Q24 - Anthropologists assert that cultures

[alex.cheng.2012]

Hey I was wondering if someone could help me make sure I did this question right.

So I got the correct Answer (A) because it's basically restating the last part of the first sentence, that outside imposition needs to be replaced by inside initiatives.

I wanted to make sure I eliminated the other questions correctly though.

(B): This one was tricky. Some schools require more independence not depending on the initiatives they got, but depending on how much outsider imposition there is.
(C): School system officials would be considered an outsider, so this can be eliminated.
(D): Argument said that outsiders can still provide valuable advice. So it's not that outsiders must be prevented from all help. Further, the necessary condition as stated in the first sentence is about replacing outside imposition with insider initiatives
(E): The first statement seemed pretty absolute. Culture can advance ONLY when outside imposition replaced with insider initiatives. So a school could become a little more independent, but not replace all of the outsider imposition, and it would still not make any progress

Any feedback appreciated, thanks.

[ohthatpatrick]

I think you've got pretty great explanations here.

My only potential tweak would be (B) ... it might be simpler to eliminate just on the basis of "more/less" independence, similar to how you thought about (E). The idea of a comparative spectrum of independence is out of scope. LSAT loves to switch from absolute language to relative/comparative language (or vice versa).

Nice work!

[zen]

I had trouble with this question and the discussion here is pretty sparse so I'll contribute what I can.

The first statement immediately presents a conditional in the form of:

1. Cultures advance ---> Independence replaces dependence;

and similarly,

2. Cultures advance ---> imposition by outsiders is replaced by initiative from within.

Notice the necessary condition for cultural advancement(what must be true in order for cultural advancement to even take place) is independence/lack of outside imposition.

It goes on to say 3. If a culture moves forward(advances) ---> natives do it.

So if cultural advancement is to occur, it must be natives, not non-natives, ushering in this advancement.

After this, it talks about how non-natives can be valuable for their advice so they are not completely worthless but are neither sufficient nor necessary for cultural advancement and any imposition by them would threaten independence and thereby threaten cultural advance( notice how both "imposition" and "threatening of independence" would serve to deny the necessary condition of our first two conditionals, thereby denying the sufficient condition, thereby failing the conditional(making it not work).

Then they substitute "cultures" for "schools", so we can replace "cultures advance" in our conditional with "schools advance".

Answer choices:

(B)- This question is not giving us a degree as to how much independence is needed. It IS needed and completely needed as it is necessary. For this fact, we can ELIMINATE.

(C)- Out of Scope. This question fails to talk about what the whole stimulus was getting at, namely, cultural/school advancement and independence. We can only make conclusion that result from concrete information we are given, and this question is much too broad. ELIMINATE.

(D)- This choice is too strong. Participation of outsiders/non-natives does not necessarily equate to imposition and the stimulus mentions how outsiders provide valuable advice! ELIMINATE.

(E)- I originally picked this answer. and is completely wrong for a very simple reason: it mistakes the necessary for the sufficient. It is the case that Independence ---> school/cultural advancement, it's the opposite: School/Cultural advancement ---> Independence.
In other words, independence alone does not make a school/culture advance! Rather, if a school/culture is to advance, it must have independence! It can't advance without it but just having it doesn't make it advance.

(A)- Correct answer. The ending of the stimulus states that we are trying to find a something that is the key to educational progress(school advance). What is integral to educational progress occurring; what must be in place for it to occur. Well we know School Advance ---> independence; in turn, we can conclude that A must be right because it presents the necessary condition for the sufficient condition the stimulus has provided us.

Hope this helps!

[jdieck]

Hi,

I'm having serious issues with the way this question is written.

The way I see it is that this stimulus introduces two necessary conditions

First N.C.

1) independence replaces dependence.

Had the author just left it at that I would have immediately chose (A) and moved on.

However, the author muddies up my understanding (even though, ironically, the author uses it to clarify) with the information after the hyphen: "only when imposition is replaced by initiative from within". I took it as a second necessary condition (kind of like if x--> y AND z in a logic game).

So in my mind I started to look at the stimulus like this:

In order to progress--->independence replaces dependence AND Imposition by outsiders is replaced by initiative from within.

The only way I can A working is if "Imposition by outsiders is replaced by initiative from within" is subsumed under "independence replaces dependence", but those seem like two different ideas to me. You can have independence, but if there is no initiative from within, independence means nothing. (is this me bringing outside assumptions??) Please clarify.

I chose B because I had eliminated A and figured B aligned more with the way I interpreted the question. I figured the schools with more initiative would get more independence. Is it the degree aspect of B that makes it wrong? I could see your reasoning being that the stimulus makes it (almost) cut and dry what leads to progress whereas the language of B introduces degrees of independence/initiative, which is never mentioned in the stimulus.

[tommywallach]

Hey JD,

Just wanted to let you know that experts (us) only respond to green/blue folks (people who've bought a class or a book), so you may hear back from other students, but you won't hear from instructors.

Thanks!

-t