What was up with the LG question that was thrown out? Forum

[anon sequitur]

I didn't take the test, but am very curious about what happened. Was there a lot of arguing in the post-mortem about this question beforehand? Can anyone remember what the problem was with the question? This has never happened with an LG question before, seems like a colossal screw up by LSAC.

[shntn]

Has it really never happened with an LG question before? I thought I'd seen one stricken from scoring before, but it may have been LR.

[anon sequitur]

Has it really never happened with an LG question before? I thought I'd seen one stricken from scoring before, but it may have been LR.

Yeah, in the "modern" (post 1991) LSAT, it's only happened on RC once or twice, 5-6 times on LR, and never on LG. I'm very surprised, I'm wondering if a question was worded ambiguously or if they just decided that the question had no predictive validity.

[lsatprepguy]

The question asked for a maximum number of people in group 2 if member Z was included (those variables are made up)

But the problem with the question was that it didn't tell you whether to include member Z in the count... in other words maximum including Z or maximum number in addition to Z

[03152016]

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[cc.celina]

The question asked for a maximum number of people in group 2 if member Z was included (those variables are made up)

But the problem with the question was that it didn't tell you whether to include member Z in the count... in other words maximum including Z or maximum number in addition to Z

Thought it was a poorly worded question; was really stressing about it during/post test. I ended up going with 'maximum number in addition to Tiao'.

Me too, but there was definitely a big TLS freakout on which one they meant, I think there was even a topic about it. It wasn't a logic mistake on LSAC's part, just ambiguous wording.

[anon sequitur]

Do you all think it was truly ambiguous (in that there was more than one legitimate understanding of the question) or just easy to misinterpret? The language in LG is usually so precise, and this sounds like the sort of thing they frequently play around with on games.

[Neander]

I just can't believe LSAC wouldn't catch this before.

[cc.celina]

Do you all think it was truly ambiguous (in that there was more than one legitimate understanding of the question) or just easy to misinterpret? The language in LG is usually so precise, and this sounds like the sort of thing they frequently play around with on games.

Personally I thought it was unambiguous and didn't give it a second thought during the actual test, but a lot of people either couldn't decide which meaning they meant or thought it was unambiguously the other direction. I don't think this was necessarily that they looked at the question and decided "Wow, this seems unfairly unclear, I think this was a mistake on our part," but more of a situation where a roughly equal number of testers chose the answer choice that the different interpretations would respectively produce.

Weird they didn't catch this when it was an experimental.

[shntn]

The question asked for a maximum number of people in group 2 if member Z was included (those variables are made up)

But the problem with the question was that it didn't tell you whether to include member Z in the count... in other words maximum including Z or maximum number in addition to Z

Oh yeah I remember discussing that question and my subsequent ban. Something about the word "with", I think. I answered it in the way I think they were looking for it to be answered, but there was a lot of confusion about it on TLS afterward. There were two valid answers based on how you interpreted that one phrase, so they just chucked the whole thing.

[03152016]

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[Neander]

Are we allowed to talk about the LSAT questions now in detail or no?