Q23 - Ethicist: Only when we know

[mgold68]

Can someone please explain this one to me? I got the right answer by guessing (C) after i narrowed the answer choices down to (C) and (E) because I knew that the assumption had to mention an action being freely performed, but i was definitely unsure of my choice, and don't understand exactly how/why (C) is correct and (E) is not.

Thanks!

[s.lee4408]

Hey guys, I was stuck between answer choices C and D due to my uncertainty on how to diagram the conclusion in this argument. Normally these questions are not very difficult for me, but I somehow I got stuck this one. Here's how I tried diagramming it but I'm pretty sure the conclusion is wrong. Would anyone like to help?

1) JPB->KELA

C: (KELA->~RAFP)->~TC


Thanks!

[tommywallach]

Hey Michelle,

Great question here! Let's start by looking at the core:

Conclusion: If we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we would not necessarily cease to see that action as freely performed.

Premise: When we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we are justified in praising or blaming re: that action.

Notice the major assumption here. There is some attempt to link praise/blame to freedom of action. We need an answer choice that connects them in the right direction.

(A) This is actually the most dangerous trap answer, but it gets things backwards. It's not saying we can't praise or blame people for stuff beyond their control. It's saying that if stuff is beyond their control, they can't be praised or blamed.

(B) Responsibility isn't the issue here at all.

(C) Here's the assumption we were looking for. If knowing a lot leads to praise/blame, and if you can only praise/blame something that is free, then Tolstoy is wrong (knowing a lot would not lead to no freedom).

(D) Again, responsibility isn't actually the issue here.

(E) This only mentions freedom. It leaves out praise/blame entirely.

Hope that helps!

-t

[lukesand88]

Here's my two cents:

if you prefer to use the diagraming method, it would be something like this:

P: praising/blaming --> know a lot

C: we must reject: Know a lot --> action not freely performed.

Linking up the two conditionals gives you:
Praising/blaming --> know a lot --> action not freely performed
Praising/blaming --> action not freely performed.
this is what the conclusion rejects. to do this, you need to contradict this statement.

C gives exactly that: praising/blaming --> action freely performed.

Hope this helps.

[shirando21]

Hey Michelle,

Great question here! Let's start by looking at the core:

Conclusion: If we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we would not necessarily cease to see that action as freely performed.

Premise: When we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we are justified in praising or blaming re: that action.

Notice the major assumption here. There is some attempt to link praise/blame to freedom of action. We need an answer choice that connects them in the right direction.

(A) This is actually the most dangerous trap answer, but it gets things backwards. It's not saying we can't praise or blame people for stuff beyond their control. It's saying that if stuff is beyond their control, they can't be praised or blamed.

(B) Responsibility isn't the issue here at all.

(C) Here's the assumption we were looking for. If knowing a lot leads to praise/blame, and if you can only praise/blame something that is free, then Tolstoy is wrong (knowing a lot would not lead to no freedom).

(D) Again, responsibility isn't actually the issue here.

(E) This only mentions freedom. It leaves out praise/blame entirely.

Hope that helps!

-t

Hi, Tommy, this is a tough question for me.

could you give more details in how to break down the complicated sentence in the conclusion into our logic language?

How do we actually translate " if we knew a lot about........, we would cease to regard that action as freely performed" into our logic language?

Thanks.

[samantha.b233]

I guess the formal logic is quite different from what we usually see, which makes it hard for us to understand the rationale behind choosing C even when we know it is the correct answer.

So the question stem goes like this:

Premise: JPB -> KL
(if we are justified in praising or blaming, we know a lot about the events)

Conclusion: ~(KL -> ~FP)
(it is not true that knowing a lot about the events, then the action is not freely performed)

We need to be able to see that the conclusion is saying, KL and FP are not mutually exclusive. If KL -> ~FP is true, then whenever we have KL, we cannot have FP; whenever we have FP, we cannot have KL. To justify the conclusion, we must find the assumption that tells us how we can conclude from JPB -> KL that KL and FP can co-exist.

