Plateuing on Conditional Logic and Weaken

mandyb10

Hi,

I've gone through the entire CC, but i'm still have trouble being able to translate passages to their Conditional Reasoning equivalencies intuitively or with enough speed and accuracy. What tools to people use to internalize conditional reasoning translations?

Also with weakening questions I tend to just as easily talk myself out of the correct answer on the grounds of it making assumptions. What are strategies y'all use to approach weaken questions? Thanks!

Ohnoeshalpme

After you finish the CC you really have only a framework for success and a theoretical understanding of the material. You will learn more now by doing. Work through sufficient assumption questions, necessary assumptions and must be true questions to hone your conditional logic intuitions.

Weakening questions are a bit different, I can't say I consciously think about a strategy for any type of question anymore but for weaken you're just looking for something that can (even remotely) make the argument less strong. You do this not by refuting the facts of the stimulus, but by weakening the strength between the premises and the conclusion. Over time and with practice you'll start to see the patterns and a lot of times be able to predict answers for this type.

If you're just finishing the CC though, you shouldn't worry about having everything click right away. Just continue to drill by question type until you have a good understanding of each type. I especially recommend untimed drilling in your case as you seem to still be mastering the fundamentals.

BinghamtonDave

Weakening questions: try to find the form of the argument. Is it a phenomena/hypothesis, correlation causation, an argument by analogy? Knowing the form of the argument goes a long way in assisting us in finding a way to effectively weaken the argument. I would listen to Sage Nicole's webinar found here:
https://7sage.com/webinar/weaken-strengthen/

I would drill problems that contain conditional logic. I started not knowing anything about conditional logic, but with enough focused and consistent drilling, a good understanding of the logic can be developed.

I hope this helps
David

NotMyName

I've gone through the entire CC, but i'm still have trouble being able to translate passages to their Conditional Reasoning equivalencies intuitively or with enough speed and accuracy. What tools to people use to internalize conditional reasoning translations?

The CC will give you the tools but what remains is sufficient practice, which varies by person. I hadn't mastered Lawgic immediately following the CC either (I doubt few have). I made it a habit to translate every conditional statement I ever saw while studying. Encounter one while drilling MC? Translate it. See one in RC? Translate it. BRing a PT/Timed Section and there's a conditional statement in a question you don't need to review? Translate it. Eventually, the repetition will train your intuition.

Fool proofing LG also helped me because of all the conditional rules that I translated.

You can also print out questions heavy in conditional language which either gave you trouble or you felt you needed to diagram for and review them every few days. Try to visualize the lawgic in review. I kept such a binder of all questions that ever gave me difficulty.

As for Weakening questions, I don't have any specific advice besides thorough BR. Strengthening/weakening argument is a skill you can develop but, like Lawgic, requires practice. Really press yourself to see why each AC is wrong/right before looking at the answer. If you still aren't sure, give yourself 24 hours and try again before looking at the AC.

mandyb10

thanks y'all! appreciate the tips.

Bamboosprout

I personally would suggest that you do those sections of the CC again. I did every section at least two times.
Do the questions and write out your reasoning before you look at JY's explanations. Then, supplement it with the question bank with similar practice drills to what is at the end of the lessons (5 questions at a time).
Wish you the best of luck.