Q20 - When teaching art students about the use of color, tea

[samantha.rose.shulman]

PT65, S4, Q20 (Necessary Assumption)

(D) is the correct answer.

Where is the conclusion? In this case, the conclusion is the very first sentence of the argument, and the rest of the stimulus is support for that conclusion. Thus, our argument core is:

Colored Paper (Unlike Paint) Allows For Comparison Of Color’s Impact --> When Teaching Art Students About The Use Of Color, Colored Paper Is Preferable To Paint

What are some of the necessary assumptions made by this argument? With Necessary Assumption (and Sufficient Assumption) questions it is important to note if there is something mentioned in the conclusion, but not mentioned in the premises (or vice versa). It is likely that these seemingly rogue elements will be mentioned in the correct answer choice. Do you notice anything like that in this argument?

Both the premise and conclusion mention the preference of colored paper over paint. However, only the conclusion mentions teaching art students about the use of color and only the premises mention the importance of allowing for precise comparison of color’s impact in varying contexts. It is likely that at least one, if not both, of these topics will appear in the correct answer.

Let's attack the answer choices!

(A) is incorrect. This answer choice starts off well, but misses the mark at the end when it states "even if they are of different textures". It is not necessary that colored paper of different textures have the same effect in a given context. Can’t we just use colored paper that has the same texture? Eliminate!

(B) is incorrect. This argument isn’t about comparing the difficulty in noticing the difference in color. Rather, it is about consistency of color _ a realm in which colored paper is considered superior.

(C) is incorrect. Light conditions? This is completely irrelevant, vague, and definitely not necessary.

This leaves us with (D) and (E). Both are more attractive than (A), (B), and (C) because they mentioned art students. (E) - although tempting - is incorrect. This argument isn’t about art students understanding how colored paper and paint differ, but instead understanding how the same color (which can be provided by colored paper more effectively than paint) has a different impact depending on the context.

(D) can be confirmed by using the Negation Test: "Observing the impacts of color across varying contexts does not help students to learn about the use of color". This completely destroys the argument!

[JensMJimenez89]

Hey what do you mean the textures don't matter? Doesn't it say towards the end that paint textures matter? And its toward end too that it mentions that.

I felt choosing B would be right because it addresses the real conclusion or idea behind the little section.

A though carries some definite relevance. I usually subconsciously try to live by the mantra, "shoot for the conclusion only." I think here is just another case of that. Am I wrong here?

[cacrv]

Can someone apply the negation test to B and explain why B's negation test results are wrong for this question?

[tommywallach]

Hey Cac,

Adding not before the verb is the negation. This should DESTROY the argument if it's correct. It doesn't. We don't care which medium would present more difficulty in differentiating between slight difference. We care about whether there IS a slight difference.

-t

[erikwoodward10]

Regarding D, I don't understand why this is necessary. I understand the logical nature of D: it links the premise in support of paper with the conclusion. However, if it is negated, I don't see how D destroys the argument.

Negated, D suggests that observing the impact of colors across different contexts does NOT help students learn about the use of color.

OK, well this absolutely kills our premise that supports paper as superior. But we still have two reasons NOT to use paint, which alone, could be reason enough to select paper. So I don't see how this really kills the validity of the argument.

Furthermore, how isn't A necessary? I understood "impact" in the premise and "effect" in the AC to be synonymous. If we negate this, it seems to be to destroy the argument. Now we have the same color paper with different textures that produce different impacts/effects. This is a pretty good reason NOT to use paper!

Help?

EDIT: Coming back to this a few days later, I realize that the answer lies within the logic nature of the question itself. In a NA question, we must assume that the premises are valid and the conclusion is valid. We need to select an answer choice that, given the logical validity of the conclusion, must be true. D must be true because it defends the validity of the only support directly given to the conclusion. My previous thinking was a logical flaw: two reasons to NOT to go with pain are not a reason to go for paper.

[Alonninos]

Hello! I went for A in this one and am still not sure that I understand well enough not to make the same mistake again. My thinking was that since a mark against using paint is that varying textures can affect the 'purity' of the color, varying the textures in paper would interfere with the claim that paper allows for 'a precise comparison of that color's impact.' The argument would need to assume that this wasn't a problem in the first place - but I guess I'm making an illicit assumption about how texture impacts paper. I can see why D is also a good (and the right) choice, but the 'helps students to learn' phrase in D seemed too much to conclude from the world 'should' in the first sentence.

Is this just a toughie or is there something in A that kicks it right out? Thank you!

[ohthatpatrick]

The author is just saying that we should use colored paper because it will perform more consistently than paint.

You can move a piece of red paper from the center of the page to the top left corner and compare what effect that color has.

