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Can anyone care to explain the following questions:

Sec 2: 5, 13, 15 (had it down to B & E), and 23
Sec 4: 6, 12 (Had it down to A and D), 15 (had it down to A and B), 18, 22


Tough ass curve on this test.

You got that right about the tough ass curve. With the RC fucking me over going -2 on the rest of the test was still not enough to bail me out.

#5 focus on what is sufficient/necessary for a bacteria to qualify as a commensal. Benefit vs no benefit between M.T(no benefit - correct answerchoice) vs H.P(benefit- in stimulus) = critical deciding factor as one by default fails to compare as it fails to be a commensal by definition, whereas H.P this is not so clear cut.

#13 - I hope you had this down to A and B. The main premise in support it "you're already happy --> therefore, you may as well quit." Here, my gut told me that happiness can vary based on the amount of effort/time/sacrifice/etc. is required to achieve anything in this world. You losing your job and being unemployed is certainly going to cause more unhappiness than dealing with the shit you need to deal with on the job and getting $$$. I think B is trying to get at the assumption A makes explicit -- but someone else should clarify this.

#15 - Says journ. action of Y(cynicism) cannot be causing X(causing public to believe people are assholes) because journalists have always been doing Y. The premise here is that because an action has always been occurring, it cannot be causing this current result of people believing X. Clearly, there is no need to assume that because something has always happened, that it has not always resulted in X.

#23 - This one was annoying. I guess, because the main purpose of SG = social cohesion, if you can find an alternative to serve the main purpose, that could resolve the discrepency. If they said the main purpose was to achieve familial bonding, maybe an answer that said that families went hunting together to achieve FB would resolve the discrepency. On some tough questions, they often put in main reason/primary factor/etc. to pinpoint where the strongest support is, and what is in need of explaining/resolving.

#6 - Look at Patty's argument. It qualifies her position to being most Jap.People did not fear ninjas. Look at T's point of wealthy people showing signs of fear. Limiting T's argument to a minority of wealthy people allows patty to counter T's counter of her argument most effectively because most people can still not give a crap about fearing ninjas.

#12 - I think here the scope of the argument is just that offering free shipping --> 25% increase in mail order sales. It has nothing to do with competition among companies. It is a simple cause effect relationship and you should look for a no cause -- no effect in AC A. With D, it seems like this would weaken the argument a bit, as it seems like competing with the policies of competitors caused the sale increase, presenting an alternative that gives no reason to believe the cause was limited to the specific change in policy, which could have been an effect of AC D.

#15 - the stimulus's study compares people who did similar amounts of typing so A is contradicting a premise and therefore not helping resolve anything.

# 18 - I hope you got this down to C and E. This question required the best explanation for why shore environments were less than perfect for achieving the evolution of brain anatomy. The mechanism for evolution was, according to stim, a high -calorie diet. If E was true, the cost-benefit to achieivng the requirement for brain evolution would be less than optimal compared to other environments. C is too weak, in that it offering more resources than they do today could be one apple in the middle of a forest in dino-time vs. the forest having no apples today. It needs to explain why shore environments were not as perfect as they seemed to be relative to other environments, and E does this.

#22 - I got this down to C and D. Is this a new question type? I could use some help with this one as well
Edit: I think D is wrong because it does not say at least partly altruistic, to match the stimulus? I am too worried about my RC right now to figure this out today, but if I do later on I will let you know

I printed this exam through blueprints online program. Apparently #22 was NOT a strengthen question -- it was a flaw question? LOL. While I am a little irked that they sent me a test with a typo, C makes much more sense now to me atleast.

abdistotle wrote:You got that right about the tough ass curve. With the RC fucking me over going -2 on the rest of the test was still not enough to bail me out.

#5 focus on what is sufficient/necessary for a bacteria to qualify as a commensal. Benefit vs no benefit between M.T(no benefit - correct answerchoice) vs H.P(benefit- in stimulus) = critical deciding factor as one by default fails to compare as it fails to be a commensal by definition, whereas H.P this is not so clear cut.

#13 - I hope you had this down to A and B. The main premise in support it "you're already happy --> therefore, you may as well quit." Here, my gut told me that happiness can vary based on the amount of effort/time/sacrifice/etc. is required to achieve anything in this world. You losing your job and being unemployed is certainly going to cause more unhappiness than dealing with the shit you need to deal with on the job and getting $$$. I think B is trying to get at the assumption A makes explicit -- but someone else should clarify this.

#15 - Says journ. action of Y(cynicism) cannot be causing X(causing public to believe people are assholes) because journalists have always been doing Y. The premise here is that because an action has always been occurring, it cannot be causing this current result of people believing X. Clearly, there is no need to assume that because something has always happened, that it has not always resulted in X.

