PT 49 Section 4 #16 Beauty and Truth Forum

[sdwarrior403]

I feel like I am really close to understanding this one. I got it right through POE, but I would like some help with this.

~ Difference between B and T -----> [Most Real -----> B]

~[Most Real ------> B]
_____________
Difference between B and T

So the argument uses the contrapositive to arrive at the conclusion. So I look to see what I am missing, and it is this piece, "Most Realistic are the most truthful." What introduces this is the word since, so I know that this is a premise supporting something. I comes immediately after "[Most Real -----> B]" ..... so I am wondering if "Most Realistic are the most truthful" supports that condition or the entire conditional statement of "~ Difference between B and T -----> [Most Real -----> B]"????


Main question: How do these statements interact with one another? In what way does (2) support the necessary condition of (1).

(1) Difference between B and T -----> [Most Real -----> B]
(2) Most Realistic are the most Truthful

[Manhattan LSAT Noah]

Oh how I've wrestled with both beauty and truth. I don't think I can tonight!

I'll let others address your specific question, but in case you didn't look it up, I wrote an explanation for it a while back: http://www.manhattanlsat.com/forums/pre ... r-f86.html

I hope that helps.

[TopHatToad]

The link above does a great job summarizing the idea, but everyone learns differently, so I'll give you my explanation as well.

C: Truth ~= Beauty

Our example that proves this revolves around realistic art. We're given a couple premises that I'll include first, followed by the conditional.

Realistic Art is Truthful
Realistic Art isn't always the Best
(and the contra you successfully got)
If Realistic ~= Best --> Truth ~= Beauty

The conclusion works by tying the original two ideas, truth and beauty, to realistic and best respectively. If I symbolize them, here's how it looks:

A ~= B --> C ~= D
Given: A = C
So... what's missing? We need to link up B and D!

An easier way to see all this without breaking it down extensively is to simply look for the word shift. Our conclusion refers to truth and beauty, but the premise makes no mention of beauty. Since beauty has to be part of my necessary assumption, my answer choices narrow to A/D/E. E is silly and easily thrown away, leaving a reasonable-sounding A and an extreme D. So if you were in a time crunch, you could be pretty confident in A without doing all this work. Hope that helps ya!

[sdwarrior403]

Is the statement the most realistic -----> B an intermediate conclusion? It looks like the link above believes so. It makes sense that it is some sort of conclusion as the word since follows it. But is this the idea thats the intermediate conclusion or is it the entire conditional the intermediate conclusion.

[TopHatToad]

I'm not quite sure what you're asking. If you're asking about realistic-->beauty being an intermediate conclusion because it's necessary to draw the final conclusion, then yes you're correct. Honestly, you're probably overthinking it though; these problems are designed to be solved (with the proper training/practice) in a minute or two. On test day, I would have used the method I stated at the end to solve it, and I wouldn't have wasted a look back.

[sdwarrior403]

I appreciate the thoughts about mindset during the test, but this is practice and I want to understand the following statement and what supports what.

If there were no difference between beauty and truth, then the most realistic pieces of art would be the best as well, since the most realistic pieces are the most truthful

So what is the intermediate conclusion? I see that since introduces a premise at the end, but it is a premise supporting what conclusion? Is it the entire conditional? Is it just the necessary condition? What is the intermediate conclusion of this argument.

[sdwarrior403]

Bump for answer on my previous post

[05062014]

Bro I gave up on this question long ago

[sdwarrior403]

I appreciate the thoughts about mindset during the test, but this is practice and I want to understand the following statement and what supports what.

If there were no difference between beauty and truth, then the most realistic pieces of art would be the best as well, since the most realistic pieces are the most truthful

So what is the intermediate conclusion? I see that since introduces a premise at the end, but it is a premise supporting what conclusion? Is it the entire conditional? Is it just the necessary condition? What is the intermediate conclusion of this argument.

Bump for help on this.

[05062014]

I appreciate the thoughts about mindset during the test, but this is practice and I want to understand the following statement and what supports what.

If there were no difference between beauty and truth, then the most realistic pieces of art would be the best as well, since the most realistic pieces are the most truthful

So what is the intermediate conclusion? I see that since introduces a premise at the end, but it is a premise supporting what conclusion? Is it the entire conditional? Is it just the necessary condition? What is the intermediate conclusion of this argument.

Bump for help on this.

I think that the premise supports the intermediate conclusion that is the entire conditional. In your original post, you caught the main conclusion which was that there IS A difference between beauty and truth. The premise seems to support the deduction that since the two variables in the sufficient condition are B = T, if Prem(most real --> most truthful (T)) then you need to show (that the most BEST --> MOST BEAUTIFUL (B)) and you do not need to show anything else because the intermediate conclusion has the necessary condition linking realistic with Best. To match the reasoning on variable (R) with variable (B)est you get answer A. This explanation makes sense, yet, does not make sense to me. Does it make sense to you?