Q25 - Cecile's association requires public

[funner567]

Ok so i understand the argument but dont see why "B" doesnt constitute the correct sufficient assumption and C does. All we know is about ceciles association so why are we worried about if they are the only ones providing the reasons?

Thanks.

[geverett]

I'll try my best. This was definitely not the easiest question though.

Premise: Public disclosure of officer's investments in required in 2 cases only:

Here is the diagram for the 2 conditional logic statements:

Authorized to disburse assoc. funds
+ <--------> Disclosure
Sits on board of petrochem. company

*I believe and I would love to hear if I am thinking about this wrong, but the use of "requires" to modify public disclosure and the use of "only" to modify the other 2 statements makes both of these both sufficient and necessary for each other to occur. Hence the double arrow, but once again if I were a betting man I would not put the title to the car up on this.

Conclusion: ~Auth. to disburse funds
+ ----------> ~Disclosure
sits on board of 1 company: timber co.


Prephrase: Okay, is the timber business a part of a petro chemical company? If not then he definitely does not meet the 2nd requirement. My other thought was the premise only tells us the requirements of the association, but could there be other requirements for public disclosure? Perhaps Cecile's wife is going to require him to disclose his investments or perhaps he is planning on running for elected office and the election commission is going to require him to make his investments public. I go to the answer choices with this in mind.

Answer choices:

B) We don't know at all if the board is requiring public disclosure on the basis of a potential "conflict of interest." Our real world experience tells us that that is often the case in situations like this, but the stimulus makes no mention of the fact that sitting on a Petrochem. board would require you to disclose investments b/c of a conflict of interest. Be careful in making unwarranted assumptions, and just go with what they tell you in the stimulus.

C) This is what we want. If the associations requirements are the only requirements for public disclosure, and there are no other outside entities that would impose additional requirements then it is safe to say that Cecile has no obligation for public disclosure.

Let me know if you need any additional help on this one, and I would be interested to hear from some other voices on the diagramming of the conditional logic in the premise and conclusion. It seems to me if the arrow did not go both ways in the premise then you could possibly have a mistaken reversal on your hands in the conclusion. thoughts?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT2]

That's a interesting point you make about the biconditional. I'm not 100% sure I understand your notation, so let me spell it out here to see if our thinking is aligned:

If the association requires public disclosure --> officer is either authorized to distribute funds or sits on a board.

If officer is either authorized to distribute funds or sits on a board --> public disclosure.

Nice work digging that out!

I will say that the biconditional, and the either/or for that matter, seem a bit like red-herrings in this case. The key to this question is understanding that there could be other reasons that influence Cecile's actions besides the requirements of the association. I know the previous post said as much, but here's an analogy to illustrate:

Ted's law school of choice requires that one take a class in writing in only two situations: if the person is from a foreign country, or if the person writes a poor application essay. Ted is not from a foreign country, and he wrote a great application essay. Therefore, there is NO REASON for Ted to take a writing course.

This argument is assuming that the law school requirements are the only reasons in the world for doing something. Maybe Ted wants to take a writing class to become a better writer, or to meet the pretty girl he's always wanted to meet, or just for fun. Again, the previous explanation was great and I probably didn't need to type this -- just thought I'd add to the conversation.

[geverett]

Mike,
That is really good. Thanks for the analogy. Writing out analogies for these arguments definitely helps you get passed the rhetoric of the stimulus to be sure you are really uncovering and internalizing the underlying logic. So thanks for that. As far as your diagramming of the biconditional it definitely seems like it goes both ways and also that each condition listed is sufficient in and of itself to merit Cecile disclosing his investments. I had it listed as having to have both of them occur to trigger the disclosure of his investments, but alas your diagram is more accurate with the use of "or". Which makes this an interesting problem because it says "and" in the stimulus but I definitely see how you don't need both of them. Can you shed some more light on other situations and how to watch out for other times where that might be the case?

[ManhattanPrepLSAT2]

Yeah, this is a tough one --

I think the key in this situation is to recognize that the key reasoning relationship came in the phrase right before the "and" phrase -- "requires... in two cases only" -- the "and" is just a part of the list of possible reasons.