You can move a piece of red paper from bordering a dark portrait to bordering a sunny landscape and compare what effect that color has.

If you were trying to do this same drill by painting red paint in all the aforementioned spots, you might sometimes have a slightly different red (we could say the author assumes that "different sheets of the same style of colored paper will look precisely similar".)

And you might sometimes be painting red in a thin, flat way but other times painting it in a gobbed, stucco, 3D sorta way.

The author is saying that variation in how much the paint sticks off the surface is another complicating factor that makes paint less consistent from usage to usage.

The author was never suggesting that we use colored paper of different textures, so how could we assign ANY opinion on that matter to her?

She could easily say to (A), "I'm not assuming that. Two pieces of the same red, but on different textures of paper, will ABSOLUTELY have different effects. Use the same texture of red paper so that you get as precise a comparison as possible."

Nothing in her argument would go against this.

======

I understand the hesitation with going from "should" to "help students to learn".

But normative words like "should" / "ought" are basically placeholders for common sense.

What sort of actions SHOULD you do?

things that produce more good than harm / that achieve your aims / etc.

What sort of things SHOULD teachers teach?

things that produce more good than harm / that achieve their aims

Isn't it fair to say that "helping students to learn" is a common sense definition of the aim of a teacher?

That's how LSAT would justify that leap.

[AnnaC659]

The author is just saying that we should use colored paper because it will perform more consistently than paint.

You can move a piece of red paper from the center of the page to the top left corner and compare what effect that color has.

You can move a piece of red paper from bordering a dark portrait to bordering a sunny landscape and compare what effect that color has.

If you were trying to do this same drill by painting red paint in all the aforementioned spots, you might sometimes have a slightly different red (we could say the author assumes that "different sheets of the same style of colored paper will look precisely similar".)

And you might sometimes be painting red in a thin, flat way but other times painting it in a gobbed, stucco, 3D sorta way.

The author is saying that variation in how much the paint sticks off the surface is another complicating factor that makes paint less consistent from usage to usage.

The author was never suggesting that we use colored paper of different textures, so how could we assign ANY opinion on that matter to her?

She could easily say to (A), "I'm not assuming that. Two pieces of the same red, but on different textures of paper, will ABSOLUTELY have different effects. Use the same texture of red paper so that you get as precise a comparison as possible."

Nothing in her argument would go against this.

======

I understand the hesitation with going from "should" to "help students to learn".

But normative words like "should" / "ought" are basically placeholders for common sense.

What sort of actions SHOULD you do?

things that produce more good than harm / that achieve your aims / etc.

What sort of things SHOULD teachers teach?

things that produce more good than harm / that achieve their aims

Isn't it fair to say that "helping students to learn" is a common sense definition of the aim of a teacher?

That's how LSAT would justify that leap.

Hi, I understand/agree with the above explanation as to why (A) is not the right answer. But could you help me negate the answer choice? Whenever I come down to two answer choices after POE, I try negation test. But with sentences like (A) where there is "even if," I find it difficult to negate it.

Thank you in advance!

[ohthatpatrick]

Negating something just means to contradict it in the minimal way possible.

You're just finding the pressure point that determines whether a sentence has a true or false truth-value.

Picture two people betting on whether a given claim is true or false. One person wins if he can prove the claim as written. The other person wins if she can prove the negation.

If two people bet on (A), what would have to be true for each person to win that bet?

For the person trying to prove claim (A), they would need to show that in all cases, any two pieces of paper, even with different textures, will have the same effect in a given context as long as the two pieces of paper are exactly the same color.

Wow. Tall burden of proof. This is why we shy away from most extremely worded answer choices on Must be Assumed (Nec Assump) or Must be True (Inference) questions.

The person trying to prove that (A) is false doesn't have to do much -- she just has to prove that AT LEAST ONCE, two pieces of paper that were exactly the same color did NOT have the same effect in a given context.

Since (A) is worded so categorically as a universal, defeating that claim and proving that universal wrong only requires providing one puny counterexample.

If someone is going to defend the idea that "ALL cotton candy is delicious", we can defeat them by producing one example of cotton candy that wasn't delicious.

Let's say person 1 says:
"Frank will come to your housewarming party even if his kids are sick."

What would need to be true to make that sentence false?
- is it enough for Frank to not come to the party?
- or do we need to also know whether or not his kids were sick when he didn't come?

The 1st one is enough on its own to contradict person 1's claim.

"even if" = the thing I'm talking about is irrelevant

So when you see "even if", you shouldn't put much importance on it. The author is identifying something as a non-factor.

If Frank doesn't come to the housewarming party, we've contradicted the original claim, because the original claim was that Frank is definitely coming.

Hope this helps.