D is attractive because there are a few claims that could be considered "a general conclusion," but "nations do not have consciences" is not an instance of any of them. Hope the below helps someone!

1) general conclusion: "any ascription of praise or blame to a group must be translated into some statement about individuals if we are to evaluate it properly." An instance of this conclusion might be "any ascription of praise or blame to a nation must be translated into some statement about its head of state/the majority of its population if we are to evaluate it properly."

2) general conclusion: "groups are not the type of entity that can be worthy of praise or blame." An instance of this conclusion might be "a nation can be neither praised nor blamed for the actions of its elected officials/will of its majority."

3) general conclusion: "blameworthiness implies conscience and agency." An instance of this conclusion might be "a head of state can be worthy of blame because a head of state, unlike a nation, has a conscience and agency."

#help 11. Yes, one definition of sympathy means to pity, but there are others:

agreement in feelings or emotions between people or on the part of one person toward another, especially as based on similar tastes, shared understanding, etc.

agreement, consonance, or accord

Is AC A incorrect for other reasons?

More generally, when the LSAT uses a word with multiple meanings in an AC, should we default toward being generous (adopting the meaning that makes the AC correct) or ungenerous (adopting the meaning that makes the AC incorrect)?

I think it's really helpful to note that the question doesn't say "strengthens the conclusion" or "strengthens the overall argument"; it says "strengthens THE GROUNDS". This hints that the correct AC must strengthen the premise that erosion has destroyed much of the rubbish. Understanding this makes it easier to eliminate all the wrong ACs and see why B is strengthening.

I was all worked up about the answer to 5 being A til I realized...

L16: “the DIGITAL PUBLICATION OF A BOOK ONLINE involves no physical inventory, thereby eliminating the costs of warehousing,....” The digital publication of a book online involves no physical inventory. The printing of books at point of sale may - and according to common sense will likely - still require inventory...duh.

Hopes this helps someone else.

To add a couple of my own thoughts...

L1 “Mexican Americans share with speakers of Spanish through the world a…a vital tradition of proverb use.” On a casual read, this could be interpreted 3 ways:

-they all use proverbs (most conservative)

-they all use proverbs in their own way

-they all use proverbs in the same way (most liberal)

Going with the more conservative interpretations (which the safest bet on the LSAT) eliminates C. Even if we applied the most liberal interpretation, the question asks for MOST strongly supported and D is explicitly stated if you combine facts from P1 and P2:

d) Proverbs are sayings that do not require a verbal context to be understood (L4: they are sayings that can be understood independent of verbal context) but whose meaning for each particular use depends on the social context in which that use occurs (L13: meaning varies depending on the social context).

Interested!

Interested! Registered for September and averaging 173.

B is wrong because the money from the government proposal goes to burglary victims generally, not the specific burglary victims of the burglar whose wages were confiscated.

C is correct because it makes the premise (where the money goes) relevant to the conclusion (whether stealing can be justified). If the motive is irrelevant to whether something is justified, then there is no argument.

Please #help

Negating AC A doesn't negate the argument:

The engraving was made in 15000 BC and brought to the settlement upon occupying it in 14000 BC, and mammoths disappeared from the area in 13000 BC.

With this timeline, the engraving was NOT made during the time when the settlement was occupied (AC A is negated), but the settlement was occupied at a time when mammoths lived in the area (the author's conclusion).

The only way negating AC A could negate the argument is if the conclusion is not "the settlement was occupied at a time when mammoths lived in this area", but rather "this [a fossil bone with an engraving of a mammoth found in an ancient settlement in eastern North America] SHOWS the settlement was occupied at a time when mammoths lived in this area".

Redoing this section and I finally found support in passage A that I find convincing for AC C!

Passage A L1 says 'dental caries is strongly linked to the consumption of the sticky, carbohydrate-rich staples of agricultural diets'. This suggests that some carbohydrate-rich foods (those which are not sticky and/or not staples of agricultural diets) are not as strongly linked to caries formation.

Let's compare it to a dice game. Each roll is a stage in the mars mission, the game is the mission in its entirety, and I'm the player (astronaut).

