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Help; A are only B (meaning?)

kylelanders22kylelanders22 Free Trial Member
in General 5 karma

Hi everyone,

How do I interpret "All A are only B"?

The conditional is clear, "no B then no A" but when thinking of it from a categorical perspective (like syllogisms etc) I'm no sure what it would look like or how to diagram.

Example:

"All diamonds are expensive"

"All diamonds are only expensive"

The first clearly allows for diamonds to be other things too, like beautiful, sturdy, etc.

But the second seems like it's saying that yes, all diamonds are expensive, but also that they're nothing else (so they're not beautiful or sturdy, just expensive)

Thanks in advance! This has confused me...

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Comments

  • goingfor99thgoingfor99th Free Trial Member
    edited March 2018 3072 karma

    Which stimulus is this?

  • acsimonacsimon Alum Member
    1269 karma

    Yeah, it does seem to have that implication. Namely, for all C such that there exists an A which is C, then C=B. This would actually give rise to the inference, though, that A=B. Strange. To the extent that this construction is has a welformed English correlate there must be some sort of implicit restriction on the “only” so as to rule out this last inference.

    However, why is this particular construction relevant to those you have for the test? I don’t remember this construction as part of CC. Nor do I remember it as part of any PT I’ve taken.

  • kylelanders22kylelanders22 Free Trial Member
    5 karma

    This isn't from an LSAT stimulus, but was a wording I came across in readings I use for practice. All other forms of "only" make sense to me and the conditional for this one also makes sense. But when you look at it as categories it seems "All A are B" and "All A are only B" are different in some way

  • goingfor99thgoingfor99th Free Trial Member
    3072 karma

    'Only' is a necessary condition indicator on its own, so it would be redundant in this case.

  • CPAtoJDCPAtoJD Member
    112 karma

    @goingfor99th said:
    'Only' is a necessary condition indicator on its own, so it would be redundant in this case.

    This. The wording is also a little awkward in general, don't think I'd expect to see this in an LSAT stimulus. IDK maybe it's just me but it sounds odd.

    In any case, it would translate to diamond -> expensive.

    In English, basically, the only characteristic that diamonds possess is that they're expensive. So you know if you're a diamond, you must be expensive.

  • goingfor99thgoingfor99th Free Trial Member
    edited March 2018 3072 karma

    I've never seen it in a stimulus/passage. Could be in a newer test but I doubt it.

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