PrepTest 36 (Dec 2001) - Second LR Section, #25 Forum

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agp2111

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PrepTest 36 (Dec 2001) - Second LR Section, #25

Post by agp2111 » Sun Jun 15, 2014 10:46 pm

Can someone explain this to me? It comes from Practice Test 36 (LSAT December 2001, Second LR Section). Question #25.

The stimulus is (in part):
Anthropologist: All music is based on a few main systems of scale building. Clearly, if the popularity of a musical scale were a result of social conditioning, we would expect, given the diversity of social systems, a diverse mixture of diatonic and nondiatonic scales in the world's music. Yet diatonic scaled have always dominated the music of most of the world. Therefore, the popularity of diatonic music can be attributed only to innate dispositions of the human mind
Answer: fails to consider that innate dispositions and social conditioning could jointly affect the popularity of a type of music.

If the stimulus says that the popularity of the scale is NOT the result of social conditioning, how could it be true that the correct answer says BOTH social conditioning AND innate dispositions played a role?

Does the stimulus prove that popularity of the scale is not the SOLE cause? And thus, an answer choice that posits it to be one of the causes is correct?

I find it difficult to say "A is not the result of B" is equivalent to "B is not the sole cause of A."

Would appreciate your insights!

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Clyde Frog

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Re: PrepTest 36 (Dec 2001) - Second LR Section, #25

Post by Clyde Frog » Sun Jun 15, 2014 11:13 pm

agp2111 wrote:Can someone explain this to me? It comes from Practice Test 36 (LSAT December 2001, Second LR Section). Question #25.

The stimulus is (in part):
Anthropologist: All music is based on a few main systems of scale building. Clearly, if the popularity of a musical scale were a result of social conditioning, we would expect, given the diversity of social systems, a diverse mixture of diatonic and nondiatonic scales in the world's music. Yet diatonic scaled have always dominated the music of most of the world. Therefore, the popularity of diatonic music can be attributed only to innate dispositions of the human mind
Answer: fails to consider that innate dispositions and social conditioning could jointly affect the popularity of a type of music.

If the stimulus says that the popularity of the scale is NOT the result of social conditioning, how could it be true that the correct answer says BOTH social conditioning AND innate dispositions played a role?

Does the stimulus prove that popularity of the scale is not the SOLE cause? And thus, an answer choice that posits it to be one of the causes is correct?

I find it difficult to say "A is not the result of B" is equivalent to "B is not the sole cause of A."

Would appreciate your insights!
I think you're going to far to assume that it is not the result of social conditioning. The argument is saying that if it was purely a result of social conditioning then there would be a a diverse mixture, but this is not the case, so it concludes that it must be only be the innate dispositions of the human mind that account for it.

Big gap there.

What if social conditioning accounts for like 10% of the diatonic scales that dominate most world music and innate dispositions account for 90%.

Daily_Double

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Re: PrepTest 36 (Dec 2001) - Second LR Section, #25

Post by Daily_Double » Mon Jun 16, 2014 12:09 am

Hey look! A flaw question. Sweet, we know the drill: Identify why the conclusion does not necessarily follow from the premises. Let's do exactly that.

So I'm reading through the stimulus and I'm thinking "First sentence is background information. Second sentence gives us a requirement of a causal explanation. Third sentence is a fact which contains the absence of the requirement of the Conditional Relationship in the second sentence. In the last sentence we a causal conclusion---Huge red flag, the author didn't eliminate all other causes!"

So after reading the stimulus once you want to recognize that there's a causal conclusion which is a common pattern in flaws, and the absence of a requirement which impacts the influence of one possible cause. Now let's bring these parts together to see (a) what we can infer based upon the premises, and (b) why the conclusion is not necessarily true.

What We Can Infer
What I'm going to do here is layout the Conditional Rule in the second sentence, then apply the fact given in the third sentence to that rule to see what the premises allow us to infer

RULE: If S. Conditioning is the only cause of Popularity ---> Diversity of Scales
FACT: Diversity of Scales

Thus we can infer that Social Conditioning is not the only cause of Popularity and there's a possibility, but it's far from certain, that Social Conditioning is not a cause of Popularity.

I should point out that there are two ways to interpret the first phrase. The first interpretation is that Social Conditioning was a cause of Popularity. The second is that Social Conditioning was the only cause of of Popularity.

Turns out this doesn't really matter. I'd argue the limited interpretation is justified based upon common usage. To use a comparison, usually the phrase "X produces Y," means that the event X is enough on its own to cause some outcome Y to be present. And the phrase if "Y is a result of X," means the same as if "X produces/gives rise to/causes Y," though in both cases the phrase doesn't explicitly limit the cause to one event, it is implied. Anyways, I used it above because interpreting the phrase this way makes it much easier to prephrase the flaw, but no matter which way you interpret it, the argument's conclusion is not a valid inference.

Why the Conclusion is Not Necessarily True
Awesome, so we know what we can infer. Depending upon your interpretation you can make two valid inferences. I'm going to list the inferences based upon the possible interpretations, compare that to the conclusion, and identify why the conclusion in each case is overly broad.

(1) A cause of Popularity

If you interpreted the phrase to mean Social Conditioning was a cause of Popularity, then you're probably arrived at the inference that Social Conditioning is not a cause of Popularity because if it were then there must be diversity, and we know that diversity is lacking.

The flaw here is basically that our conclusion assumes there are only two possible causes. The author identified another cause X and concluded that X must be the sole cause based upon the elimination of one other cause Y. BUT WHAT IF X AND Y AREN'T THE ONLY CAUSES? For example, what if there's another explanation in addition to the one we've eliminated (Social Conditioning) and the one in the conclusion (Innate Dispositions), maybe drugs could be a cause? Because we only eliminated one cause, we cannot conclude that another possible explanation is the only one until we eliminate the other possibilities. The author doesn't do that here.

(2) The only cause of Popularity

If you interpreted the phrase this way, which is the same way I interpreted it, then you probably reached the same inference I did in the beginning, which is that Social Conditioning is not the only cause and it might not be a cause of Popularity at all.

The flaw here is similar to the one above, but it's even worse in nature. See under the first interpretation, we could at least eliminate one cause but the flaw was that the author didn't eliminate other causes. Here the author doesn't even eliminate one cause; we know that Social Conditioning isn't the sole cause, but it still could contribute.

Hope this clears things up for you. I got a little technical with the explanation but what you should take away form this question is that whenever you see a causal conclusion ask yourself "Have all of the possible causes been eliminated?" I bet they haven't, and that's usually the flaw.

agp2111

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Re: PrepTest 36 (Dec 2001) - Second LR Section, #25

Post by agp2111 » Tue Jun 17, 2014 10:46 am

Thank you so much Daily Double and Clyde Frog.

Daily Double, I particularly appreciated your breakdown of the two possible inferences I could have made. I happened to make the first inference, thinking that the stimulus was proving that it was not a part of the cause. I understand now how the flaw the argument makes - assuming that there are only two possible causes - is still noticeable having made this first inference.

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