Q14 - University president: Research institutions have

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Principle-Example (the Principle above will justify the arguments below)

Stimulus Breakdown:
Princ: If research might yield insights into the causes of practical problems affecting quality of life, then research institutions have an obligation to promote research (even theoretical).

Answer Anticipation:
This principle allows us to conclude "we DO have an obligation to promote research". It does not have any power to prove "we do NOT have an obligation".

Correct Answer:
E

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) "Denying a grant application" sounds like "DON'T promote research", which we can't prove using this rule.

(B) Funding = promoting research. Does this match the trigger? Is it potentially going to give us insights into the cause of practical problems? Doesn't sound like it. Seems to only help astronomers in their work.

(C) Funding = promoting. Does it match the trigger? No, no buzzwords that resonate with "some promise of yielding insights into causes of practical problems".

(D) "not funding" = "don't promote research", which we can't prove using this rule.

(E) Yes! Funding = promoting. Does it match trigger? Yes, "likely to aid in understanding causes of disease" qualifies as "shows some promise of yielding insights into causes of practical problems".

Takeaway/Pattern: Normally when we apply a Principle, the answer choices have a very "Premise -> Conclusion" feel, and we simply try to match the premise with the Trigger and the conclusion with the Outcome. This was weirder since it felt more like one fact, but with a little translation we could still see "funding vs. not-funding" as the intended match for the Outcome and then focus on whether we had a match for the Trigger.

#officialexplanation

[kky215]

I chose A as the answer but apparently E is the correct answer.
I can see why E is the right answer but I can't seem to definitively rule out A either.

My thought process was:

if some promise of yielding insights into practical problems that affect qualify of life --> research institution is obliged to promote research
contrapositive) ~promote research --> ~promise

Is A wrong because it says "university" instead of "research institution"?

Help please!

[tommywallach]

Hey Kky,

The mistake you're making here is thinking that a given precept definitively defines its reverse.

For example, if I say: "Every American is beautiful."

That does not imply: "Every Non-American is not beautiful."

Make sense?

In this example, the precept is: RI's should research anything with practical benefits.

Answer choice (A) says "University rejects something that is NOT practical."

See the problem? Just because RI's should research everything practical doesn't mean they can't ALSO research some impractical things.

Hope that helps!

-t

[ptewarie]

Hey Kky,

The mistake you're making here is thinking that a given precept definitively defines its reverse.

For example, if I say: "Every American is beautiful."

That does not imply: "Every Non-American is not beautiful."

Make sense?

In this example, the precept is: RI's should research anything with practical benefits.

Answer choice (A) says "University rejects something that is NOT practical."

See the problem? Just because RI's should research everything practical doesn't mean they can't ALSO research some impractical things.

Hope that helps!

-t

I think a more easier solution is to look at it this way.
Read carefully, this will help you score points quickly:



Remember, The sufficient term will always serve as the "evidence" portion(why) and the necessary will always serve as the conclusion portion(thus..).

This is so, because we CAN NEVER justify that the sufficient occurred, we can ONLY justify that the necessary occurred from the sufficient. Just because the necessary occurs, does NOT allow us to conclude that the sufficient occurs. This means, that the necessary portion MUST always be the conclusion portion( what was triggered) and the sufficient MUST always be the evidence(trigger) portion, because only the trigger can force the necessary to occur.

Remember, when you started studying for the LSAT, you learned that a simple way to differentiate conclusion from evidence is to note that Evidence will always answer: WHY( the trigger).


In principle apply problems, this is a key deduction and will save you A LOT of time. Anytime you see a conclusion that is not a necessary portion of the formal logic or its contrapositive, you can cross it out. I see fellow peers waste so much time going over lengthy answer choices for no reason.

What that means in this problem,is this:
From the formal logic that:

If research shows practical promise--> promote research

Contrapositive:

if not promote research--> research did not show prac. promise


Only two things can serve as "conclusions"
1. Thus.. Obligation to promote research ( from original formal logic)
2. Thus...Research did not show practical promise


Answer choice A, says, if you revise it:

Math problem was not related to practical concerns(why trigger), thus university denied grant(necessary).

This is NOT a justified application of the principle, because it DOES NOT follow from either the formal logic or its provided contrapositive. Nothing allows to trigger to NOT fund research.


B. is out of scope b/c there's no practicality involved
C. same- no practicality
D. Same- no practicality

E:

Research is likely to aid in understanding structure of proteins that cause disease(trigger).
THUS
Research institute funds an investigation.

This is a perfect match because
a. it involves practical application
b.The conclusion matches the necessary portion of our formal logic. Practical applications can trigger obligation to fund research.


In problems like this, make sure to see what is the conclusion and the evidence. Re-order the sentences accordingly. Whatever gives a reason is the trigger.

