The Benefit of the Doubt Forum

[Blueprint LSAT]

If you were that kid growing up who corrected people all the time and argued with everything whether it was important or not, congratulations. Everyone probably always told you you should be a lawyer and now that day is finally coming. This post is probably not about a problem you have. For everyone else, the LSAT is likely frustrating you in a specific way.

Reading on the LSAT is different from other academic reading.

With most reading you are trying to do quickly, you want to give the author the benefit of the doubt. Your goal is to pick up the gist of what they are saying as fast as possible. You may be reading critically and taking issue with the opinion of the author, but rarely are you going to challenge the technical details of their argument as long as you understood what they meant.

This holds true in real life as well. Nobody wants a boring conversation partner who just agrees with everything, but we reserve a special hatred for the person who goes to the other extreme and dunks on you every time you make a grammatical error.

On the LSAT, you kind of have to be that person though.

In LR sections you are often looking for the flaw in an argument. That flaw may not be the flashiest or most topically relevant piece of information, but for our purposes any win is a win. If we can take down a question on a technicality that point is worth just as much as if we had found a more satisfying answer. There are no moral victories on the LSAT.

So don't hesitate to be pedantic. Just because something doesn't seem of central importance doesn't mean it can't still be a problem. They only give you so much information to work with in LR so be careful if you are dismissing too much of it.