further in the paragraph and been reminded that West Coast cool involved connected play and slower tempos, that would've shown that A was correct.

For Q. 5, I remembered reading the germane portion of the passage and saying, "Oh, that's exactly how Lil Wayne writes songs" (for those unaware, he freestyles in the booth, cleans it up in subsequent booth sessions, comes out with the full verse). So I went into the question thinking "freestyle then edit". I eliminated everything but A and E. I then went back to the passage and saw "base script" and "movie director". That drew meet A, but blinded me to the fact that A has the reverse order (synthesis then individually, not individuality than synthesis). Would bet on my life that LSAT test writers intentionally made answer choice A with the goal of people harkening back to those phrases.

Definitely would've gotten Q.3 without referring back to the passage. Might've gotten Q. 5 if i spent that time reading the passage instead breaking down A and E individually. But I'm also trying to build good habits of referring to the passage and finding info quickly. Tough conundrum.

Anyone else get this one wrong and choose A because they misread "prescription" as "prediction"?

Imagine watching First Take where Necessary Assumptions are used as argument points

Stephen A. Smith vs. Skip Bayless (Forget Max Kellerman, not the same show)

Who is the G.O.A.T - Michael Jordan or Lebron James?

Skip: "MJ is the greatest, no question. He has six rings, never lost in the Finals, 5 time MVP, won DPOY, and was virtually unguardable!!"

Stephen A: "That stance is asinine, asiten, asieleven!!! Lebron is the G.O.A.T.! He has played basketball! He exists! He has feet! His molecular composition includes hydrogen!"

Dead air for several minutes

I think (B) is a sneaky trap answer for this question.

I answered correctly (D), but didn't love the answer. I thought, in passing, "well what if they were so well hidden that they were never used at all? Thus, they'd have a negligible effect, just for the opposite reason (that reason being a lack of space to lay eggs rather than other spaces being too occupied)". I just loved the other answers less.

When doing my Blind Review, knowing in advance that I didn't love my answer, I re-read B and thought, "hmm, why did I eliminate that in the moment? Seems plausible". And on the surface, in my initial re-read, it did. A duck who sees other female ducks would seemingly have more opportunities to lay their eggs in the other ducks' nests, wouldn't be duped by the nesting boxes, and would consequentially be the most successful (these are all unsubstantiated leaps I made without content in the stimulus to support it).

Is that what (B) is saying? Nope.

(B) simply says that female ducks who see (note: simply see) other female ducks are the most successful. Maybe they see other female ducks all the time. At their own nest. Never leaving the nest. Thus, the ducks never have an opportunity to lay their eggs within the other ducks' nests. Also, as JY said in the video, even if the answer choice mentioned that the other ducks left their nests, we don't know for sure that these ducks would be the "most" successful.

I think this answer choice plays on inferences one could make based on the stimulus. The ability to detect other ducks' nests is spoken in a very dominating fashion. The "parasitic" nature is "rare" because other nests are well hidden. This plays on the Darwinian "survival of the fittest" trope that has been engrained in our minds for YEARS. In the heat of the moment, I think LSAT writers want us to harken back to this instinct rather than really scrutinizing the wording of the answer choice and the content of the stimulus.

With all that in mind, I was able to stick with my original answer of (D). I love the Blind Review. It causes me to really rationalize my thought process, which causes me to do so more instinctively during timed questioning.

Could somebody help me understand how C for #8 weakens the author's claims?

I know it seems simple on the surface, but I actually got this one right in my original PT and wrong on my BR because of careful attention to word choice.

The passage claims that "Spanish poets, even those of the modern era, seem to take their language for granted, rarely using it in radical or experimental ways." If poets "rarely" use their language in radical/experimental ways, it would seem to me that finding one instance of originating a style that's radical in its use of Spanish is not inconsistent with that statement. If the passage said "never," I could more easily see C contradicting that statement.

My primary concern with this article wasn't the reported score being truthful or not.

Rather, it was the representatives from LSAC and Washington that treated the test as if it was based mainly on aptitude, and little time should be spent studying. Sounds like a ploy to get more people to register and take the LSAT (LSAC getting additional $$$), as well as for "lesser-tier" schools to boost their application totals and enrollment so they can, you guessed it, get more money. Sends a terrible message to readers who don't look into it any further and compromise their financial well-being.