Q21

[bramon.elizabeth]

Quick question: When the passages uses "may" in its hypothesis, should we assume that Q21 is interpreting this as "will"? Otherwise the hypothesis as written gives lots of wiggle room, ie, it doesn't say for certain that the high photosynthetic plants will lose the advantage to lower ones. That would allow (C) to still be consistent with the hypothesis.

[ohthatpatrick]

Good question.

I definitely don't want to say that LSAT would ever treat "may" and "will" equivalently. However, in the fuzzier context of this question task, I think they do want us to treat them about the same way.

Even though 'may' (as you implied) really only indicates a possibility (not even necessarily a probable outcome), in this context, I think of 'may' as the word that begins the actual 'hypothesis' they're referring to.

Quick example to differentiate:
I may come to your party.
(i.e. it's possible ... the probability of my coming is greater than 0)

Here 'may' is definitely being used only as a strength of language modifier.

Sara's absence may be due to the flu.

Here, 'may' is being used not only as a strength of language term, but it also indicates the start of a hypothesis.

The person saying that sentence hypothesizes that the having the flu has caused Sara to be absent.

The person is clearly not sure of that hypothesis (as 'may' indicates) ... but I don't think we would say the hypothesis is "Sara may have the flu" ... rather, we'd just say the hypothesis (which by nature is a speculative guess) is just "Sara has the flu".

All of this is some crazy nuanced language stuff, but hopefully you're catching my drift. I think we're allowed to shift from 'may' to 'will' because the HYPOTHESIS can be phrased in terms of a specific prediction, even though the strength of belief in the hypothesis is less than certainty.

And, if none of that persuaded you, the question stem doesn't demand an answer that is INCONSISTENT with the passage (i.e. contradictory), only something that is LESS CONSISTENT with the hypothesis than is any other answer choice.

Let me know if you have follow-up questions.

[agersh144]

I got this question right, but I'm still not quite sure I understand it. Could someone help me out with this one...

[ohthatpatrick]

Sure thing.

The hypothesis in 22-25 is essentially this:

If you have high photosynthetic efficiency (PE), such as corn and sugar, then you win, you out-compete other plants, when the atmosphere has low CO2.

If the atmosphere has high CO2, those plants lose their edge. Low PE plants start to compete well.

Simplifying it even more into "friendly caveman language"
for High PE --
high CO2 = bad
low CO2 = good

for low PE --
high CO2 = good
low CO2 = bad

So if we want something LEAST compatible, we just need to go against one of those ideas.

(A) High PE did better when CO2 was lower. This fits.
(B) Low PE is doing better in high CO2. This fits.
(C) High PE beats Low PE in a high CO2 environment. Doesn't fit the story. This is our correct answer. High CO2 is supposed to be GOOD for low PE and BAD for high PE.
(D) Equal PE ... not gonna be able to go against the passage because the hypothesis doesn't deal with equals
(E) This deals with high CO2, but we know nothing about the PE, so we can't judge it according to the hypothesis.

Hope this helps.