Different strokes for different folks, but for me, conditional "triggers" break down at a certain point -- the people who write the LSAT are damn good. A conceptual understanding can give you confidence that no matter how it's worded, you can understand the meaning correctly. When I read that first sentence, I look for what has to be certain, and I say to myself "Oh, so, if the disclosure has been required by the association, it's got to be because of X or Y." I may use some knowledge of how these word triggers work to help with the conceptualization, but the conceptualization drives my understanding. When I've tried to apply a more technical approach -- say, in this case, thinking about how the "requires" relates to "only" relates to "and" -- I tend to make more errors than I would otherwise. Some other people -- even our instructors -- may disagree, but I've heard of a lot of trigger tricks, and none of them are, to me, as useful as the innate sense I've developed of what must be true.

[funner567]

thank you !!

[jennifer]

is A, incorrect because it restates the premise? But I am not sure if it actually restates the premise, because answer choice A references the future.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT2]

(A) is also a tempting answer! And one of the few rare ones that are incorrect, in large part, because of tense.

I think you are on to something when you state that (A) references the future. Note that the conclusion makes a specific point of stating "at this time," and we are told in the premises that Cecile is (i.e. "at this time") not authorized to disburse funds.

If the conclusion had been about the future, then (A) would definitely be much more attractive. However, even if the conclusion had been about the future, in order to ensure that the argument follows logically, we would also need to know that she would never, in the future, sit on the board of a petrochemical company.

Hope that helps, and please follow up if you have further questions.

[jimmy902o]

I guess i read this question wrong, but i thought that when the stimulus said she Cecile "sits on the board of just one company, a small timber business" I did not feel like this was sufficient to conclude that she did not sit on the board of a petrochemical company, i.e. the timber company could have been a part of a petrochemical company. I feel like that makes sense chemicals are needed in breaking down and removing trees. this is why i chose D because i thought it clarified that she did not sit on a petrochemical board. Everything else makes sense (including the correct answer choice) if i assume that the timber company does not equal a petrochemical company, but i have a thought time getting there. very frustrating!! could someone please help me understand this better? thanks



also for future reference for me, should i just take the conclusion as it is "there is no reason to disclose" as precluding my issue above? that it is mean to mean those two conditions have to be met (not authorized to disburse and not petrochemical)?

[daniel]

I guess i read this question wrong, but i thought that when the stimulus said she Cecile "sits on the board of just one company, a small timber business" I did not feel like this was sufficient to conclude that she did not sit on the board of a petrochemical company, i.e. the timber company could have been a part of a petrochemical company. I feel like that makes sense chemicals are needed in breaking down and removing trees. this is why i chose D because i thought it clarified that she did not sit on a petrochemical board. Everything else makes sense (including the correct answer choice) if i assume that the timber company does not equal a petrochemical company, but i have a thought time getting there. very frustrating!! could someone please help me understand this better? thanks

D is attractive, I think, because it tries to play on the strategy for sufficient assumption questions where you try to fill the gap between two mismatched terms. But, take a closer look at answer choice D: It actually says the opposite of what you'd want to look for if you were trying to fill a gap between "timber business" and "petrochemical company," because the answer choice states that the timber company is owned by a petrochemical company. If we were trying to fill this gap in the argument, I think you would be looking for something that says "the timber company is NOT owned by a petrochemical company." Tricky.

As stated, answer choice D either weakens the argument or is completely irrelevant, depending on whether the ownership interest of a petrochemical company means that its subidiaries are themselves petrochemical, even if they are in different (non-petrochemical) sectors.

[ohthatpatrick]

Great response. I was also thinking, the first time I did this problem, that the gap we were looking to seal was "the small timber business whose board she sits on is NOT a petrochemical company". (D) does the opposite of this.

The real shift ends up being between "Cecile's association does not require her to disclose" and "there is NO reason for Cecile to have to disclose".

LSAT may have even thrown in the modifier "small" timber business to make it fair game that this one company, a small timber business, cannot simultaneously be a petrochemical company.

