Q18 - Salesperson: When a salesperson is

[aileenann]

This question wants us to find a flaw. Since the argument itself is so technical, this looks like a good candidate for threshing out the argument with conditional logic. This is especially helpful when the question wants us to find a flaw, as the formal articulation of the argument should make the flaw relatively easy to spot.

If we spell this out more formally, the argument should look like this:

if successful -> in business 3+ years (conclusion)
successful -> has developed strong client base
in business 3+ years -> comfortable living

Do you see what has gone wrong here? It looks like the author forgot that you can't just flip conditional statements around at your convenience. There's actually no solid "chain" of logic we can set up with the two statements to get to our conclusion. That is, the ideas don't link up to connect success to length of being in business. All we know for sure is that being in business for 3 years is enough to make everyone comfortable. It doesn't tell us that 3 years is the *minimum* absolutely required for success.

(B) gets right at this fault - a logical fault pointed out by the gaps in the statements, which are not really able to get us to the ultimate conclusion. That is, specifically, the conclusion is not air tight because nothing in the two premises guarantees that there are no salespeople who achieve success before 3 years of experience have accrued.

Now let's look at the wrong answers.

(A) is perfectly consistent with the conclusion above and does nothing to weaken it.

(C) like, (A), is consistent with the conclusion, which sets a *minimum* rather than a maximum.

(D) is also consistent with the conclusion - if anything suggesting that even three years is too low for the minimum.

(E) speaks to feasibility. However, this conclusion is not concerned with what is feasible but rather with what is necessary (if you think these two are at all necessary, watch out - you are bringing in your own background assumptions).


#officialexplanation

[jmichaelchin]

I like to think of this one in terms of necessary and sufficient conditions.

The conclusion is that 3 years or more is necessary to be a successful salesman.

The premise says that essentially, three years or more is sufficient. Okay, so three years guarantees your success but that doesn't mean that it's necessary.

It helps to find the contrapositive of the conclusion, which would say that not three or more years of success (so less than) means you won't be successful. Well the premises don't say that.

Once you realize this, C is a dead on restatement of this.

[aileenann]

Great insight! I definitely agree that thinking about necessary and sufficient conditions - if you master them - can be a very effective and fast way of having insights like the one you mention.

[joseph.m.kirby]

C: Successful --> been in sales 3+ years

P: Successful --> establish client base
P: 3+ years & establish client base --> eventually can have comfortable living


The flaw relates to a gap in the logic where the evidence assumes that: establish client base --> 3+ years so as to allow the conclusion to follow. Answer choice (B) attacks this assumption by providing evidence that shows the salesperson overlooked other possibilities (establish client base --> ~ 3+ years).

[joseph.m.kirby]

On another note, I think answer (A) might be a bit tricky (even though (B) is the better answer).

As for eliminating (A), one must look for the flaw in the assumption that connects the premises with the conclusion:

C: Successful --> Sales 3 yrs

P: Successful --> CB
P: 3yr & CB --> Comfortable living

Answer choice (A) actually attacks an assumption involving two of the sufficient conditions of the premises being connected (it attacks an assumption of 3 yrs & CB --> successful, by putting forward a negation of the necessary condition of the assumption, similar to (B), 3 yrs & CB --> ~successful ). However, the assumption (3 yrs & CB --> successful) isn't posited by the argument; thus, this assumption is not a flaw of the argument and the argument thereby doesn't fail to consider (A).

[jardinsouslapluie5]

To Aileenann

Sorry, but what does it mean by being "consistent with the conclusion" on (A)?
I understand your correct answer explanation.
But I still cannot confidently eliminate all the rest of answer choices.
Could you anybody go to detail, please?

Thank you

[patrice.antoine]

To Aileenann

Sorry, but what does it mean by being "consistent with the conclusion" on (A)?
I understand your correct answer explanation.
But I still cannot confidently eliminate all the rest of answer choices.
Could you anybody go to detail, please?

