Possible Substitution Equivalency Strategy

SeanyB42

Hi. Im studying for the June LSAT and (like most people) am having trouble with SE questions. While watching on of JY's game explanation videos for PT 66 and noticing some differences in they way he set up his board and they way I set up mine, I thought of a potential strategy that may or may not be good and was hoping to get some feedback from others about what they might think of it.

Normally, I have not bothered to even try to answer SE questions on timed PT's and had adhered to this in this case (PT 66, section 3, Q11). However, upon my first reworking of the game I attempted it and actually found it to be relatively easy. The key was that (unlike JY's) my boards had been split on the node of the exact inference that was being substituted. Having these relevant sub-game boards already at my disposal saved me the time and trouble of possibly splitting on that inference for the question, and were extremely helpful in the knock out/sneak in process. Perhaps more importantly, having already worked the game and questions with an understanding of that relevant rule as the primary determinant of the possible worlds of the game had instilled me with a deep understanding of how that rule functioned in the creation of worlds by the time I came to the final question and allowed me to quickly and confidently asses the answer choices.

The potential strategy I am putting up for discussion is whether or not it could be helpful to, at the start of each new game, check the final question of that game to see if it is SE. If it is, then might the rule that is being replaced within it be the rule that implies the key inference along which you should strongly consider splitting your board? I feel as if this step could easily be added to the checklist of things to do at the start of each game and could be extremely beneficial. I am not suggesting a rigid following of this and I am sure that in some cases it is best to split along nodes that are not mentioned in SE questions. However, after looking through some past games that include SE questions, it seems to me that these games are often structured towards building an understanding of the inferences created by the rule being replaced, an understanding that must be funneled into the last Q for a final comprehensive test. At the very least, if it doesn't make since to split along the replaced rule, knowing the SE Q is coming, and having the functioning of the rule in the back of your head as you work through the Q's, might be very helpful.

Lucas Carter

@SeanyB42 said:
Hi. Im studying for the June LSAT and (like most people) am having trouble with SE questions. While watching on of JY's game explanation videos for PT 66 and noticing some differences in they way he set up his board and they way I set up mine, I thought of a potential strategy that may or may not be good and was hoping to get some feedback from others about what they might think of it.

Normally, I have not bothered to even try to answer SE questions on timed PT's and had adhered to this in this case (PT 66, section 3, Q11). However, upon my first reworking of the game I attempted it and actually found it to be relatively easy. The key was that (unlike JY's) my boards had been split on the node of the exact inference that was being substituted. Having these relevant sub-game boards already at my disposal saved me the time and trouble of possibly splitting on that inference for the question, and were extremely helpful in the knock out/sneak in process. Perhaps more importantly, having already worked the game and questions with an understanding of that relevant rule as the primary determinant of the possible worlds of the game had instilled me with a deep understanding of how that rule functioned in the creation of worlds by the time I came to the final question and allowed me to quickly and confidently asses the answer choices.

The potential strategy I am putting up for discussion is whether or not it could be helpful to, at the start of each new game, check the final question of that game to see if it is SE. If it is, then might the rule that is being replaced within it be the rule that implies the key inference along which you should strongly consider splitting your board? I feel as if this step could easily be added to the checklist of things to do at the start of each game and could be extremely beneficial. I am not suggesting a rigid following of this and I am sure that in some cases it is best to split along nodes that are not mentioned in SE questions. However, after looking through some past games that include SE questions, it seems to me that these games are often structured towards building an understanding of the inferences created by the rule being replaced, an understanding that must be funneled into the last Q for a final comprehensive test. At the very least, if it doesn't make since to split along the replaced rule, knowing the SE Q is coming, and having the functioning of the rule in the back of your head as you work through the Q's, might be very helpful.

I agree with you in that SE questions are significantly easier when the board splits nicely into a relatively small amount of worlds that are visually represented. When this happens, we can easily check if a SE answer choice was a MBT in the original set of worlds. If it was not, we can eliminate that AC for being under inclusive or knocking out too many worlds. I have noticed that there does not seem to be a pattern between what kinds of games include SE questions or what kinds of rules are included in SE questions. For example, some SE questions do exist in games with split boards, while some also exist in very open ended games.

In terms of your strategy, I think that SE rules are not necessarily powerful in that they always create lots of friction for splitting, but have more so to do with their complexity in language in that the rules can be expressed in multiple ways in english or logic. However, this is just my intuitive reaction. Maybe as a community we could create a spreadsheet and try to determine if there is any pattern in SE questions.

SeanyB42

Yeah the game in which this idea came to me definitely predisposed me towards thinking that this more clear cut strategy could possibly arise. Great idea about creating a database for the function of replaced rules within games. I had a similar idea when contemplating all this. Obviously we wouldn't want only a few people killing a bunch of games to create it but a collaborative effort is certainly doable in theory. JY places his SE lesson at PT 63. If there is one SE question on each available test from then to PT 86 then there shouldn't be much more than about 23 in existence? Would definitely be very interesting to see.

At any rate, I do still see merit to the practice of quickly checking for an SE question at the beginning of each game and perhaps underlining the rule where it appears in the game instructions. This can be done not for the purpose of blindly trying to split along that exact rule but to put the rule in the back of your head as you work through the games. For me, I think this practice could definitely help in feeling more prepared to confidently assess the function of the given rule by the time I arrive at the SE question. Additionally, while they are definitely difficult to recognize, it stands to reason that similarities between SE questions do existence. I think that having the replaced rule in your head as you work through games the first time could also help you condition yourself to more readily perceive the process of the test makers on SE questions and subsequently answer them.