There are a couple other Sufficient Assumption questions that have had the same feel as this:
i. the internal logic of the premises is airtight
but
ii. the conclusion is of a broader scope than the premise, so the sufficient assumption we need is something that restricts our scope to what was discussed in the premise.

[olumide_francis]

Even though I found the gap, i still have a question I want to confirm.
In the stimulus, are "disburse fund + board of a company" sufficient condition? I was confused by the phrase " in two cases only: when...". Should we consider it "only when"(only if) condition?

[uhdang]

Hi, multiple confusions experiencing from this question, so help me out.

How is C) a sufficient assumption? This sounds more like strengthening / necessary assumption to me. Reasons go following:

1) A major gap I can spot in this argument is between 'sitting on a board of a petrochemical company' and 'sitting on the board of a small timber business.' Before getting into the answer choices, like patrick, I was expecting a statement that would confirm no relation between these two boards. Aside from this gap, I don't see a gap big enough for a sufficient assumption to fill in. If I am missing any, please point it out to me.

2) I thought C) is a 'strengthening' answer. Argument can be strengthened by eliminating a possible weakness and C) is doing exactly that. I know that sufficient assumption ultimately strengthens the argument by filling the link, but as I said in 1), I couldn't spot the link.

3) After finding out C) is the answer, I tried analyzing it, and I can settle for being a 'necessary assumption' because it seems to be acting as a 'defender' type of a necessary assumption. (Eliminating a potentially vulnerable route of the argument) Besides, negating it DOES destroy the argument: The association's requirements are NOT the only reasons there might be for Cecile to disclose her investments -- there might be other reasons that she should disclose her investment. Sufficient assumption is not supposed to destroy the argument when negated, isn't it?

[ohthatpatrick]

Yeah, like so many of these previous posts are saying, this is a weird one.

When you’re reading/evaluating arguments in the Assumption Family, you’re chiefly looking for
- Missing Logical Links (added connective tissue)
and
- Potential Objections (ways to accept the Prem but argue the opposite of the Conc)

As you get to know LR a little better, you’ll discover that certain question types skew more towards one than the other.

Principle Strengthen: 100% MLL
Suff Assump: 98% MLL, 2% PO
Nec Assump: 50% MLL, 50% PO
Flaw: 20% MLL, 80% PO
Str/Weak: 15% MLL, 85% PO

I obviously pulled these percentages out of my butt, but they reflect my approximate sense, having done 1000’s of problems. This Suff Assump question is weird because it’s NOT testing a missing link, per se. This argument is logically valid, with only one potential objection: are the requirements from Cecile’s associations the only rules we need to consider?

If they are, she’s good to go!

- Is she an officer authorized to disburse? No. Check!
- Does she sit on the board of a petrochemical company? No, just a timber business. Check!
(Note: we were, in desperate search for a missing link, thinking ‘maybe LSAT wants me to say that petrochemical is not the same as timber?’ … but in reality, you don’t have to make that link … they are different words with different meanings … for example, LSAT doesn’t have establish that “3 is different from 4”)

If you want to view the stimulus as having a missing link, it would look like this:

Here’s a logically valid version of what the argument SHOULD have concluded:
C’s association says disclosure is only required in cases X and Y.
C is not a case of X or Y.
Therefore, C’s association says disclosure is not required.

Here’s the non-airtight, stimulus version of the argument:
C’s association says disclosure is only required in cases X and Y.
C is not a case of X or Y.
Therefore, The Universe says disclosure is not required.

So the missing link is “whatever C’s association would say is what The Universe would say”.

You’re correct that Sufficient Assumption can’t be judged by the Negation Test.
Suff Assump = if true, it proves
Nec Assump = if false, it ruins

BUT, that doesn’t mean that a Sufficient Assumption answer choice is WRONG if it DOES pass the negation test. Again, we just shouldn’t be judging Suff Assumption by the negation test.

Hope this helps.

[uhdang]

Thanks for the reply, Patrick. Big help as usual.

Just knowing that there is in fact a sufficient assumption that attacks "potential objection" is a big help. Thank you.

