#6 - The notion that one might be justified in behaving

[Morgan2cats]

Hi,

That's a good question; the argument basically breaks down as follows:

Premise: For an action to be justified, you must behave rationally:
Justified action rational behavior

Conclusion: Thus, irrational actions cannot be considered justified:
rational behavior justified action

The author's conclusion is the contrapositive of the premise.
Similarly, correct answer choice (B) breaks down as follows:

Premise: If water is spilled accidentally, it cannot be intentional:
spilled accidentally intentional spill

Conclusion: If you intend to spill a glass of water, it cannot be accidental:
intentional spill accidental spill

Again, note that the conclusion is the contrapositive of the premise.

I hope that's helpful! Please let me know whether this is clear--thanks!

~Steve

Hi PowerScore,

I am having difficulty translating the first sentence into conditional logic.

My thoughts:
"One might be justified in behaving irrationally" is wrong
= "some behaving irrationally can be justified" is wrong
= no one behaving irrationally can be justified
= "behaving irrationally - justified"

1. Can I translate "might be" into "some"?
2. Could you share your translation procedure?

Many thanks!

[Jeff Wren]

Hi Morgan,

While your approach looks like it got you to the right idea in the end, you may not need to go through all of those steps.

Sometimes it can be helpful to zoom out and think about what the sentence means more generally (in plain English) before we decide whether or not we want to diagram it.

The first sentence is basically saying that "justified" and "irrational behavior" do not go together.

For example, take the following sentence:

"The notion that dogs and cats are the same is incoherent."

What does this mean in plain English? It means that dogs and cats are not the same.

If we wanted to express this with conditional diagramming, it would be:

If dog, not cat.
D -> Not C

And the contrapositive would be:
If cat, not dog
C -> Not D

In the same way, from the first sentence in the stimulus, we can go directly to the diagrams of:

Justified -> Not Irrational
Irrational -> Not Justified

[Morgan2cats]

Hi Morgan,

While your approach looks like it got you to the right idea in the end, you may not need to go through all of those steps.

Sometimes it can be helpful to zoom out and think about what the sentence means more generally (in plain English) before we decide whether or not we want to diagram it.

The first sentence is basically saying that "justified" and "irrational behavior" do not go together.

For example, take the following sentence:

"The notion that dogs and cats are the same is incoherent."

What does this mean in plain English? It means that dogs and cats are not the same.

If we wanted to express this with conditional diagramming, it would be:

If dog, not cat.
D -> Not C

And the contrapositive would be:
If cat, not dog
C -> Not D

In the same way, from the first sentence in the stimulus, we can go directly to the diagrams of:

Justified -> Not Irrational
Irrational -> Not Justified

Pure magic! Thanks, Jeff!

[ellieeiff4]

Hi all,

I understand why C is the correct answer (somewhat), but my main concern is how to approach these questions. I get myself confused in the answer choices and often pick the incorrect answer. I chose B for this question (without much of an explanation for why I thought that it was right).

Could someone please assist with helping me "zoom out" on these questions and have a better grasp of understanding argument structure when the wording is confusing? Thank you!

[Jeff Wren]

Hi ellieeiff,

Did you mean to say that you understand why Answer B is correct and that you chose Answer C?

Answer B is the correct answer.

If you haven't done so, already please read Adam's post (Post #8) and Rachael's post (Post #10).

They can be found here:

viewtopic.php?f=596&t=6365

We have a strategy for Parallel Reasoning questions (like this one) called the Test of Abstraction. It involves describing the action of the argument without including the specific details (see Adam's earlier Post #8 for an example). More information on Parallel Reasoning questions including the Test of Abstraction can be found in "The Logical Reasoning Bible" and in any PowerScore LSAT course.

As far as simplifying/making sense of the complex language on the LSAT, that is a skill required throughout the test, both in LR and RC. That is a huge topic that can't really be adequately addressed in a forum answer, but familiarizing yourself with the most common types of logical reasoning used and argument and sentence structures will help with this difficult task. Fortunately, these topics are discussed in detail in the LR and RC Bibles and in any PowerScore LSAT course.