[nthakka]

From answer choices (A) through (D), there is nothing that can relate to the sufficient condition in the stimulus. We need something that benefits people's quality of life.

"No practical concerns" in (A). "Magnitude of planets in distant solar systems"

in (B). We have no idea if this meets that criteria or not, and it requires an unwarranted assumption.

(C) Managing grant applications in physics faculty? Doesn't seem like something that would benefit people's quality of life. Maybe one minor segment of the population, and even then, it's a stretch. (D).

Poorly understood aspects of economic behavior? We have no idea if this relates to people and their quality of life. Maybe these economists are researching some complex model to explain the behavior of fortunate 500 CEOs. We just don't know.

(E): "structure of proteins that cause disease". Note that this matches the sufficient condition in the stimulus exactly, which was "research shows promise of yielding insight into causes of practical problems that affect people's quality of life". Disease certainly fits this criteria, and they are looking into a cause of it, which is structure of proteins. The necessary condition is met in that they fund the investigation.

[pewals13]

Could anyone exlain how (A) fails to meet the contrapositive of the rule set out by the university president?

NOT promote research---------->NOT promise of yielding insights into causes of practical problems that affect people's quality of life

I thought that matched up with

NOT fund grant application---------->NOT have relation to practical concerns

I understand that (E) is a tighter fit but was wondering if someone could weigh in

Thanks!

[christine.defenbaugh]

Great question, pewals13!

I think the key to understanding the distinction is in the question stem itself. We're being asked to justify a particular action in each answer choice. The only action we've got here is the decision to fund/promote or NOT to fund/promote. In order to justify one of those actions, we need a conditional that has the appropriate action as the result of the conditional (i.e., the necessary condition).

The principle given in the stimulus can be translated as:

IF research promises insight to practical problems --> should promote

The contrapositive that you lay out is correct, but it would never justify any particular action. Instead, the contrapositive would simply tell us that if we already know that something was not funded (i.e., the action has already occurred), then it should not have had promise for insight into practical problems.

It cannot, however, tell us that IF something has no promise for practical problems, THEN as a result we should not fund it. That would be an illegal reversal of the contrapositive!

And that's exactly what's happening in (A): what we know is that this research would have no promise for practical problems. The university uses that given information to take the action of denying the grant application. While this matches the two elements of our contrapositive, it puts them in the wrong order. While the university hasn't violated the original principle, it also cannot use that principle as support for its decision to deny funding.

The only way we'd be able to justify the action of denying funding is with a conditional that said "IF [something], THEN [deny funding]".

Does that help clear things up a bit?

[pewals13]

Awesome, thanks!

[abkrusemark]

I'm having trouble with this one. Everything that's been said above makes a lot of sense:

Practical research --> Obligation to promote

No obligation to promote --> Not practical research

I understand that if research wasn't funded (for whatever reason), then it definitely wasn't practical.

Answer A seems to say that this university had no obligation to promote research (ie deny a grant), and also that it wasn't practical. I'm not seeing the illegal reversal (because it wasn't practical, the university decided to deny the grant). It seems more like 2 facts: 1) the university denied the grant and 2) it wasn't practical. Where's the improper causation?

Also a sidenote-- the intro noun in the first part of every question lists university, gov agency, university, foundation, and research institute. Since the stimulus was concerned with research institutions this was a quick tip off that E was the better answer.

[andrewgong01]

I think I am missing somthing "obvious" here. I also saw the principle as "Show insight into something practical... ---> Obligation to promote it
The contrapositive is "If no obligation to promote it then this is something with no practical insight"

"A" states that a university has denied a grant (i.e. it triggers no obligation). And we know that this work indeed had no practical insight so to me it seems like "A" also conforms.

[ohthatpatrick]

The confusion here stems from the fact that the answer choices aren't clearly arguments. If they WERE, and we were trying to justify the argument (typical wording of this question stem), then hopefully you'd understand why we're insisting on justifying the conclusion

GIVEN A PRINCIPLE
X --> Y

An argument justified by that principle would either sound like
Prem (X) --> Conc (Y)
or
~Conc (~Y) --> ~Prem (~X)

In this case, we're not justifying an 'argument', but rather "Justifying the action", according to the question stem.

The principle provided justifies the action of "promoting research".
(If there's promise of practical benefit ------> obligated to promote research)

Using this principle, the only action we could every justify is "obligated to promote research".

The action in (A) is "denying a grant application".

To justify a conclusion / action, etc., we need a rule that sounds like
"If xyz is true, then this conclusion/action is justified".

In other words, to justify the action of "denying a grant application",
you need a law that says
"Whenever xyz applies, then we should deny a grant application".

The law you cited was
"Whenever we don't have an obligation to promote something, we know that the 'something' didn't have promise of practical insights."

That rule doesn't "justify an action".

It says "If an action occurs, we are justified in knowing something."