Necessary Assumption Patterns

glaezzo

Hello Everyone,

I have been taking practice tests and I notice that I am overwhelmingly getting necessary assumption questions wrong. I understand the basics for solving them such as finding the gap. However, are there any patterns with solving necessary assumption questions. I found noticing patterns for weaken/strengthen to be very helpful and they’ve become my stronger question type. I greatly appreciate any feedback. Thank you!

ebalde1234

Are you relying on your inution or are you solving them by looking at the logical structure of the argument (valid / invalid argument form ) sa and na questions are more lawgic heavy

AshleighK

NA questions have two "types": bridging a gap or protecting the argument. Always remember that NA are on the lower spectrum of being a perfect argument unlike SA where the argument is 100% valid. NA is also a weakness for me but I mostly struggle with applying all the lawgic I've learned onto paper. For NA you can also use the negation trick when you're down to two answers. If the answer wrecks the argument when negated, it's correct.

I second what @ebalde1234 says, not only recognizing the form but also understanding your lawgic fundamentals.

s_jricke

@glaezzo said:
Hello Everyone,

I have been taking practice tests and I notice that I am overwhelmingly getting necessary assumption questions wrong. I understand the basics for solving them such as finding the gap. However, are there any patterns with solving necessary assumption questions. I found noticing patterns for weaken/strengthen to be very helpful and they’ve become my stronger question type. I greatly appreciate any feedback. Thank you!

Wrong ACs are almost always too strong or just straight up irrelevant. You're usually looking for some weak statement that has to obviously be true, like if I say productivity is going to improve because I'm going to implement something that improves productivity it must obviously be the case that the actual implementation or set up of the new measure doesn't end up being a net loss for productivity in the long run. Wrong ACs will say stuff like, the new method is the BEST method for improving productivity (why couldn't it be the second best?) or MOST employees will be more productive under the new measures (why couldn't it be only 10 or 20 percent of employees?).

NA questions can definitely be tricky because sometimes the correct answers are literally so obvious that you don't give them enough credit when reading them. Perhaps, you've experienced this feeling of reading an AC and glossing over it because it seems like some random, obvious, and not necessarily argument or detail specific thing. For me, that's a cue that I need to re-read it because I'm probably looking at the right answer.