A is tempting because it tries to jump from the negation of "freely performed" to "caused by conditions beyond their control." It creates yet another gap in the logic and hence is not the best answer.

B is about whether one is responsible for his/her action. Out of scope.

C says, if we are justified in praising or blaming, then the action is freely performed, "JPB -> FP." With this assumption, we have JPB -> KL and JPB -> FP, which proves that there can be KL and FP co-exist.

D comparison trap + out of scope

E was what I chose, which actually says "~KL -> FP." As we can see, this is quite the opposite of what we are looking for.

Hope that helps!

[ptewarie]

The answers provided work well, so good job all.
However, the LSAT is not as complex as one makes it. All this diagramming and double negation can help, but is not necessary to do well.

This is a regular sufficient assumption question, meaning the following:
1. The answer choice must be strong( usually a "only" "must" "always)
2. The answer choice MUST force the conclusion to be true by connecting missing pieces between evidence and conclusion.

All we need to do is find the conclusion, which states we must
REJECT Tolstoy's claim. Since Tolstoy's claim is a formal logic claim, and we need to reject it, we just need to show that sufficient can occur without the necessary.


So Tolstoy's claim is :
If we know a lot about events-> Cease to regard action as freely performed

Rejection

If we know a lot about events-> NOT cease to regard action as freely performed.


Understanding how to "reject" formal logic statements is a key skill that will help with the LSAT. As a matter of fact, many assumption question with a formal logic conclusion will require this skill. Important to note is that you dont negate the sufficient and the necessary, rather you negate necessary and leave sufficient as is.

So if statement: A--> B
the logical opposition of that is : A-->~ B

Many people say ~A->~ B or ~A->B THAT IS WRONG!

You use this skill in the "denial " test of necessary questions.


Anyhow
so we need to "force"

evidence:

justified in praising or blaming--> know about events leading up to it

Conclusion:
know about events leading to it -> NOT cease to regard action as freely performed.( same as we will continue to or we will regard as freely performed)


Basically this translates to:

Evidence:
A-->B ( justified only if know alot)

Conclusion:
B--> ~ C ( know alot--> ~ cease)


The cool thing about this is that the link is already made
A-->B and B--> ~C

another way link can be made is
by noting A-->~C
because if A-->~C and A-->B then some B's must be ~C's and vice versa, which would also invalidate the ethicist's claim that
b-->C ( B is always C)


lets look at answer choices, and yes C is a match.


A, B, D don't even deal with the formal logic at hand and E is flawed for it simply takes Tolstoy's argument and negates both sufficient and necessary. This does absolutely NOTHING to prove the argument.
Rejection, as earlier mentioned, means saying necessary did not occur but sufficient did. This is not the same as saying neither sufficient nor necc occured.

Weird question, but the eliminating the answer choices should have been a breeze.

[charles.dj.kim]

This looks exactly like the reasoning on question #25 of this section. But #25 says it is flawed reasoning. Can someone explain this please?

Thank you!

[maxinmin1991]

This looks exactly like the reasoning on question #25 of this section. But #25 says it is flawed reasoning. Can someone explain this please?

Thank you!

I think Q23 is a flawed reasoning.
In addition to (C), we need to assume that "We must be justified in praising or blaming a person for an action".

[yolandadadad]

I think some of the previous explanations confuse 'when' and 'only when' : when A then B = A->B , while only when A can B = B->A,

[donghai819]

I thought the language seems a bit complicated and it took me some time to understand what the author says. The conclusion is a rejection of a conditional statement:

"We must therefore reject Tolstoy's rash claim that if we knew a lot about the events leading up to any action, we would cease to regard that action as freely performed."

How to translate this? Well, when we try to negate a conditional statement, we ALWAYS negate the necessary part. So here we'd have: if we knew a lot about the events leading up to any action, we would cease to regard that action as freely performed.

[SahyunM196]

I understand the logic for this sufficient assumption question goes:

Premise:
Justified in praising or blaming a person for their action --> we know a lot about the events that led to an action

A --> B

Therefore

Conclusion:
We must reject Tolstoy's claim that,
If we know a lot about the events that led to any action --> We would cease to regard that action as freely performed.