If the dice lands on a 4, I die. Each roll, there's only a 1 in 6 chance I die (quite unlikely) but we roll 100 times. Odds are unlikely that I survive the game.

Does this help?

But it doesn't say "a carb's texture and its composition"; it says "CARBS' texture and composition", as in the texture and composition of ALL carbs. The sentence continues "since carbs more readily stick to teeth", indicating that we're comparing the texture, composition, and stickiness of carbs to non-carbs, not of some carbs to other carbs.

Also, the question doesn't ask about "carbs"; it asks about "carb-rich foods".

I agree it's ridiculous to assume all carb-rich foods have the same texture and composition and therefore cariogenic potential (which is why I chose C), but the question asks about what the PASSAGE suggests.

#help #isbutteracarb

No, remember the 'Some and Most Relationships' section of the curriculum...

most: more than half - all

some: one - all

The author says some mutations fall into a category, but most do not. Let's say you have 100 mutations. 'Some' means at least 1 mutation falls into a category, and 'most' means at least 51 do not. So the number of mutations that could fall into a category is 1 - 49.

We can see that 'most do not' is not necessarily the same as 'almost none do'.

Maybe they did hunt migratory and non migratory mammals. What new light does this fact lend to the evidence that teeth from different seasons were all found at the same campground?

A is wrong because it doesn't give an alternate explanation for why the gazelle teeth from different seasons were all at the same campground, whereas C does.

Q. 27

D: Yes, it examines (through an illustration) another facet (in certain cultures authenticity is a foreign concept) of a distinction (between fake and authentic) advanced by the author in the preceding paragraphs

E: if the final p affirmed a general principle, it would be that in some cultures authenticity is a foreign concept, but that's not the principle enunciated at the beginning of the passage, which is that it can be difficult to distinguish fake from authentic. The final p supports this 'principle' through an illustration of one facet of the difficulty, but it doesn't affirm it.

Turns out I just didn't know this definition of 'alternative':

'providing or being a choice between two or among more than two things'

So if there are two explanations to choose from, they are alternative explanations.

I was thinking of the 'unconventional' definition, where there is one initial option and one or more other non-mainstream options.

I was initially attracted to C until I realized it was a sufficient assumption and not required for the conclusion to be reached

Q. 14 D #help

Can someone please explain to me how the P. Brevis hypothesis is an alternative explanation? Alternative to what? It seems to me that the P. Brevis hypothesis is the initial explanation and the author's PCB hypothesis is the alternative explanation (singular).

#help

Q13: I chose D because it felt like the least wrong answer, but can someone please explain to me how 'suffering' ( which JY says human figures symbolize in his elimination of AC A) is not an emotion or psychological state?

It does mean selling real-world items for virtual currency, but simply allowing that practice is not a characteristic specific to INTENTIONALLY commodified games. Some games simply allow it, but we're talking about the games that encourage it, which refers back to P1: they encourage it by granting IP rights to creations. Hope this helps!

I think it would still be incorrect because of the second part of the sentence: "will induce competitors into the market". To induce isn't just to tempt someone to do something but to actually cause them to do it, meaning competitors will actually enter the market. The conclusion only states that the mere THREAT of competition - not actual competition - will keep prices down. Thus, this is unnecessary.

Thank you for this explanation! It resonates with me more than that in the video. To augment a bit, this AC wants us to confuse correlation with causation. There could be an additional factor causing both the milder temperatures and the less storable water, or it could be a complete correlation with no causal relationship. Therefore, it does little if anything to strengthen the argument in the stimulus.

As soon as we see it's a PMR of this length, we should choose A, flag it, and come back to it once we've gotten to the end of the section. Then, we should come back and map out each of the ACs.

#help Q11

P3 says major eruptions can directly cause a drop in temperature of up to half a degree, even without the feedback loop. Is half a degree just too small a difference to be considered ‘unusually cold’?

Thank you so much for this reply, it was super helpful! "They are of inferior quality, AND SO add nothing to the overall quality of the museum’s collection." I think I just read it as "AND add nothing..." but the "so" helps me see why we can contradict that premise/sub-conclusion. Thanks again!