[Anonymous]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for reading. The “EXTREME LINKS” (pg 460-461) was the hardest drill of the trainer that I encountered so far, so I have quite a few questions about it. The major problems I had were in diagramming out the statements, because in many instances I saw that your answers posted online contradicted pg. 457 of the trainer (sufficient and necessary indicator words) so I got very confused. For almost every single question in this drill, there was at least one sentence that I diagrammed differently than your online answers. Here goes:

-For the first drill “Fred”, I originally diagrammed this sentence: “Fred won’t attend unless Leon does, and Leon will only attend if Sarah does not” as F –> L, ~S –> L, but on the answer link below you said it was F –> L —> ~S. Can you explain why that is?

-For the second drill “Cheaters”, the last sentence reads: “The public adored those who win and do not brag about it”. I diagrammed this as:
Public adores –> Win and ~Brag
But you diagrammed this as:
Win and ~brag —> Public adores
Why is that so?

-For the third drill “Students”, I diagrammed the first sentence “Every student is required to wear a uniform, and only those wearing uniforms are allowed to ride the bus.” As:
S –> WU –> RB
you diagrammed it as S –> WU, RB –> WU
How come? Therefore, I am confused about the latter part of this sentence: “…ONLY THOSE wearing uniforms ARE allowed to ride the bus.” Does that mean that “are”, as in, “are allowed to ride the bus,” indicates a sufficient condition in this case (like you diagrammed?) Because on pg. 457, under “Conditional Terms”, it’s says that “are” indicates necessity, so I am confused. Also, what does “only those” in this sentence indicate (sufficiency or necessity and why?)

-For “Doll”, it says in the second sentence: “The doll can only wear one dress at a time, and it can ONLY wear a hat WHEN it wears a purple dress” I diagrammed this as: “PD –> H” as you said on page 457 of the Trainer that “when” indicates sufficiency and “only” indicates necessity. Yet you diagrammed this out the opposite way: H –> PD. How come?

-In “Lumber”, the last sentence of the passage says, “Only wood that is not cut to exact dimensions is currently discounted” – I diagrammed this the way you did, “CD –> ED” even though I was confused because ONLY and ARE both indicate necessity according to page 457.

-Your posted online answers that I keep referring to for the “EXTREME LINKS” drill: http://thelsattrainer.academy/forums/topic/extreme-links-help/

[Mike Kim]

Hi Gitanjali,

Happy to try and help —

I think the confusion may stem from the visuals on page 457 — those words are meant to indicate when the subject matter is present — as in yes, there is a conditional statement here, or yes, they are talking about one thing being necessary for another — the list of words is not meant to give any indication as to the exact relationship or ordering of elements in a conditional statement (whether it’s X – > Y, or Y – > X etc.) — sorry if I didn’t make that clear enough —

My suggestion throughout the book is to think about all conditional statements you encounter in terms of the guarantees they represent — this is much more consistent with how top scorers naturally think, and I believe that this is a far easier and more effective method than trying to memorize/utilize equations based on indicator words and such (for more information, please check out lessons 13 and 18 again) —

Here are the various conditional statements you brought up where your answers differed from mine/ along with some explanation of how to think of the phrases in terms of guarantees:

From Drill 1 –

Leon will only attend if Sarah does not.

If Leon attends, what do we know for sure? Sarah must not have. And so L- > – S.

Let’s check it the other way — if Sarah doesn’t attend, does Leon have to? No, they can both be absent and it wouldn’t violate the rule.

From Drill 2

The public always adores those who win and do not brag about it.

If the public adores you, does it guarantee that you won and didn’t brag about it? No, it doesn’t — maybe they could adore you for a million different reasons (such as giving everyone a free house), and it wouldn’t violate the given rule.

If you win and don’t brag, will the public adore you? Yes, because the rule tells us they always do as long as you satisfy the criteria. So, the guarantee is that

W + don’ brag -> pub adores.

From Drill 3

Only those wearing uniforms are allowed to ride the bus.

Does this mean that if you are wearing a uniform you are guaranteed a ride on the bus? No — maybe there are other reasons (such as that you are carrying something illegal) why they won’t let you ride, and it wouldn’t violate this rule in any way.

However, if you are riding the bus, per this rule, you must be wearing a uniform.

R -> U.

From Drill 4

The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress.

Can the doll wear a purple dress but no hat? Sure. So, PD -> H is not a guarantee.

If the doll is wearing a hat, do we know for sure it must have on the purple dress? Yes.

So, H -> PD is the given guarantee.

For Drill 5
Only wood that is not cut to exact dimensions is currently discounted.

So, if you have a piece of wood not cut to exact dimensions, does the above guarantee that it must be discounted? No, you could have an undiscounted piece of such wood without violating the rule.

If you have a piece of wood currently discounted, do we know for sure that it is wood not cut to exact dimensions? Yes we do, because only that type of wood is currently discounted.

So, D -> not ED.