Thank you

Hey Jardin, this is how I was able to eliminate the rest of the answer choices. Now remember, the conclusion is the very first sentence: 'when a saleperson is successful....it's establish they have been in sales for AT LEAST three years' (capitalized bolded for emphasis)

A - This corresponds with what the stimulus says, which states that developing a client base takes AT LEAST three years. It could take more than three years, according to what we read. No flaw here.

C - This also corresponds with what the stimulus says: a salesperson who has not yet spent three or more years (drawing back to the AT LEAST) may not successd as such. No flaw.

D - Restates one of the premises in the stimulus. The stimulus establishes that it takes AT LEAST three years to develop a firm client base

E - Whether or not a salesperson can afford to spend X amount of years to build a client base does nothing to attack the stimulus. This is out of scope.


Hope this helped some!

[kpopstar123]

Someone please help me out...

Ok... so I diagrammed this as well.

Successful -> client base
3 years -> comfortable

---
Successful -> 3 years


Now, what's exactly wrong with this argument?

Because 2 of the previous posts conflict with each other:

I think one of the geeks said that this argument is wrong because it turned around one of the statements (I believe the second premise?)

and other said that it actually makes unwarranted assumption, that (client base -> 3 years)

well which one is it?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

I think one of the geeks said that this argument is wrong because it turned around one of the statements (I believe the second premise?)

and other said that it actually makes unwarranted assumption, that (client base -> 3 years)

well which one is it?

Good question! It's the latter. The 2nd premise is really just an irrelevant distraction. The flaw in the argument is the unwarranted assumption that (client base -> 3 years).

The correct answer rightfully points out that the argument failed to consider the possibility that this might not be true - that some might have a strong client base after less than three years of experience.

[kpopstar123]

Thanks for the response Matt.
Then let me try to summarize what has happened in the argument.

So basically (since you have mentioned that the second premise is a distraction) argument is saying

Success -> strong client base
---
therefore Success -> 3 years

So the argument has made an unwarranted assumption that
strong client base -> 3 years?

since it is unwarranted assumption, we are trying to choose an answer choice that will directly contradict the assumption?

Because in order to negate a conditional statement, you have to negate the necessary condition and what A is suggesting is
Strong client base -> ~not necessarily 3 years.

Am I on the right track?

THank you!

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Am I on the right track?

Perfect, nice work!

[samuelfbaron]

What if it stated "studies have shown that one MUST spend 3 years in order to successfully develop a client base"

Does the "at least" make it a sufficient assumption?

...and if it were changed to a must/unless scenario would that make a necessary assumption?

This was a difficult question. I think I understand that the Salesperson is overlooking the fact that being is sale for 3 years is sufficient but not necessary for success.

[WaltGrace1983]

Here is a question for the instructors: a lot of LR questions deal with studies. Studies show "x" and then proceeds to make a conclusion regarding the information from the studies. This one does it too. How much weight do we give to these studies in question when we are analyzing arguments?

I understand that sometimes the studies are flawed altogether. For example, in 53.3.6 we have a study which was looking at the bird diets and the study was only conducted in the morning. It proceeds to say that its findings show what is generally true about bird diets. This is clearly flawed because we cannot say that a small sample in the morning is representative of the entire diet of a bird throughout the day (as the correct answer shows). However, I am not really talking about those "clearly flawed" studies. I am talking about the studies that are shown in this question - the studies that are just "studies" and never discuss how many people were analyzed, over what period of time, etc. They are just "studies." What role do they play?

I hope that makes sense!

[rinagoldfield]

Hi WaltGrace1983,

GREAT question. I think the important thing to remember is that you must always accept any premise of an LSAT argument. Here, the study functions as a premise of the salesperson’s argument. We therefore accept the study as valid, but question the inferences the salesperson draws from the study.

