#23 - Company president: Our consultants report that, in

[asuper]

Hi, I got this question wrong. After doing a blind review, I want to make sure my reasoning is correct. I had trouble deciding between A and D. Would A be incorrect because if the criteria is the same, then perhaps improvement in productivity would benefit more from a seminar on efficiency than time management? Perhaps it is not time management that makes them the most efficient? I am not sure...
Would D be correct because it doesnt necessarily weaken the argument? I mean, the conclusion refers to mid-level managers so its not necessarily the case the those managers are already efficient. The conclusion seems to assume that mid-level managers are in fact no efficient and thus improvement in productivity is warranted.
Any help would be great. Thank you.

[Adam Tyson]

Good question, asuper, and you have the same two contenders that I had. At first, I thought A was the winner - until I got to D, saw that it was irrelevant, and had to go back and think a little more about A.

D is the correct answer because it doesn't weaken the argument. The efficient ones don't need to improve - that's great, but what does it have to do with helping the ones who are not as productive and may not be as efficient? Answer D focuses on the wrong group of managers, and so it has no bearing on this proposal.

Answer A seems to be attacking the validity of the report and the value of its findings. If the two things being measured were measured using the same criteria, then of course the two will be correlated. You'll get the same answers for both - they are good at both, or they are bad at both, or they are mediocre at both. The correlation will no longer have any value in determining whether one thing causes or influences the other. That's my view of it on my second pass - it's a form of data attack, one of the five classic ways to attack a causal argument.

I hope that helps!

[Albertlyu]

Answer A seems to be attacking the validity of the report and the value of its findings. If the two things being measured were measured using the same criteria, then of course the two will be correlated. You'll get the same answers for both - they are good at both, or they are bad at both, or they are mediocre at both. The correlation will no longer have any value in determining whether one thing causes or influences the other. That's my view of it on my second pass - it's a form of data attack, one of the five classic ways to attack a causal argument.

thank you, Adam, please may I ask if you can further elaborate on the reason why A is wrong? I understand D does not touch the core of the argument as you have illustrated above.

My understanding for A, one way to weaken the argument is to attack the data collection process, ie. the research used different criteria of assessments, therefore the data is off which means most efficient managers do not necessarily have good time management skills. So by saying they used the same criteria, the answer choice is strengthening the author's argument by saying, yes, the most efficient managers do know how to manage time.

thanks Adam for your help.

Albert

[Robert Carroll]

Albert,

Answer choice (A) weakens the argument because it shows that the correlation between efficiency and time management skills is essentially tautological.

Imagine the following argument: "People with excellent driving skills get into fewer accidents. Therefore, to prevent accidents, we should teach driving skills."

What if I told you that my definition of "excellent driving skills" is "I choose to say that someone has excellent driving skills if they get into fewer accidents than average, and not otherwise." In other words, my definition of "excellent driving skills" just is a measure of the number of accidents. Then "excellent driving skills" and "low accidents" are correlated because they're just two phrases for the same idea. By definition, they'd have to correlate.

Similarly, in answer choice (A), efficiency and time management are measured by the same criteria, so if someone is good on one of those points, they will, by definition, be good on the other. That means the correlation is true, but useless - it's true by definition, not true because two independent factors are lining up with each other because of a causal connection between them.

Robert Carroll

[Albertlyu]

Albert,

Answer choice (A) weakens the argument because it shows that the correlation between efficiency and time management skills is essentially tautological.

Imagine the following argument: "People with excellent driving skills get into fewer accidents. Therefore, to prevent accidents, we should teach driving skills."

What if I told you that my definition of "excellent driving skills" is "I choose to say that someone has excellent driving skills if they get into fewer accidents than average, and not otherwise." In other words, my definition of "excellent driving skills" just is a measure of the number of accidents. Then "excellent driving skills" and "low accidents" are correlated because they're just two phrases for the same idea. By definition, they'd have to correlate.

Similarly, in answer choice (A), efficiency and time management are measured by the same criteria, so if someone is good on one of those points, they will, by definition, be good on the other. That means the correlation is true, but useless - it's true by definition, not true because two independent factors are lining up with each other because of a causal connection between them.

Robert Carroll

Thank you so much, Robert! I finally got it!

Say I use "productivity per day" as the criterion, an ordinary manager can do 1 thing, an efficient manager can do 5. and "using the same criteria" means that it is because of the fact that he can do 5 things per day, I reached the conclusion that the said efficient manager has good time management skills. Yes, of course, this weakens the conclusion, they are the same thing and this disproves causation.

thank you again Robert for your help, really appreciated it.

Albert

[flowskiferda]

I'm having trouble seeing how D is any better than C. In order for D not to weaken, we have to assume that there are managers who aren't already efficient--because if every manager is already efficient, then the seminar won't improve productivity. Similarly, for C not to weaken, we have to assume that those managers who are still unproductive weren't even more unproductive before the seminar. How do I decide which one of these assumptions is less of a leap--that there were some inefficient managers, or that those still unproductive managers weren't even less productive beforehand?

Also, I have a question about answer choice A--It's confusing because it depends on whose definition of efficiency we are using. If we are using the consultants' definition of efficiency (which is the same thing as time management), then even with the info in A, the seminars still increase efficiency, at least by their definition. For A to weaken, we have to assume a definition of efficiency other than what the consultants offered. Once again, how should we know to do this?

[Beth Hayden]

Hi Flow,

C weakens because if the time management seminars didn't help most managers at other companies improve productivity, why would they work for the managers at this company? You're right that in that edge case it's possible that the seminar was marginally helpful. But a weaken answer choice doesn't have to completely annihilate the conclusion, it just has to make it less likely to be true. Answer choice C makes it less likely that the time management seminar is going to help productivity.

On answer choice A, I am going to refer you to Robert's earlier explanation because I think that's a perfect way to explain it!

I hope that helps, but please let us know if you have any follow-up questions!
Beth

[lsatquestions]

I had E as a contender. Can you please explain why E is incorrect?

[Adam Tyson]

E is a case of "the effect is present when the cause is absent," which is one of the 5 common ways to attack a casual argument. If the most efficient managers have never attended a time management seminar, what reason is there to believe that attending such a seminar will be any help at all? Something else must be more important than whatever that seminar would provide.

[CJ12345:]

Hi, Powerscore,
I am still confused by A. Is A attacking the premise which is not allowed in LSAT?
Also, for D, is there any definitely way to show that it has nothing to do with weakening the conclusion. My counter-conclusion is that to improve productivity, middle-level manager does not necessarily need training on time management tech. I kinda feel like D supports my counter-conclusion