—

Hope that helps —

Mike

[Mia]

Hello, I am still unclear about drill 4 on the part where you discussed that the conditional statement would be H–>PD. I am still not convinced that it is not PD–>H considering it literally has two indicators directing it in the way I understand it (only and when).

[Amy]

I am also having some confusion on this drill.

On the doll question, I am confused because I thought:

If the doll does not wear purple slippers, it wears a red dress. And if it is wearing a red dress, it is not wearing a purple dress. If it isn’t wearing a purple dress it can’t wear a hat. So why is number 7 “no?”

[Amy]

Oh my goodness, I mis-numbered the questions. So sorry!

[Mike Kim]

Hey Amy — no worries — let me know if I can help with anything else — MK

[Mike Kim]

Hi Mia,

Here are three different ways to think about the conditional statement —

“The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress.”

I hope they help clear things up —

1) Thinking about the statement in terms of guarantees —

The functional purpose of a conditional statement is to represent a guarantee — if one thing is true, the other thing must be true.

For PD -> H to be a correct, that would mean that per the above statement, wearing a purple dress guarantees that the doll has on a hat.

With that in mind, it can help to read the statement —

“The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress”

and ask yourself —

“Does this statement guarantee that if the doll wears a purple dress, it must wear a hat?” If you don’t see such a guarantee in the statement, than you know that PD -> H can’t be correct.

2) A more technical explanation

“The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress” is akin to

“The doll can wear a hat only when it wears a purple dress” is akin to

“The doll can wear a heat only if it wears a purple dress.”

“Only if” is a fairly common phrase, and “X only if Y” is correctly translated as “X -> Y.”

3) With an analogy

“The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress” is akin to

“We can only watch programs on the television when it is plugged in.”

Does this mean that if a TV is plugged in you must watch it? No.

Does this phrase mean that if you were able to watch TV it was plugged in?

Yes, so you could translate it Watched -> Plugged in.

Relating this back to the doll example —

“We can only watch programs on the television when it is plugged in” =

W -> P

“The doll can only wear a hat when it wears a purple dress” =

H -> PD

—

Again, hope that helps clear things up — take care — Mike

[varcity64]

Mike (or anyone really),

Can you please help me clear up some confusion I am having from the first example “Leon will only attend if Sarah does not”? What is the difference in the way it was presented in the trainer and me stating “Leon will attend only if Sarah does not”? Not realizing this was wrong, I drew my diagram with Sarah as the necessary condition resulting in L -> -S Thank you.

Edit: I think I am overthinking a little bit. it turns out L -> -S is the correct diagram. But can I think this way on the test (changing it to “only if”) thus making it easier on me mentally?

[sweetbugg3]

I am quite confused with Mike’s explanation.

Leon will only attend if Sarah does not. This tells me that if Sarah does not attend, then Leon will attend. It doesn’t say anything about what happens if Sarah attends. Leon could still show up or he could just not attend. Uncertain.

Where do you get that Sarah attending guarantees that Leon will not attend? I am so confused with your explanation for these drills.

and no offense, me understanding is more important that “what top scorers think”

Thanks.

[Mike Kim]

Hi Sweetbugg3 —

Conditional statements involving “only” and “if” are very confusing to a lot of students — and so I try to explain the issue in a variety of different ways, because I’ve found that different explanations work better for different learners– sorry I couldn’t put one out there that was effective for you —

For additional general discussion of conditional statements, please check out lesson 13 —

For further specific discussion and practice with the phrases involving only and if check out lesson 18, as well as this video about LSAT vocab —

https://youtu.be/Q0KiE__jpuM — at about the 3:50 mark —

— Mike Kim

[Mike Kim]

Hey Mohammad —

I think that (converting one phrase for another) is a tool that you can keep in your arsenal, and it can certainly prove to be extremely useful when you feel lost or stuck, but ideally I would use it as a secondary method — in general, you want to first do your best to try and understand conditional statements correctly in the manner in which the statements are given — if a statement is causing you trouble to begin with, I think there are increased chances that you may accidentally change the meaning by altering it — hth — mk

[sweetbugg3]

Thank you for your patience with me. I was very frustrated hence my comment. I will review the chapters again and try to make sense of all this.

Can you elaborate on your comment to Mohammad?

“I think that (converting one phrase for another) is a tool that you can keep in your arsenal, and it can certainly prove to be extremely useful when you feel lost or stuck, but ideally I would use it as a secondary method — in general, you want to first do your best to try and understand conditional statements correctly in the manner in which the statements are given — if a statement is causing you trouble to begin with, I think there are increased chances that you may accidentally change the meaning by altering it — hth — mk”

The chapters you recommend I reread, do they further discuss your recommendation above?

Thanks!

[Mike Kim]

Hi Sweetbugg3 —

Happy to help — if I understand your question correctly, than yes — the strategies for conditional statements that I recommend in those chapters and elsewhere involve trying to help you correctly understand the significance of conditional phrases as they are written — HTH — Mike