So, I'd imagine for Sufficient assumption questions,

1) if there are answer choices with MLL type and PO type simultaneously, we would go for MLL type? I never faced this type of questions, but this is what I would naturally assume, for Sufficient Assumption in general is related to MLL type.

2) if there is an answer choice of PO and no MLL, we'd go for PO (just as in this question)?

Having thought this far, another question comes to me regarding Necessary Assumption in this case. Is there a Necessary Assumption with both PO and MLL type? if so, do we go for PO type?

Your 1000+ question experience would be a big help for my question.

[ohthatpatrick]

A valid answer is a valid answer.

LSAT would never provide us with two possible correct answers and make us decide which is more correct.

So you don't have to worry about any of those head-to-head scenarios.

The proof is in the pudding ...

a Nec Assump answer is right when
if negated, it ruins an argument

a Suff Assump answer is right when
if true, it proves the conclusion

[erikwoodward10]

This question would have been a nightmare if I wouldn't have reviewed a similar SA question a few weeks ago, PT 42 S4 Q19 (https://www.manhattanprep.com/lsat/foru ... -t864.html).

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong (I'll also admit that I only skimmed the posts above!), but in a SA question with sound logic, if an amplified conclusion is presented, the assumption is that the amplified conclusion is always the case. With this in mind, C is the obvious answer choice.

[dhlim3]

Premise 1: Required to Disclose --> (Authorized to disburse funds) or (Sits on the board of Petro comp)

Premise 2: (Not Authorized to disburse funds) + (Does not sit on the board of petro comp)

Conclusion: No reason to disclose



Premise 2 is just one end of the contrapositive of Premise 1. So Premise 2 is essentially saying that Cecil is NOT required to disclose. But from this, the conclusion makes a jump that therefore, Cecil has no reason to disclose.

So the gap is in:

Not required to disclose --> [GAP] --> No reason to disclose.

The GAP must be a sufficient assumption that if you are not required to disclose then there is no reason to disclose, or contrapositively, the only reason to disclose is if you are required to disclose. This matches perfectly with answer choice C.

[AshelyL359]

Well the thing i don't understand is that, like u have mentioned, the premise has already point out that "Public disclosure of officer's investments in required in 2 cases only" so the premise has pointed out "only"!! it doesn't make sense that choice C strengthens "only" again. There is no need.
could anybody help me out? THX!!

I'll try my best. This was definitely not the easiest question though.

Premise: Public disclosure of officer's investments in required in 2 cases only:

Here is the diagram for the 2 conditional logic statements:

Authorized to disburse assoc. funds
+ <--------> Disclosure
Sits on board of petrochem. company

*I believe and I would love to hear if I am thinking about this wrong, but the use of "requires" to modify public disclosure and the use of "only" to modify the other 2 statements makes both of these both sufficient and necessary for each other to occur. Hence the double arrow, but once again if I were a betting man I would not put the title to the car up on this.

Conclusion: ~Auth. to disburse funds
+ ----------> ~Disclosure
sits on board of 1 company: timber co.


Prephrase: Okay, is the timber business a part of a petro chemical company? If not then he definitely does not meet the 2nd requirement. My other thought was the premise only tells us the requirements of the association, but could there be other requirements for public disclosure? Perhaps Cecile's wife is going to require him to disclose his investments or perhaps he is planning on running for elected office and the election commission is going to require him to make his investments public. I go to the answer choices with this in mind.

Answer choices:

B) We don't know at all if the board is requiring public disclosure on the basis of a potential "conflict of interest." Our real world experience tells us that that is often the case in situations like this, but the stimulus makes no mention of the fact that sitting on a Petrochem. board would require you to disclose investments b/c of a conflict of interest. Be careful in making unwarranted assumptions, and just go with what they tell you in the stimulus.

C) This is what we want. If the associations requirements are the only requirements for public disclosure, and there are no other outside entities that would impose additional requirements then it is safe to say that Cecile has no obligation for public disclosure.

Let me know if you need any additional help on this one, and I would be interested to hear from some other voices on the diagramming of the conditional logic in the premise and conclusion. It seems to me if the arrow did not go both ways in the premise then you could possibly have a mistaken reversal on your hands in the conclusion. thoughts?