#23 - This one was annoying. I guess, because the main purpose of SG = social cohesion, if you can find an alternative to serve the main purpose, that could resolve the discrepency. If they said the main purpose was to achieve familial bonding, maybe an answer that said that families went hunting together to achieve FB would resolve the discrepency. On some tough questions, they often put in main reason/primary factor/etc. to pinpoint where the strongest support is, and what is in need of explaining/resolving.

#6 - Look at Patty's argument. It qualifies her position to being most Jap.People did not fear ninjas. Look at T's point of wealthy people showing signs of fear. Limiting T's argument to a minority of wealthy people allows patty to counter T's counter of her argument most effectively because most people can still not give a crap about fearing ninjas.

#12 - I think here the scope of the argument is just that offering free shipping --> 25% increase in mail order sales. It has nothing to do with competition among companies. It is a simple cause effect relationship and you should look for a no cause -- no effect in AC A. With D, it seems like this would weaken the argument a bit, as it seems like competing with the policies of competitors caused the sale increase, presenting an alternative that gives no reason to believe the cause was limited to the specific change in policy, which could have been an effect of AC D.

#15 - the stimulus's study compares people who did similar amounts of typing so A is contradicting a premise and therefore not helping resolve anything.

# 18 - I hope you got this down to C and E. This question required the best explanation for why shore environments were less than perfect for achieving the evolution of brain anatomy. The mechanism for evolution was, according to stim, a high -calorie diet. If E was true, the cost-benefit to achieivng the requirement for brain evolution would be less than optimal compared to other environments. C is too weak, in that it offering more resources than they do today could be one apple in the middle of a forest in dino-time vs. the forest having no apples today. It needs to explain why shore environments were not as perfect as they seemed to be relative to other environments, and E does this.

#22 - I got this down to C and D. Is this a new question type? I could use some help with this one as well
Edit: I think D is wrong because it does not say at least partly altruistic, to match the stimulus? I am too worried about my RC right now to figure this out today, but if I do later on I will let you know

Thanks!

#5 This was funky because I felt that C was something obvious to the writer of the stimulus and that there had to be some other reason to prove that he was wrong.

#13 - Yeah I had B but I had eliminated A (although I did not look too closely into it)

#15 - I picked B, but is it definitively wrong because we have to have, in our answer choice, a relation to the core of the argument...which is cynicism + social well being and B does not really attempt to account for the well-being of society?

#23 - Yeah for this question, I glossed over the "main purpose" part and that's what messed me up.

#6 - Is A wrong because although it may account for very little ninja activity (ninjas don't rob or kill poor people), it still doesn't account for most people not fearing ninjas? (I only accounted for the former part and not the latter part in picking an answer choice)

#12 - Seeing the structure of the argument (Free shipping leads to increased sales) and answer choice's structure (no free shipping leads to NO increased sales), it all makes sense (classic strengthen answer structure). I thought D was the answer (after like 2 minutes of mulling...*shaking my head*) because if the the company didn't get a lot of business compared to their competitors prior to free shipping (they might have had cheap prices but the lack of free shipping held many consumers back?), then by switching to free shipping probably caused the increase in sales. I realize that in my thought process for D that I am also accounting for an underlying alternative, but I was thinking that the conclusion does not have strong language to say that shipping alone caused the increase, but that it probably caused it. I don't know. Anyone care to expand on this?

#15 - Wow, I did not see the bit on the study comparing those with similar amounts of typing. Dumb mistake on my part.

#18 - Unfortunately I had picked A, which I now know is COMPLETELY wrong because the conflict is between shore and savanna/woodland. E makes perfect sense though. Although I eliminated E based on the stimulus not mentioning calories, but I guess the LSAT expects us to reasonably know already that fats account for caloric content (although that is "common sense," I would not have judged it to be completely common sense especially for those who are not knowledgeable at all in the sciences...)

#22 - Yeah, I labeled this question as a flaw type. Can you explain C?

Hmm, for #6 (s4) -- It seems like A is wrong because that would just add fuel to Tamara's fire (argument). If tamara wants to counter patty's point about very little ninja activity with her evidence of wealthy people having very squeaky floors A would support her argument instead of pattys counter. You may have a case if A said, "having squeaky floors to catch burglars, mice?, etc. was common in japan." AC A seems to go along with tamaras point and the fact that it says intentionally squeaky floors makes it seem like the intentions are concerning ninjas. It is not explicitly stated that the intention is something else, so why would Patty have ground to leave it at that?

#22 -- The action ( lookout sentinels loud bark) --> effect (forager sentinels run for cover), therefore, LSent is partly altruistic. Altruistic is defined as, "unselfish concern for others." When the lookout sentinel spots a predator, how do we know that he isnt just yelping in fear and the bark is just that? maybe it barks and just has a "I just need to be faster than these stupid forager sentinels" mentality and he is not altruistic at all. Does this make sense?