The birds question is similar, although more "clearly flawed," as you say. We’re not evaluating the data gathered by the ornithologist, we’re evaluating the conclusion the ornithologist draws from the data.

Remember: evaluate the logic, not the facts.

Your task is to figure our what role the study plays in the argument. Chances are, a study in an LSAT argument functions as a premise or a counterpoint. Either way, don’t worry about evaluating its data. Worry about evaluating any inferences someone draws from those data.

Hope that helps!

--Rina

[Mab6q]

I really could use some help on this if someone wants to chime it. I understand why B is correct and how the other answer choices are way off. However, my question deals with the stimulus itself. I think Matt said the second premise is a distraction, why is that the case. I diagrammed it as another conditional? Was I suppose to? Could someone clear this up?

This is how I diagrammed it:

Successful Salesperson --> sales for three years (Conclusion)

Successful Salesperson --> strong client base

3 years of dev strong client base --> make a comfortable living

I thought the author made two flaws. First, he assumed that strong client base meant three years of dev strong client base. Second, he equated make a comfortable living with three years in sales.

Is that just the more complicated way of thinking about it? Should I have just skipped the last part when diagramming? Is it because it comes from studies?

Any help would be appreciated.

[jeanne'sjean]

I really could use some help on this if someone wants to chime it. I understand why B is correct and how the other answer choices are way off. However, my question deals with the stimulus itself. I think Matt said the second premise is a distraction, why is that the case. I diagrammed it as another conditional? Was I suppose to? Could someone clear this up?

This is how I diagrammed it:

Successful Salesperson --> sales for three years (Conclusion)

Successful Salesperson --> strong client base

3 years of dev strong client base --> make a comfortable living

I thought the author made two flaws. First, he assumed that strong client base meant three years of dev strong client base. Second, he equated make a comfortable living with three years in sales.

Is that just the more complicated way of thinking about it? Should I have just skipped the last part when diagramming? Is it because it comes from studies?

Any help would be appreciated.

Same question Can we just regard the second premise as irrelevant??

[AnnaT620]

Thank you so much for the above posts and discussion - I am so lost on this question, is there another way to explain the flaw here?

I diagrammed this as:

Premise: successful -> has developed strong client base
Premise: 3+ years building strong client base -> comfortable living
__________________________________________________________
Conclusion: successful -> in business 3+ years

My understanding of the flaw was initially equivocation of the terms successful with comfortable living, and initially picked A as the answer here? Based on the above this seems way off base.

Based on the above explanations on the forum, I can get as far as understanding that 3+yrs in sales is necessary to being successful in sales. However, I don't understand how the premises confuse the sufficient condition for the necessary condition, which is I think what B is describing. Is there a takeaway I am missing to approaching questions like this in the future?

Thank you again very much! Apologies for the many questions and I really appreciate the support

[Misti Duvall]

Hi Anna!

No problem at all; please ask away. That's why we're here.

So this is a tricky question, and the conditional logic approach described above is good way to approach it. (And your notation is correct). But we can also try to approach it in a bit less formal way, which might make it a little easier.

The conclusion states that if a salesperson is successful, they've been in sales at least three years. The premise that most directly supports it says that if you've developed a client base for at least three years, you can eventually make a comfortable living.

However, just because every person who has developed a client base for at least three years will be successful, that doesn't mean there aren't other superstars who are successful in less than three years.

What I described is an illegal reversal, but it also tracks with answer choice (B) even if you didn't break out the formal logic. Ask yourself: what do I think is wrong with this argument? That might be an easier way to do it if the diagramming feels hard to navigate.

Final note re equivocation: I think what you're describing (using two terms to mean the same thing) would be a term shift. But that's not the case here because making a comfortable living and success aren't that far apart. Regardless, I don't think answer choice (A) describes a term shift. It's basically restating something that's covered in the second premise (eventually make a comfortable living...).

Hope this helps.

[AshleyT786]

Is making a comfortable living in sales and being successful the same concept?