PT 52, Section 1, #17 Forum

[February1088]

This is a really devastating justify the conclusion question.

For me, I'm having trouble understanding the content of the passage. I'm actually having trouble with the definition of 'prudent.' It literally means acting / showing care for the future. Imprudent means you don't give a crap about the future. Right? The last sentence that says: "Thus, it is imprudent to appear prudent" How is it imprudent to appear prudent?

Can someone explain?

[justbubbles]

Don't feel bad. This one made no sense to me either.

I took this test just yesterday and I spent way too much time on this, even trying to understand the Kaplan and PowerScore explanation to this.

Try Steve's LSAT Blog explanation. I don't have that. Maybe that could give you a better perspective?

[February1088]

I saw the explanation of this problem on manhattan lsat but still could not figure it out

Questions like these are the reason why I believe I cannot get a 100% score on the LR sections.....

[justbubbles]

Agreed. LR is designed in such a way that there are at least some q's that's bound to stump you - like this one.

There are some q's in LR (especially q's 21-25/26) that even the right answer makes no freakin' sense to me. I still will swear that the wrong answer I picked was right.

Don't worry. Just do what you can.

[delusional]

I have to say, I'm not loving this question. I think the explanation is that the first sentence of the passage is essentially irrelevant. The second sentence basically defines the word "prudent" by implication, and says that prudence leads to resentment. The "gap" which is the logical leap that is basically synonymous with the "assumption" is missing, and the conclusion is that it's imprudent to be prudent. But why? Maybe resentment is a wonderful thing. Well, if you assume that breeding resentment is imprudent, then that is what fills in the gap between the premise and the conclusion.

Now, premise: assessing friends carefully (prudence) breed resentment.
Assumption: breeding resentment is imprudent
Conclusion: appearing prudent is imprudent.

ETA: One of the LSAT books I read described that to find the assumption, you need to find the gap between the premise and the conclusion. I found that that tip worked very well for me.

[February1088]

I understand your explanation, and I understand how you got that assumption, but how does that assumption equal the answer choice?

Correct answer B says Imprudent people act instantly and intuitively. That doesn't seem like it equals the assumption you wrote out....I think the first sentence is relevant because it uses the same words as the answer choice...can someone help?

[maxpower430]

my test says the correct answer is E, which might be causing some confusion. basically it's saying that cautiously gathering info about people before judgment appears to be prudent, which will make people resent you. therefore, it is bad to appear to be prudent. this is of course, assuming that you don't want people to resent you, which E represents nicely. hth.

[UnamSanctam]

The CR is E, not B. Also, I've always made "prudent" synonymous with "wise".

ETA: It is imprudent to appear prudent = It is unwise to appear wise. E makes a lot of sense using that definition of "prudent", rather than the one proposed in the original post.

[lakers3peat]

Just reviewing over this one right now and this is how I solved/diagrammed, correct me if I'm wrong.

1st statement-superfluous.

2nd statement- "perceived as forming opinions of others only after cautiously gathering and weighting the evidence are generally resented"

'perceived as forming opinions of others only after cautiously gathering and weighting the evidence' = the definition of being prudent so what it is actually saying is that:


Appear Prudent ---> Generally Resented

Conclusion: It is imprudent to appear prudent.

Rephrased to understand it easier, To appear prudent is to be imprudent, Rephrased:


Appear Prudent ---> Imprudent



So we have:

P: AP ---> GR

______________

C: AP---->IM



The missing link: GR---->IM; aka (E) It is imprudent to cause people to resent you; Cause people to resent you(GR)---->then Imprudent(IM)


P: AP--->GR
(A): GR---->IM
_____________
C: AP--->GR--->IM





this took me a while to fully wrap understand.. the formal logic isn't always delicately laid out on the table for you in the perfect form of IF/THEN statements; this one is difficult because they mask prudence behind a long sentence then in the answer choice they phrase it weirdly so you don't know which is antecedent and which is the consequent but I'm pretty sure that is the correct way to diagram/understand this.

alternatively, what I did on my first pass through was just look for the term that is mentioned in the conclusion but not in the premises which for this is imprudent. On that bases alone, you can eliminate A, C, D.