We must reject B --> C (which translates to B --> ~C)

I am having difficulties understanding why the right answer is (c) A --> ~C
In my understanding, having the two premises A --> B and A --> ~C do not sufficiently lead to the conclusion B --> ~C
It's like saying Apple --> Fruit and Apple --> Not Blue; therefore Fruit --> Not Blue. But blueberries are blueberries for a reason...

[JoeH98]

I understand the logic for this sufficient assumption question goes:

Premise:
Justified in praising or blaming a person for their action --> we know a lot about the events that led to an action

A --> B

Therefore

Conclusion:
We must reject Tolstoy's claim that,
If we know a lot about the events that led to any action --> We would cease to regard that action as freely performed.

We must reject B --> C (which translates to B --> ~C)

I am having difficulties understanding why the right answer is (c) A --> ~C
In my understanding, having the two premises A --> B and A --> ~C do not sufficiently lead to the conclusion B --> ~C
It's like saying Apple --> Fruit and Apple --> Not Blue; therefore Fruit --> Not Blue. But blueberries are blueberries for a reason...

Hi, usually it's not very helpful to translate ~ (B -> C) to B -> ~C.
More correct way of doing it is negating the relationship between B and C. Now, how to we negate a statement like, if B, then C ?
Think about the nature of conditionality. It is saying, if B happens, C must happen no matter what. Negating this would be, if B happens, and C can still not happen.

If you want to diagram this: ~(B->C) = B some ~C

To apply this logic to this particular questions:

K: know a lot
J: Justified
F: Freely performed

Premise: J -> K
Conclusion: We must reject (K-> ~F)
Rejecting (K->~F) gives us K some F

In other words,

Premise: J-> K
Conclusion: K some F

We can make this valid in a lot of different ways, for example, we can say F some J, which will lead to K some F or we can also say J->F, which will lead to K some F (A->B and A->C means B some C).

The correct answer (C) follows the latter approach by giving us J->F

Hope this helps.

[JoeH98]

Hey Michelle,

Great question here! Let's start by looking at the core:

Conclusion: If we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we would not necessarily cease to see that action as freely performed.

Premise: When we know a lot about the events leading up to an action, we are justified in praising or blaming re: that action.

Notice the major assumption here. There is some attempt to link praise/blame to freedom of action. We need an answer choice that connects them in the right direction.

(A) This is actually the most dangerous trap answer, but it gets things backwards. It's not saying we can't praise or blame people for stuff beyond their control. It's saying that if stuff is beyond their control, they can't be praised or blamed.

(B) Responsibility isn't the issue here at all.

(C) Here's the assumption we were looking for. If knowing a lot leads to praise/blame, and if you can only praise/blame something that is free, then Tolstoy is wrong (knowing a lot would not lead to no freedom).

(D) Again, responsibility isn't actually the issue here.

(E) This only mentions freedom. It leaves out praise/blame entirely.

Hope that helps!

-t

I think you got the conditionality in premise in a reversed order.

[VickX462]

What I do when I see two negative-sounding verbs such as the ones (reject...cease to...) in the conclusion is––I take them out.

Here's the conclusion: If we knew a lot about the events leading up to any action (K), we would regard that action as freely performed (FP).
Premise: We are justified in praising or blaming a person (J) for that action only when we know a lot about the events that led to an action (K).

Premise: J-->K
Conclusion: K-->FP

We need to connect J and FP, and only answer choice C (J––>FP) fits. Answer choice E (~K ––>FP) appears ostensibly incorrect now that we are clear about what the conclusion is saying.

[DanielG926]

Figured I would post my private notes here, in case the reasoning is flawed or anyone else might benefit from them:

Dang, this is a question. ..

ok.

Justified in praising/blaming action - > we know alot about events that lead to it
We DONT know alot about events -> We are not justified in praise/blame.

