"Almost All"

Sarah889

Hey All,

Logically, what does "almost all" translate to? It seems that it should be more restrictive than "most", but I'm not completely certain.

Currently looking at PT79.S1.Q18 for anyone who wants context.

Thanks.

AllezAllez21

Haven't taken that PT yet, but I think you should view it as "most" from a logical diagramming perspective.

From a more general perspective, its somewhere between most and all.

Sarah889

@AllezAllez21 That was my initial thought too but "most" translates to 51%-100%.

Almost all excludes the possibility of 100% and it seems unlikely that 51% could be considered "almost all"...doesn't it?

OlamHafuch

Almost all does not exclude 100% any more than "most" does. The only reason that 100% does not contradict a statement that says most is b/c if 100% of A is B, it is true to say that most of A is B. The same is true for "almost all."

TheMikey

Almost all means most

10000019

I don't think "almost all" and "most" are synonyms. There is a loose mathematical definition of "almost all", but I'm not sure if that would apply to the LSAT.

J.Y. Ping

This is a good question. While I haven't seen the LSAT make an answer choice turn on the distinction between "most" and "almost all", they don't have exactly overlapping meanings.

For example, "almost all" has a more restrictive lower bound. So if 51/100 dentists agree on X, you rightly say "most dentists agree that X." But you couldn't say "almost all dentists agree that X."

Sarah889

@"J.Y. Ping" said:
This is a good question. While I haven't seen the LSAT make an answer choice turn on the distinction between "most" and "almost all", they don't have exactly overlapping meanings.

For example, "almost all" has a more restrictive lower bound. So if 51/100 dentists agree on X, you rightly say "most dentists agree that X." But you couldn't say "almost all dentists agree that X."

Yea that was my gut feeling, but I'm happy to have confirmed it here.

The argument that prompted this had the following form:
1) "Almost all students surveyed chose x."
2) "Almost all students surveyed chose y."
C) Therefore, most students surveyed chose x and y.

I'm not sure if that's a valid argument, but it seems reasonable to think so.

akistotle

I haven't done PT79, so I don't know if this is related to this topic, but when I did PT55 S1 Q15 (https://7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-55-section-1-question-15/), I was not sure if "almost every" includes or excludes the possibility of every. I thought it excluded the possibility because it says "almost." Then I saw that J.Y. addressed this question on the page of PT55 S1 Q15 below the video.