________________________________

Conclusion: we must reject idea that "IF Know Alot -> DON'T regard as performed freely" (contrapositive being "if we regard an action as performed freely -> we don't know alot about events leading up to it")

So now we're looking for a link between Knowledge, Freedom, and Praise.

A) mentions conditions beyond a person's control and praise/blame, but nothing regarding our knowledge of it (it's easy to assume that an observer has knowledge based on the wording, but it doesn't mention it).

B) I answered this (I distinctly remember my brain melting by this point) . It mentions genuine responsibility (which potentially links to freedom, but I think it's tenuous), and that that is NOT determined by how much the judging party knows about events leading up. This was tempting I guess, but it says there's no relation between knowledge and praise/blame, and we're trying to prove there IS some relation, just contradictory to Tolstoy's.
D) Talks about degrees, which I took to mean it was wrong because the stimulus doesn't mention it.
E) IDK why I said this was wrong, I think it confused me into just taking an educated guess, but reading it again, it seems to me that it just affirms the conclusion? It's mostly out of scope.

C) is the only answer that links Praise/Blame and Freedom, which are each linked to knowledge.

This was hard and I am not sure my reasoning is right, like I said I got it wrong during my PT, but I figured I would post anyway....

[LSATN100]

The key is that:
NOT [A ->B] cannot be rewritten as [A -> Not B]
NOT [A ->B] should be rewritten as [A ---some--- not B]

[JinZ551]

Here's my two cents:

if you prefer to use the diagraming method, it would be something like this:

P: praising/blaming --> know a lot

C: we must reject: Know a lot --> action not freely performed.

Linking up the two conditionals gives you:
Praising/blaming --> know a lot --> action not freely performed
Praising/blaming --> action not freely performed.
this is what the conclusion rejects. to do this, you need to contradict this statement.

C gives exactly that: praising/blaming --> action freely performed.

Hope this helps.

love your answer, thanks

[Laura Damone]

Nice work here, ya'll!

[StratosM31]

I found (A) extremely tempting, and (after skimming the posts here) think it has not been sufficiently explained why (A) is wrong. Therefore, I'll try:

Let's start from the stimulus:

P1: justified in praising or blaming --> know a lot about the events, let's call them X --> Y
P2: sometimes we're justified in praising or blaming, thereforoe sometimes X (consequently, as X leads to Y, sometimes also Y)
C: reject that knowing a lot about the events of an action always leads to ceasing to regard that action as freely performed, let's call it Y --> not Z. That means, reject that Y --> not Z, that means sometimes Y and Z coexist (= sometimes we regard an action as freely performed although we know a lot about the events that led to it.

Let's write it all down again:

P1: X --> Y
P2: sometimes X, therefore sometimes Y
C: sometimes Y and Z

Answer anticipation:

We're looking for a sufficient assumption. One coming to my mind is X --> Z. If so, and since sometimes X, therefore sometimes Z, it proves that sometimes Y and Z coexist (exactly our conclusion). Means that sometimes we regard an action as freely performed although we know a lot about the events that led to it.

Let's go to (A):

If we assume "beyond their control" = "not freely performed" and "people should not be regarded as subject to praise or blame" = "we are justified to praise or blame people", it means: justified to praise or blame (X) --> actions were freely performed (Z').

Now, why did I write Z' instead of Z? Because it is not the same! Z' means that the actions were indeed freely performed, while Z means we REGARD the actions as freely performed. (A) is talking about Z', the stimulus is talking about Z.

Z' and Z are two completely different conditions! Even if a specific state is true, it is not guaranteed that we REGARD this state as being true. And even if we regard a state as being true, it is not guaranteed that this state IS INDEED true! We regard the earth as being a sphere, although it is an ellipsoid. At school, we regard some thermodynamic conditions as perfectly reversible, although in the real word there are no perfectly reversible conditions.

LSAC made a very well-hidden term shift here, by omitting a subtle, yet extremely important word in the last part of the sentence in (A): REGARD. That's why, in such questions, it is extremely important to catch every single word, and immediately re-read the stimulus if trapped between two answer choices.